- Joined
- Mar 20, 2023
- Messages
- 35
- Reaction score
- 68
Oh what a happy day!
So, I have been casting bullets of the REAL flavor, 320gr variety with some home-brew lead alloy. I use candle wax and lard as lube. My smoke pole is a TC Black Diamond. It was neglected for over 15 years (sat and rusted inside out) but not horrible bad. My accuracy was touch and go the last few shooting sessions at 50 yards or so. My bullets are far from perfect resulting from my far from perfect casting process but for now, as long as the rifle band is perfect it goes into my target shooting lot. The best bullets are for final tweaking and hunting. I had a few keyholes from bullets that were just shy of getting culled.
You see I have been shooting 15 year old powder this whole time. I had a few hang fires here and there. When I went to clean after my shooting session, my breech plug and nipple were quite dirty. All the above was kind of expected by me in a perfect world of shooting pyro. The other day I dropped my last two pellets of 15 year old powder.
I have a brand new box of pryro, 50/50 ready!
I shot that rifle and instantly felt the difference 15 years makes. 100gr of pyro and 320gr of bullet lets you know you shot something. To be honest a 12 ga kicks harder but I"m old and I like to exaggerate. It definitely kicked harder with fresh powder!
My groups tightened up to the point I can hit a coffee can every time even with less than perfect bullets at 50yds. This is plenty accurate enough to kill what I need to at that distance. I'm yet to shoot my hand picked bullets to see if I can get much better accuracy but really that is good enough for me! At cleaning time my breech plug was almost good to go. Very little residue and just needed a small scrub and wipe with damp cloth and it was clean. NO LIE! The nipple also was near perfect with a wire "cleanout tool" removing nothing. Perfectly clear only needing a small scrape at the end near the powder. Is pryodex not so dirty anymore? The barrel was another story. Bore cleaner made like black stinky soup. It took nearly two rags cut into strips and passed down the bore before anything came back clean. I then lightly oiled up a cloth and gave the gun a lite oil coat to prevent rust for a while. (Hope this is good to do.. its just my process)
I know some of you folks wouldn't settle for my accuracy results. Maybe you shoot far longer distances. I know my rifle is capable of much better performance which It has shown me using 45cal sabots. I'm set up with powder, bullets, caps and lube. I have enough "ammo" and possibles right now that I estimate I will be able feed my family for the next 10 years minimum if need be. I'm a happy fellow. I just had to share. Hope you each have a blessed and wonderful day. (Hope you like RED lol)
So, I have been casting bullets of the REAL flavor, 320gr variety with some home-brew lead alloy. I use candle wax and lard as lube. My smoke pole is a TC Black Diamond. It was neglected for over 15 years (sat and rusted inside out) but not horrible bad. My accuracy was touch and go the last few shooting sessions at 50 yards or so. My bullets are far from perfect resulting from my far from perfect casting process but for now, as long as the rifle band is perfect it goes into my target shooting lot. The best bullets are for final tweaking and hunting. I had a few keyholes from bullets that were just shy of getting culled.
You see I have been shooting 15 year old powder this whole time. I had a few hang fires here and there. When I went to clean after my shooting session, my breech plug and nipple were quite dirty. All the above was kind of expected by me in a perfect world of shooting pyro. The other day I dropped my last two pellets of 15 year old powder.
I have a brand new box of pryro, 50/50 ready!
I shot that rifle and instantly felt the difference 15 years makes. 100gr of pyro and 320gr of bullet lets you know you shot something. To be honest a 12 ga kicks harder but I"m old and I like to exaggerate. It definitely kicked harder with fresh powder!
My groups tightened up to the point I can hit a coffee can every time even with less than perfect bullets at 50yds. This is plenty accurate enough to kill what I need to at that distance. I'm yet to shoot my hand picked bullets to see if I can get much better accuracy but really that is good enough for me! At cleaning time my breech plug was almost good to go. Very little residue and just needed a small scrub and wipe with damp cloth and it was clean. NO LIE! The nipple also was near perfect with a wire "cleanout tool" removing nothing. Perfectly clear only needing a small scrape at the end near the powder. Is pryodex not so dirty anymore? The barrel was another story. Bore cleaner made like black stinky soup. It took nearly two rags cut into strips and passed down the bore before anything came back clean. I then lightly oiled up a cloth and gave the gun a lite oil coat to prevent rust for a while. (Hope this is good to do.. its just my process)
I know some of you folks wouldn't settle for my accuracy results. Maybe you shoot far longer distances. I know my rifle is capable of much better performance which It has shown me using 45cal sabots. I'm set up with powder, bullets, caps and lube. I have enough "ammo" and possibles right now that I estimate I will be able feed my family for the next 10 years minimum if need be. I'm a happy fellow. I just had to share. Hope you each have a blessed and wonderful day. (Hope you like RED lol)
