The firearm thread

[wbks]

What kind of money would you guys expect people to pay for that savage?

[Indiana_Jones]

Indy (or anyone else with a lee breech lock): Can you give me rough measurements on the diameter of the mounting holes and their spacing on the bench for the Breech Lock press?

Only just read this now, been moving all weekend.

My lock is at my folks place for the moment, will try to remember to get that measurement for you next time I'm over there

-Indy

[jono035]

Only just read this now, been moving all weekend.

My lock is at my folks place for the moment, will try to remember to get that measurement for you next time I'm over there

-Indy

Don't worry about it mate, the damn thing should be here by tomorrow so I can get cracking with it then. Thanks anyway. Hope the moving went well...

[Indiana_Jones]

Don't worry about it mate, the damn thing should be here by tomorrow so I can get cracking with it then. Thanks anyway. Hope the moving went well...

It went ok. Tired though.

Must remember to ring the cop shop tomorrow regarding my new addy

-Indy

[Drunken Monkey]

Hey Indy,

I went in last time but there is actually an online form you can use:
http://www.police.govt.nz/faq/items/15278

A.

[Indiana_Jones]

Hey Indy,

I went in last time but there is actually an online form you can use:
http://www.police.govt.nz/faq/items/15278

A.

cheers mate, now that i think about it, i think i did do it online last time, can't remember 100% now.

I prefer to call, guess i'm old fashioned lol

-Indy

[Mr Merde]

Yesterday I took the rifle over to my range to try her out.

Set the sights for 100 yards and squared up on an estate agents sign at the base of the cliff.

Pulled the trigger and shit myself. The steel butt plate slammed into my shoulder, even though I was holding it tightly in. The rifle leaped a little but the recoil was something fierce.

Massive cloud of skoke drifting accross the firing point.

Settled down and fired another 4 shots. Shoulder aching by now. Took a breather. Looked down the spotting scope. No sign of any hits on the target. Another 5 shots, no holes apparent on the target. Walked to the target and there were 4 holes, 2 of which were perfect keyholes.

Back to the firing point and had someone stand behind me spotting for fall of shot. Took another 10 shots and realised that it was shooting low.

Adjusted the sights in incriments and finally when shooting at a 30 cm square target using a 6 o'clock hold it was hitting at 4 o'clock about 3 inches low. If I had not used the 6 o'clock hold it would have been on target. The setting on my sights to hit the target at the base of the cliff, on my range, 200 yards.

So it looks like my range is more like 175 -180 metres not the 100-125 I first guessed at.

10 more shots and all of them into a 30cm square target at 200 yards. This is accurate for a BP rifle. 1 MOA approx.

Next the hard shot.

Tin cans at 200 yards. Took 3 shots but did that can jump. 535 gns of soft lead hitting at 1400 fps is a lot of energy. Not a lot left of the can afterwards.

So after 50 rounds of 45-70 I called it a day.

My conclusions for the day.

Old rifles in good condition are accurate.

I need to play around with the load so as to reduce the felt recoil and possibly stopp some rounds keyholing.

I love 45-70

I love black powder.

I cant wait to try this rifle over 500 yards plus.

My shoulder bloody hurts, but it was worth it.

Chris

[Wolf]

sounds like a great day, Chris. What does it mean when the rounds keyhole like that?

[jono035]

Sounds like a pretty good result and a good quantity of smoke and noise!

535 grain projectile at 1400fps works out at 3kJ which is around about .308 energy isn't it? The .308 bullets weigh about 1/4 as much though, of course!

Any further plans on using that little valley around the corner?

[Mr Merde]

sounds like a great day, Chris. What does it mean when the rounds keyhole like that?

Could be too much powder upsetting the bullet, could be the base of the bullet was knicked so the propellant gases leaked via a point and upset the bullet in the barrel. Too much lube, to heavy a compression of the bp, etc.

As you can see there are a lot of variables. I am going to have to play around with the loading of the round to see which one or ones will correct this.

I know that the cadet version of the rifle (I have the cadet) had the sights registered for the carbine load which was a 405 gn projectile over 55 gns of ffg bp. I loaded mine with the rifle load of a 500 gn + projectile over 64 gns of ffg.

What I will do first is drop the powder down to about 50-55 gns and check what sort of compression I get with that load and bullet. If needs be I will have to get another mould to throw a 405 gn head.

I need to do some prep on the cases. ie expand the flash hole to .9 mm, this allows more flame from the primer to act upon more powder.

I'll work on it till the bullets are making nice neat holes on the target then start moving out to 3, 4 , 5, 6, 7 and 800 yards.

These BP rifles can be temperamental and it is a matter of patiently experimenting to find the right load for each distance.

Most of the fun.

Chris

[jono035]

Could be too much powder upsetting the bullet, could be the base of the bullet was knicked so the propellant gases leaked via a point and upset the bullet in the barrel. Too much lube, to heavy a compression of the bp, etc.

Could it be anything to do with the bullet spin? I've heard people talking about keyholing issues with bullets that didn't get enough spin due to either being too slow out of the barrel. With cast lead I think there were also issues with combinations of shallow rifling, soft lead, undersized and heavy bullets that could result in the outside of the bullet being stripped away rather than spinning up the bullet. This could be more to do with modern barrels designed for jacketed bullets being used with cast lead though, I don't have any idea myself.

[Mr Merde]

Could it be anything to do with the bullet spin? I've heard people talking about keyholing issues with bullets that didn't get enough spin due to either being too slow out of the barrel. With cast lead I think there were also issues with combinations of shallow rifling, soft lead, undersized and heavy bullets that could result in the outside of the bullet being stripped away rather than spinning up the bullet. This could be more to do with modern barrels designed for jacketed bullets being used with cast lead though, I don't have any idea myself.

Lead should be cast with tin to the ratio of about 20:1 lead\tin
The tin helps it make nice crisp casts from the mould and the softness of the lead allows the bullet to upset to fill the grooves.

I think it is going to be more to do with powder and bullet weight.

It only has a 29 1/2 inch barrel.

As said it means i am going to have to do a lot of experimentation to find the ideal round.

The cadet has ther same number of grooves and lands with the same twist as the full length rifle, and that will stabilise a 500 gn bullet. So I dont think it is the bullet's weight. The mould I have throws a bore riding bullet, it may be this. I need to get some friends with different 45-70 moulds to cast me 20 odd projectiles each so that I can test fire them.

After 50 roundsa of this you know you have been shooting.

Need to build a set of shooting sticks to rest the barrel on. eliminate as much human error as possible.

[Wolf]

Sounds like a lot of fun, experimenting with different loads and projectiles.

Keep us up to date with what you've found.

[jono035]

Went and collected the rest of the reloading gear today and then spent the morning bolting it down to the bench.

Had a bit of a play with the powder measure... Testing it at 3.4 grains it was consistently throwing 3.4-3.5 9 times out of 10 with 1 that was 3.7... Looks good providing I'm more careful if I'm loading up to max loads, but I'm not really fussed about getting the biggest bang possible.

Got all the dies set correctly and after a bit of faffing about to try get a correct over-all length for the truncated cone bullets that I bought I loaded up a box of ammo.

Min load was 3.2 grains of AP70, max was 4.2 so I started at the minimum and loaded 10 rounds each in 0.2 grain steps up until I got to the max (which I threw at 4.0 and then manually added powder to 4.2).

Took the bike out to the range a couple of hours ago and roared through them all.

The 3.2 and 3.4 grain loads had virtually no recoil, produced a lot of smoke and barely ejected the (very sooty) cases. The 3.6 and 3.8 were ok but the 4.0 and 4.2s were more like the factory loads I'd been firing. I didn't see any pressure signs at 4.2 grains but then again I've only read about them so not 100% I could spot them anyway.

Going to clean the barrel after dinner and see how much work it takes to get shiny as it looks a little bit dark at the moment, hopefully not too much work...

All in all a very enjoyable experience, probably took me about 3 hours to get things set and to load 60 rounds (with another 40 sized and primed).

Edit: Just wandered out to the shed and put together 200 more rounds, took about 3 hours.

[JDK]

Jono035
whats that in ?? i used to use AP70 in my 45 colts found the same thing sooty cases with lighter loads went to AP 50 and cleaned them up a bit
now useing trailboss or BP found the trail boss a tad snappy but cleaner burning ..
Mr Merde
good to hear ya got the 45/70 going i have a few 535gr's to load up for my rolling block the ones i tryed worked OK just need to get my good eyes on for getting more distance (HAHA no not from that for the reson for going blind ) have to check up where my blacks gone too come to think of it found some ffG goex works a tad better than the chinaman stuff ..
catch ya
JDK