Hi Folks,

Help a newbie muzzleloader. I just purchased a knight rifle. I see that in the owners manual it states that you can use either two or three Pyrodex pellets. Depending on your preferences for power, recoil tolerance, etc. I am just wanting to hunt Georgia Whitetails (max. 200 lbs.) and to start with I will probably limit myself to 75 yard shots. So your thoughts. Two pellets or three???? Thanks for your input.

I have been shooting a Knight Disc rifle for 5 years and have never had any luck with a 150 gr Pyrodex charge. I use 130 grs Pyrodex pellets and Barnes 250 gr Expanders and would not hesitate to shoot a deer at 200 yards with that load. (I will should prefice my former statement with the fact that I shoot ALOT and practice shooting 200 yards.) I would start out with 100 grs as a starting place and work up. Your choice of bullets might make a difference too. Your best option is to find someone that knows muzzleloading in your area and let them coach you.

Jeff,

Thanks for the feed back. Here in GA, we have a special primitve weapons season (Muzzleloaders and bow only) prior to regular rifle. No scopes or aimpoints allowed. So I am limited to irons. I have only shot the knight about 20 rounds so far and at this point 75 yards is my limit to confidently hit the vitals on a GA deer. But I greatly appreciate your info on loads. Thanks. Hugh

Keep in mind the "NEW" rifle you purchased as far as the load limit. The old "model" Knight MK 85 (I think) was only rated for 100 grains of powder. Just about all the newly produced blackpowder rifles have capabilities of loading 150 grains of blackpowder. Good shooting! Mike

Interesting write up on 50 caliber inline ballistics in the current issue of Shooting Times. Two pellets (~100 gr) starts a sabot'd pistol bullet about as fast as a 44 magnum carbine. Three pellets (~150 gr) doubles the recoil and offers performance closer to that of the 444 Marlin. For deer inside 100 yards give me the lighter kicking carbine sort of load, thank you very much. We cannot use scopes or dotsights during our muzzleloader season either so I've been working with a Williams receiver sight on my Encore 209x50.

Hugh
Which Knight do you have?

Hugh,

Go w/ the two pellet load. Far less recoil and much more accurate in most rifles.

The most accurate bullets I've found for my Knight rifle are the Hdy 250 grn SSTs, they are flat and accurate as well as deadly on deer.

Good Luck

Reloader

Reloader,

Thanks. This was the kind of info I needed. I will try the Hornadys. Hugh

Jeff,

I forget the model name, it is home and I am on the road. It is a Disc with the stainless steel barrel. Hugh

I am a big fan of the Disc rifles, but I am not that fond of the Hornady SST's. I have tried 250 gr and 300 gr bullets, and they are both accurate. I had read rave reviews on message boards and decided to try them this past season. I killed 2 deer and was not impressed with the performance. I have been shooting Barnes 250 gr Expanders for 5 years and never had a deer take a step after being hit. Both deer that I killed this year were under 40 yards and both ran. I will be shooting Expanders again next year. Good luck with your gun.

100 grains of Pyrodex select did the trick this year.

quote:

I am a big fan of the Disc rifles, but I am not that fond of the Hornady SST's. I have tried 250 gr and 300 gr bullets, and they are both accurate. I had read rave reviews on message boards and decided to try them this past season. I killed 2 deer and was not impressed with the performance. I have been shooting Barnes 250 gr Expanders for 5 years and never had a deer take a step after being hit. Both deer that I killed this year were under 40 yards and both ran. I will be shooting Expanders again next year. Good luck with your gun.

Jeff, Yeah, that is sort of strange.

I've only heard rave reviews about them as well. I've been using them for three seasons and they've been the most accurate and the most deadly bullets I've ran through a Mler yet. I've busted some bone w/ them as well as double lunged and they done well. I have had a couple stay in the deer when big bones were hit but, they always were on the opposite side.

Reloader

I really like the Mk 85 I have two Laminated in 50 and 54.

In the 50 I put a 209 conversion kit on it and use the 777 2F at 100 grains with Hornady XTP .452 250 gr or XTP 240 Mag .452 or .452 Speer HP 260 gr in black MMP sabots. This has been my load since 1987.

As others the new SST 250gr should work excellent also.

For your situation I'd try 2x50's no real need for going above 100 grs unless you find better accuracy but using pellets it can get rather costly to find all the variables that may or may not work, plus still be limiting. If the 100grs don't work maybe pick up a can of loose this way you can change in 5 gr increments and the cost is much more appealing to do so. I prefer loose because I have found accuracy loads between the options of a pelletized form, cost effectiveness and I use 777 now in my inlines. With 777 loose powder is 15% hotter than it's pyrodex counterpart but in pelletized it is diluted to be the same...FYI.

As far as bullet I use the SST now but my main reason is for longer range accuracy/ballistic gains. In your case a standard bullet will suffice and probably do just as nicely. I recommend trying the hornady XTP for S&G's, it is a proven game taker. IME it shoots pretty nicely in my Knight and Rem Mler. 240gr XTP has accounted for more game then any others in my case. Best of all it is extremely reasonable to shoot.

BTW the SST hasn't given me any game end issues, 8 deer and counting. However I really don't find it any better in terms of getting the job done than the XTP...just better down range characteristics (100 +).