I made a smoothbore caplock a while back. Posted about the first shots sometine back. Since then I added a Sorbathane pad and sights. Shot it yesterday. Between the pad on the gun and the pad strapped to my shoulder recoil was not a problem. As for accuracy I was really surprized. My load consisted of a pure lead ball, greased ticking patch, and 280 gr. 2-f. Shooting over cross sticks at about 40 yards accuracy was outstanding. The holes all touched. I will try to kill a hog with it at the first oppertunity.

So how where your groups? What range you sighted in for?

Give more info ,, How did the patches look and are you useing an over the powder wad?

I shoot an underhammer 8 bore,but its rifled

Sounds great. I'm still trying to get mine to shoot that consistently. A couple of shots will touch and then one will drop 6" out of the bottom of the group. I have a list of things to try when I get some more time this summer.

The patches look like they could be used again. I did soak them in melted lube. Real goopie. The lube is a home made concoction. Bee's wax base, crisco, olve oil, and some lanolin.

This is not the kind of thing I can shoot a bunch and get a real feel for all the in's and outs. A few observatins I have made so far.

The pressure is super low. Anything that boosts it causes a high shot. The recoil goes up. I assume that means more velocity. One of my initial shots was tried without swabbing the bore between shots. I had to get real agressive on the broom stick to get that ball on the powder. That shot kicked more and impacted high. The shots that all went the same place were pushed down a clean bore. The fit of the ball and patch is such that I can just barely start it with my thumb. No beating is necessary with a starter. If I wack it with a mallet the ball upsets and gets tighter. Since the patches do not show any significant blow by I have a thoery.

The balls are very heavy and made of pure lead. Upon firing the acceleration from the 2-F is probably upsetting the ball to fit tightly and taking up all slop. This must be helping accuracy.

Another observation. Replacing the nipple with one that fires musket caps helped make thing more consistent. With the #11 caps ignition was not 100%. Talk about pucker factor waiting for a hang fire! Anyway, I did nottice more conistent recoil from the musket caps. I only had a bead on it then so I can't comment on accuracy. I would bet I would get vertical stringing with the #11 caps though.

Another possible reason for low and with shots would be where you rest it and how you hold it. The ball is very heavy and has long barrel time. The movement of the barrel before the ball exits will be critical and significant. If you were to hold it differently from shot to shot, or rest the barrel at a different place it would cause vertical stringing.

I don't know how this plays into it but, I have a 34" barrel. I wanted to go as long as possbible. It was originally 44". I could not begin to hold it off hand so I shortened it. The barrel weighs about 14# as is. I digress. Often the barrels on these things are real stubby to allow practical shooting. If your barrel is short you might be having more tendancy for velocity differences shot to shot??

I filed and drifted the sights to hit point of aim at 40 yards. I was not using a wad.

Hope some of that helps. I don't constier a
2"-ish group at 40 yards to be spectacular. A smoothbore shotgun would do that with slugs. I am just real happy it is minuet of hog.

How about posting some pictures?

Hog Killer

try #11 mag cci caps...

2" at 40 is actually better than the AVERAGE shooter can hope for with a 22, standing

jeffe

Accuracy standards for what is basically a smoothbore musket are pretty loose. I will be happy if I can get consistent three shot 4" groups at 50 yards. A shotgun with slugs will be more accurate and is not really a fair comparison (I wish it would shoot that well). I need to try an overpowder wad, switch from T7 to blackpowder and increase my loads more. I have shot fairly light loads most of the time and the chronograph data are very inconsistent. One of the limits on load development is that I can only shoot a dozen or so shots before I start getting a strong desire to lay it down and shoot a 22 lr for the rest of the day.

If your patches have the burnt cross look on them then they are working well,don't boost the powder charge,, I prefer to use a wonder was over the powder,seems to help and tighens the group a tad, smooth bore I mite not swab the bbl in between shots, more likel every 2 or 3

Your groups are not bad at all, my 8 bore is sighted in at 50, and will shoot close to 2" groups, considering the balls are damn near that ,

My load right now is 275 grains of 2F,Elephant
drop tubed, Wonder wad soaked in lube,over powder, .10 cotton tick patch also soaked in lube around the 920 grain ball made of 80% plumbers lead and 20% wheel weights. I use the wingless musket caps,and mine takes 2 of them.

Musket caps are the best for these big boys.Haven't had any luck with number-11's even the newer so called mag ones