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Cap and Ball at 450 Meters

1K views 15 replies 12 participants last post by  northmn 
#1 ·
 
#9 ·
I think this is his Whitworth hexagonal bore military target rifle. The bullets are cast in a hexagon, and fit the barrel closely. If you look, he doesn't use a cloth wad when seating the bullet., he only lubes it with his fingers. Whitworth rifles set World records back then at distances to 1000 yards.
 
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#10 ·
Not only were Whitworths quite capable, so were the P58 Enfields. In fact, anyone using a P58 had 10% of their score deducted to make it "fair" to the other competitors. I shoot a first gen Parker Hale P58 in musket competition and it is a sub 2moa rifle with minie balls.

Now PRB, Patched Round Ball, the load and type of muzzleloader that most are familiar with suffer at distance. The drag on a round ball is huge and past about 100yd it gets sketchy fast. The Minie bullet design of Civil War fame and Whitworth "bolt" design were the last word in muzzleloader tech before cartridge guns started taking over. Lots of folks think a muzzleloader or black powder gun can't be accurate but that's so far from the truth as to be laughable. A properly set up gun (just like modern ones) in the right hands (just like today) can be scary accurate just like today. What a modern gun does for the shooter is it enables the shooter to be able to be more accurate at distance by reason of the advanced technology taking out a large part of the shooter skill. To be fair, a black powder gun is unforgiving in poor technique. A modern gun, by virtue of how it functions, is much more forgiving.

There is another technique used in black powder that modern shooters know almost nothing about and that is paper patched bullets. The bullet is wrapped in paper and then loaded into the cartridge. In the P58, it used a version of paper patching and that technique survived through much of the black powder cartridge era. Many new shooters today have no clue how to make it work, but guys who shoot the Quigley Match in Montanna are intimately familiar with it.
 
#13 ·
Here's a shot of the .451" Whitworth bore and bullet. I'm pretty sure this is the rifle he used in the 450 meter shots. Check out his channel on YouTube, it's a great source of black powder knowledge.

Gun Revolver Shooting sport Shotgun Shooting
Finger Tire Hand Thumb Auto part
The Confederates bought Whitworth rifles from the British, and were pretty successful at sniping Union Officers.
 
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#14 ·
Their were a lot of long range BP muzzle loading rifles made. When the US was invited to the Wimbleton to compete against an Irish team they brought Sharps Breech loaders but the Irish used muzzle loaders. Muzzle loaders were considered more accurate at the time. 1000 yard match. The US won but mainly because one of the other team shot the wrong target. It was a very close match. Pedersoli made a copy of the Gibbs rifle, which was used back then also. The common loads were about 70 grains of good BP under a 480 grain 45 cal bullet. At one time I thought about making up a similar rifle out of a 45-70 barrel blank. I hate the "modern" muzzle loaders and thought it would feel good to make one of these up and show some folks what a real rifle could do. Some used paper patching instead of a bare bullet. It loaded easier and was also very accurate. The would cut the paper into a cross which met when seating the bullet and would for a better seat than just a round piece cut like you would see on a round ball. The patch was not wrapped around the bullet as in a breech loader. Some Schuetzen shooters were known to load a cartridge full of powder and muzzle load the bullet. These rifles had false muzzles to avoid barrel wear and start the bullet properly.

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