bp cartridge has taken over muzzleloader for me

pete · Post by **pete** » Tue Feb 08, 2005 7:07 pm

Bearbait2; I don't have a flinter. I have a Hawken Shop Hawken .54 percussion slant breech model. It's authentic to the Sam Hawken/ Gemmer era. You make some good points.
Redhawk1; I don't think hunting primitve has to involve primitive clothes. But the guns should reflect 1700's or 1800's era muzzleloaders in form and function. A Thompson Renegade or Hawken reflects form albeit not in the strictest sense and from a functional standpoint they're ok as long as they're used with loose powder and lead balls or mine' style bullets.

buffalocannon · Post by **buffalocannon** » Wed Feb 09, 2005 4:45 pm

I know a guy up north who complains about the guys who hunt during the bow season with compound bows and all the new rigs with the wheels and all. He ONLY hunts with his homemade longbow and homemade arrows. He puts on animal skins during the hunts and always brings home the bacon. I must say that the new bows scare me to death with their power. A friend who is an avid bowhunter has let me shoot at targets with his from time to time. You can shoot these new ones damnnear completely through a tightly wound, three-wire bale of hay. So, in my opinion, even the bowhunters have now got an edge.

Leatherstocking · Post by **Leatherstocking** » Wed Feb 09, 2005 5:13 pm

Bearbait................I really like the Gemmers, seeing my first, that was a trapdoor, way back when, built by "Blue Jacket" Sanders who was a builder back in the old days with Green River Rifle Works. Your's sounds cool!

Buffalocannon

Remember Ben Franklin suggested to the Colonial Congress that the long bow would be a readily available and much cheaper weapon to fight the British, who no longer wore armor and would be sitting targets as the colonial stood back and lobbed arrow after arrow at the rank and file Red Coats at three hundred yard distance........since the Brown Bess was only effective at 75 yards, it made sense! I like the new compounds...pretty neat, but I wouldn't want to hunt with one. Might take one into battle though. We must all confess we are "method" hunters what ever we use.

Be Blessed!
Leatherstocking

8iowa · Post by **8iowa** » Thu Feb 24, 2005 9:53 pm

I recently set up a CVA "muzzleloader" for a friend, and believe me he has to be a very good friend for me to mess with one of those contraptions.

The experience reinforced my belief that hunters are buying these rifles: 1. because they are cheap. 2. they have the general appearance of the rifles that most hunters are accoustomed to.

This appearance is decieving. Once you get past the familiar looking form, the operation of the rifle is quite different from your favorite Remington 700. First of all there is this special tool to remove the breech plug, which in my opinion has a very long - too long - flash hole. You have to remove the breech plug every time you clean the rifle. next, you have to obtain a tube of high tech grease, not included with the rifle, to coat the threads of the breech plug every time you replace it. Then there is a special tool that is necessary to place the 209 shotshell primer in the end of the breech plug, and of course to remove it after firing. This requires a fair amount of dexterity and willl be very hard to do under low light conditions.

The barrel has a 1 in 28 twist, unsuitable for patched round balls. Lead conicals like Lyman's "shocker" can be used, but the rifle is really designed for use with pellets under jacketed bullets in plastic sabots. This type of projectile requires the barrel to be cleaned between shots. Now! Is this beginning to look like a real pain in the ...... or what!

I hunt the muzzleloading season with a 5' long "Kentucky" flintlock. I can easily reload within a minute, and I can reload many times before I have to clean the barrel. My tools are simple, and kept in a traditional leather "possibles" bag slung over my shoulder. My .50 round ball will easily take deer up to 100yards. I have never had so much fun in hunting and I have missed the regular rifle season in Michigan for two years in a row.

As for a special season for black powder cartridges, be careful what you wish for. I can just see plastic stocks, scopes, bolt action rifles, and cases filled with "substitute" powder under bullets in plastic sabots. Ugh!

J. King · Post by **J. King** » Sun Feb 27, 2005 1:26 am

I agree with you guys.

The way I look at it, any chimp in a pair of coveralls can shoot a highpower rifle with a scope.
but it takes alot of pratice and skill to hunt with with a traditional Muzzle loader or BPC rifle.

My father hunted everything with his Parker-Hale volunteer for as long as i can remember.
after so many years of hunting he decided to retire it. now even he has upgraded to a modern "muzzleloader". He doenst use a scope or anything like that but it is a custom built sabot shooting.........thing. it looks like a highpower rifle, shoots like a highpower rifle it mind as well be a high power rifle. Takes the sport and skill out of using an old style gun for hunting.
which is what the Muzzleloader hunt is suppose to be all about.

Beruisis · Post by **Beruisis** » Mon Feb 28, 2005 7:49 pm

Leatherstocking & Bearbait, I'm glad you lined out this redhawk chap....where is he from anyway, New York city? Anyway, your responses were well put.

Redhawk1 · Post by **Redhawk1** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 10:17 pm

[quote="Beruisis"]Leatherstocking & Bearbait, I'm glad you lined out this redhawk chap....where is he from anyway, New York city? Anyway, your responses were well put.[/quote]

Yep, they got me straight. Lined me right out

Well chap I am from Delaware.

Redhawk1 · Post by **Redhawk1** » Sat Mar 12, 2005 10:27 pm

Leatherstocking & Bearbait, very well put replys. I guess my comment was for those the preach what they shoot as if they live the part until it is not longer convenit. No offence to you all.

I like to get close to game when I hunt, that is why I love to bow hunt. Up close and personal. My last deer taken was at 5 yards with my bow.

Leatherstocking · Post by **Leatherstocking** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 12:34 pm

Redhawk,
Your original post was correct in the sense that are quite a few guys who fit the picture you painted....there are alot of folks that don't! I think that perhaps you're pride may be getting the better of you.....your last post, suggesting that your a bit superior in your abilities......I think you might find quite a few guys who have accomplished the same feats.........however, try and not paint with such a broad brush...in the end we all need as many gun collectors, shooters, and hunters...both bow and rifle(Muzzle loaders... modern and traditional, rifle hunters...modern and traditional, bow hunters.....ditto......)....we need to be in the same camp! I've packed a number of the wealthy, in-line, $40,000 S.U.V. hunters into the high country, and though our methods are different...they tended to be pretty good guys and always pro-gun and pro-hunting!
Be Blessed! leatherstocking

pete · Post by **pete** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 1:31 pm

On another note. Modern gun hunting had/has it's gun writers. Bow hunters and muzzleloaders theirs too. I wonder if bp cartridge hunting will ever be adopted by a gun writer/s? I know MLV writes some hunting stuff as does Sam Fadala and Rick Hacker once in awhile but I'm talking about a pretty much full time hunting writer/s for the mainstream mags. Secondly would such a writer/s be good for the sport? I am inclined to think no on both questions if the sport is to be kept traditional.
I don't think there's enough money in it if every new techno gadget can't be incorporated into it which brings me to the second question which is if tradition is thrown out and every gizmo is incorporated then the game would be ruined. What's the thought on that?

BuckeyeShooter · Post by **BuckeyeShooter** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 2:13 pm

Well I've been trying to stay out of this, but I can't take it anymore. First off do really think that most anything we do is truly traditional? Because I'm thinking if you really want trditional with a Sharps you will need to get rid of you bench mounted loading press, your scales, all your grease groove moulds, your electric lead pot, your spotting scope, fancy cleaning rods, your chronograph, your vast supply of different primers to test, the option of what black powder to use (especially if it's imported), etc etc...... So that being said I enjoy the sport immensly and like a lot of the trditional aspects of it but where do you want to draw the line. I have and use an inline muzzleloader to hunt with and wouldn't trade it for a flintlock ever. I do have some percussion muzzleloaders also, but when I'm hunting anymore it's purely a meat gathering hunt and I want to do it and be done with it. If that means shooting a whitetail at 150 yards with my scoped inline then that's all the better to me. I'm getting the impression by some of your comments that I'm some how a poor sportsman because of this and I'm somewhat offended by that. I don't care how you want to hunt and that's your business but to say that if someone is not traditional in their hunting then they are somehow a poor hunter than I think the word elitest comes to mind.

HvyMtl · Post by **HvyMtl** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 9:42 pm

Bunch of girlymen, try jumping on a 10 pt. buck during rutt from a tree limb and killing it with a bowie knife, and oh yeah i'm born and raised in N.Y.C. now living in N.J. To bad we're so far away from each other or you could tell me how you don't like Yankees in person.

Ken

P.S. The buck weighed more than me.

Redhawk1 · Post by **Redhawk1** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 10:16 am

[quote="Leatherstocking"]Redhawk,
I think that perhaps you're pride may be getting the better of you.....your last post, suggesting that your a bit superior in your abilities......I think you might find quite a few guys who have accomplished the same feats.........however, try and not paint with such a broad brush
Be Blessed! leatherstocking[/quote]

That was never my intent, you took it out of content. I was merely commenting that I love to bow hunt. I know a lot of hunter get this close to animals during bow season. I am left here bewildered at your comment.

Leatherstocking · Post by **Leatherstocking** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 12:13 pm

Redhawk, ........and others
Go back and read your post with an open mind..................a writing format such as this allows quite a bit of misunderstanding. If I misunderstood you, please forgive, but if you look at your comments.....it was easy to do!

I too love to bow hunt! I think we all get a bit uppity when we either think our way of doing something is the superior way, or that someone else is not honest in their terminology! I have in fact hunted in soggy moccasins, breechcloth and leggins,trade shirt and a smooth bore trade gun........however I did return eventually to an internal combustion engine driven horseless carriage.................I've also dusted prairi dogs with a car-15 with 4 power scope. Fun, but not primitive!!!!!

This whole disscussion got started when a guy stated that it was a bit disingenuous to state any of us are primitive hunters when we use in-line muzzle loaders, wear camo, and drive $40,000 s.u.v.'s......................that's painting with a rather large brush. Some might think that hunting with an in-line is sorta "girlie". I personally don't care, just don't call it primitive and then debate those of us who do like the old ways and do in fact employ them! For those who think that those who do hunt primitive, are disingenuous because there may be some aspect of our hunt which may include modern convienences ie. cars, loading presses, or pastic gun cases for carrying rifles to the field, I will allow that there are very few on this continent who like Lewis and Clark could argue they did anything, but especially hunting without some 21rst Century convienances.

For the most part, as this original posting stated, my Sharps also has replaced my Leman rifle and my trade gun, as the weapon of choice.......I will say it again, we are all method hunters in one sense or another....that doesn't mean that one method is better than another, however had I been hunting all these years with a 300 Win. mag. with a 4x9 variable scope, I'd have a whole lot more trophies and more meat than the methods I have chosen! There is no ego....for me in the manner I hunt. I'm still a kid at heart and when I'm hunting, the method transports me back to a time when I was playing "Davy Crockett", sculking through the woods looking for indians or critters. The method for me personally is a bit of a handicap...............if I was a serious meat hunter, I'd be using my "Star Trek" laser guided, heat seeking, photon blaster!

No doubt there are guys who get game every year with bows, scopped in-line muzzle loaders, and sharp sticks.....I'm just not one of them, but I do enjoy how I hunt, and in the end isn't that simply a personal decision! Not better, just personal!

Leatherstocking

pete · Post by **pete** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 8:36 pm

Boy this thread has taken a turn. Oh well so be it. Leatherstocking that was well put.
BuckeyeShooter when most of us say traditional I think what we mean is that we are using basically the same type of firearm that was used in the time period we're interested in. There are some things you said that aren't accurate examples include (1). Getting rid of grease groove bullets. Grease groove bullets were used in the 1870's. The military used them and I'm more than sure more than a couple of animals were killed with 'em (Harvested for you proper types

). A hunter named P.C. Bicknell mentions the use of a Maynard shooting a 40 cal-ring ball. He says a patched ball would't lead the barrel when shooting fast.
(2) Stop using imported powder. Hunters in the 1870's used powder that was imported. Curtis & Harvey powder being one.
(3) The use of a bench mounted press, electric pot and modern cleaning rods etc. don't give somebody what would be called a big technological edge when in the field. You're right about the range finder. But it sure wouldn't make a Sharps 45-70 firing blackpowder into a 300 mag.
About the inline issue. You can shoot what ever you want but I don't think it's fair to make an even comparison when it comes to hunting accomplishments of an inline vs. a muzzle loader of older design. I also don't think that animals taken with an inline should be in the same catagory in the record book as ones taken with old time style guns.
I don't think anybody implied you're a poor sportsman.

Shiloh Rifle Forums

bp cartridge has taken over muzzleloader for me

Try a knife !