Paper patch chamber

[Eric Johanen]

I've been working with a 45-70, 45-90 and a 50-70 all with Shiloh's standard chamber and so far the results are proving promising. Paper is leaving the muzzle in confetti and the bullets are shooting well. I have been following the threads discussing Orville's 7 degree chamber and have two questions (thinking about another 45-90 in a Long Range Express heavy barrel and a 44-77 Hartford heavy barrel) While the standard chamber works well with both paper patched and greased grooved bullets, How does the 7 degree chamber work with grease groove bullets? Second, in one of the recent posts mention was made that that this chamber profile works the brass harder. Just how does it work the brass harder that the standard chamber? In the 45-90 Orville chamber what die set up are you fellow's using to reduce the mouth to fit the tighter chamber mouth? And same question for the 44-77 These Shiloh rifles are really great shooters and I have started shooting Creedmoor matches with the 45-90. I plan on using the 45-70 in competition both Mid and Long range next year and really want to get my paper patch bullets shooting accurately at distance. 50-70 Military rifle and the 44-77 Hartford sporter used for hunting with paper patched bullets.

[Orville]

Eric
A pp bullet with the paper on is bore diameter. The standard chamber being used today allows the chambering of a groove size bullet or larger. Therefor to load a pp bullet in the brass used in a standard chamber the brass must be sized smaller then when loading a gg bullet, working the brass more. The original sharps rifles and thier loading instructions say sizing the brass wasn't needed just clean, recharge the case and load the bullet, the also stated if the bullet fits too loose use the shell reducer (sizing die) this would have been because the wall thickness of brass can vary today and also back then. The 7 degree is an average of the lead at the end of the chamber, I have seen chamber casts from original guns where the lead angle ran from 15 to around 2 degrees. What this shallow angle does is allow the bullet enter the barrel with out stripping lead or paper.
You say you are haveing good luck now with a standard chamber and pp bullet so far you have been lucky and or you have not put the rifle through any extented or fast shooting like the buffalo hunters would have done in a battle with the hostiles.

I have 4 original sharps, a standard hunting rifle, creedmoor, midrange and a business rifle, all have the shallow angle at the end of the chamber, I also have chamber casts from 3 original sharps chambered for the the 45-70 cartridge, and these would allow the use of the standard military load with was a lead bullet, all have the shallow lead at the end of the chamber, approx 7 degrees.

[Eric Johanen]

Thank's for your reply Orville. So far I've been using the paper patched bullets for target shooting and wipeing between shots. The results have been so far very promising. Have not attempted a shot string without either wipeing or using the blow tube. Yes, I do have to neck size my brass and expand with a .450-.452 tapered expander to use the .450 to .452 diameter paper patched bullets. So I am working the brass a bit more that just slip fitting into once fired cases. In the .45 cal's I'm using two BACO molds: a 540 grain .441 dai when patched it goes .449-.450, and a .444 545 grain patched to .451-.452. If using the shallow lead would these diameter bullets work? Or, would they have to be of smaller diameter? A reamer based on your chamber would be much smaller in the neck to allow the paper patched bullets to slip fit the brass and the shallow lead would be ideal for paper patching and would it still allow the use of a grease broove bullet or would it be dedicated to paper patch only? (I'm thinking paper patch only based on the tighter neck dia of the chamber) I'd really like to have a rifle set up to duplicate what the ODG's actually used and get it shooting well. The standard chamber works well for hunting and the target range where only a few shots are fired in the field or where wipeing or blow tubeing are used. Being able to fire a extended string without having to blow or wipe seems to me to be the most practical for really seeing what the rifle is capable of using paper patched bullets and black powder

[Orville]

Eric
IMO the shallower lead will help with gg bullet also, you could check with rdnck who also posts on this forum. I do not shoot any gg bullets in any of my sharps, I may try some in the new 50-70 after I get several hunderd pp bullet through it.

[montana charlie]

would it still allow the use of a grease broove bullet or would it be dedicated to paper patch only?

You could use a grooved bullet, but it would have to be of bore diameter.
That means it would have to be set way out of the case, just like the PP bullets, so it could bump up to seal the bore.

For a PP and GG chamber, try patching to groove diameter in your current rifle. Size a bullet (of any description) down to .452 - .454" and wrap with your paper for a slip fit in an unsized fired case.
You might like the results well enough to go looking for an appropriate mould.

CM

[Eric Johanen]

MC, I did this years ago when I had a early Farmingdale Sharps. With the generous freebore the groove diameter patched bullets worked well. Mine was a 45-120 and loaded with 5 grains of IMR4198 and 105 grains of 1 FG GOEX it did shoot well. With the 45-70 nd 45-90 I do not want to give up any powder capacity by having to seat a groove diameter paper patched bullet deep into the case to use with a standard Shiloh chamber. This is why I'm concentrating on using bore diameter patched bullets. I can seat them very shallow in the case and run 80 grains of powder in the 45-70 and 100 grains in the 45-90. With the 45-90 I'm getting over 1400fps with 535 to 545 grain paper patched bullets and they are stable going though the target nice and round with no evidence of tipping. (My shooting partner who pulled targets for me said they get downrange pretty quick.) This is working for the target range but I'm looking for a chamber that will give me repeated shots without the blow tube or having to wipe between shots. My opinion on groove diameter bullets is to continue using grease grooved bullets. It is much less labor intensive that working with the paper patched bullets and the results are very good out to 1000 yards. The bore diameter paper patched bullet loads are a challenge and it interestes me very much

[montana charlie]

The bore diameter paper patched bullet loads are a challenge and it interestes me very much

Then you would probably be happiest with an Orville-style chamber.
CM

[Don McDowell]

Eric, I'm getting pretty decent results with the 45-70 shiloh chamber , using a .444 creedmoor bullet wrapped in paper mill 9# onionskin (100% cotton). I use remington cases, chamfer the case mouths, and then resizing them in my Lyman 45-70 size die. That dies sizes the cases down so that the patched bullet will just barely slide in, and no crimp is necessary.
I use mostly a .060 fiber wad an1/8 inch lubed felt wad and a .030 fiber wad between 72 grs of 2f ,either goex express or KIK, the bullet is seated a little over .1 into the case.
Shooting 72 grs of KIK 1.5 a .060 fiber wad and the same bullet with the exposed paper wiped with jojoba oil , has shown some promise as being a good target load as well.

[montana charlie]

You could use a grooved bullet, but it would have to be of bore diameter. That means it would have to be set way out of the case, just like the PP bullets, so it could bump up to seal the bore.
CM

CM,
I tried that a while back using the 45-90 PP rifle setup for bore-diameter bullets. The GG bullets were first lubed and then sized-down in two steps; first to 0.454" and finally to 0.450" as learned from the LRML crowd that does it often. The results were abysmal.

I am not surprised. I assumed the reader would decide that it even sounds unworkable.

From my experience so far, a freebored PP chamber gives the best flexibility IMHO.

In my 'standard' chamber I just patch a .454" bullet to groove diameter ... or shoot GG without need for 'dinking around'.
Flexible enough for me ...

CM

[Kurt]

My first reproduction 74 Sharps was a Pedersoli that had a freebore throat like Dan mentioned and it would not shoot a bore riding nosed GG bullet for sour grapes but it would shoot a groove diameter PP bullet very good also a greaser that had no bore riding nose.
Those straight cylinder free bore chambers are something I have never found in any of the original old rifles I had, mostly rolling blocks, and I dont know why Wolfgang ever had his chambers cut like that.

[Eric Johanen]

Kurt, I had two farmingdale Shiloh's back in the 70's and both had the Wolfgang freebore chamber. I think back then shooters were just rediscovering black powder cartridge shooting and did not want to sacrifice any case capacity so the freebore allowed them to seat standard .458 bullets out and retain the case caspacity. They did work if you fooled with them alot but was not the answer for sure! From my experience the current standard Shiloh chamber works for hunting where a few shots are fired with greased bullets and fine on the target range where one can blow tube or wipe between shots and I am also having nice results with a paper patched bullet wiped between shots. I'm now looking for the paper patched chamber that will allow a string of shots whitout having to blow or wipe. Back then i read all the old guy's stuff (Ned Roberts, Walter Cline, Harry Pope and all the origonal stuff I could find) They were convinced that a weak-mild primer was necessary along with a powder that left moist fowling in the bore for best results. Back then we did not have such a powder and most people used a magnum primer or duplex loads to handle the fouling. Now we have better powders Goex express (now gone ) and KIK which are much closer to the old black powder those fellow's were writing about. It seems to me we still did not have the proper chamber to bring out the best untill Orville worked up his design. From what I've been reading, it is now possible to experience these rifles as they were made to be shot and get the best possible results in the hunting fields and on the target range. This is my goal for the next Shiloh order.

[Kurt]

Just look at a .22 rim fire chamber and you will see what the old black powder chambers looked like. The .22 rim fire chamber has not changed over the years and it shoots the lead bullet just great. And if it was practical it would shoot the PP good too.
I have a few rifles with the original chambers one with a 4 degree/1.5 compound that I had a reamer made from a chamber cast of a original 77 Sharps that had a flawless bore. A 5 degree/2.5 in my .44-90 BN and one with Orville's 7 degree, they all shoot the GG and PP anyway you want to load and shoot them, wiping, blowing or just load and shoot.
You can also do this with the chambers and throats now used in the Shiloh Rifles and they work. But I give the edge to the original throat using lubed naked or PP bullets.
Someday they might come out with a cooler primer or smaller flash hole or a Berdan type of flash hole for black powder cartridges.

Kurt