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24 and 28 Ga Smothbore Performance

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Would seem that back in the day the 28 and 24 Ga were the most used hunting smoothbores both for Settlers and Indians. Based on balls sold and Hunting guns delivered. I was wandering if anyone has built either a Trade Gun, Fowler or TULLE fusil-de-chasse in either of these gauges? If so how did they perform with shot and round ball? I have a 20 Ga TULLE fusil-de-chasse and love it. I am thinking of building one of these small gauge guns and am in the process of doing a little research.

Thanks in advance for any and all info,
Ferret Master
 
The most frequently photographed French smooth bored guns in Kevin Gladysz's book seem to be about modern .62/20 ga. Also Russel Bouchard in his book on the guns made in Tulle France says that guns of similar caliber were popular among civilian hunters. A few however, were larger.

Similarly, Hanson in The North West Gun says that the Hudson Bay Co. typically sold 24 ga. guns.
 
Would seem that back in the day the 28 and 24 Ga were the most used hunting smoothbores both for Settlers and Indians. Based on balls sold and Hunting guns delivered. I was wandering if anyone has built either a Trade Gun, Fowler or TULLE fusil-de-chasse in either of these gauges? If so how did they perform with shot and round ball? I have a 20 Ga TULLE fusil-de-chasse and love it. I am thinking of building one of these small gauge guns and am in the process of doing a little research.

Thanks in advance for any and all info,
Ferret Master
I have a 28 gauge, or roughly 0.54 “ caliber fowler type gun. Shoots great with patched ball, using quite a heavy charge. Not used it with shot.
 
I have a North Star West Northwest gun in 20 gauge, and a Caywood Northwest gun in 24 gauge. So far, I have only shot these with ball, and I won't comment on performance because I'm a lousy shot on the best of days! I will say both of these have plain, drilled touch holes and they are both fast and reliable with regard to ignition. I think touch hole liners are over rated, but that's a topic for another discussion.

Just to review, here is a very limited list of ball/bore gauges:
20 gauge = 0.615" (350 gr)
22 gauge = 0.596" (318.18 gr)
24 gauge = 0.579" (291.67 gr)
26 gauge = 0.564" (269.23 gr)
28 gauge = 0.550" (250 gr)
30 gauge = 0.538" (233.33 gr)
32 gauge = 0.526" (218.75 gr)

Note that a lot of people, including gunmakers, consider .54 caliber equivalent to 28 gauge. It isn't.

Most of the references on Northwest guns will tell you they were typically 24 gauge, but Henry Leman made a limited run of them in much larger caliber, and some guns are known to be as small as .56. Caspar Whitney mentioned "30 bore" trade guns in the Canadian northwest in the 1890's, and an article about the Hudson's Bay Company in the MOFT Quarterly a few years ago described the typical trade gun as "20 gauge." In Guns on the Early Frontiers, Carl Russell mentioned a Whatley gun, in which the "...bore is 9/16 inch, or about .69 caliber," which is a wildly inconsistent comparison (9/16 inch is 0.5625"), which points up the importance of finding more than one reference to corroborate this sort of detail. The best systematic study of existing Northwest guns (that I know of) is Ryan Gale's For Trade and Treaty. Most of the Northwest guns in that book run around .60 caliber, so although they may be described as 24 gauge, they are actually closer to 22 gauge.

Balls are another matter. The difference between ball diameter and bore diameter is termed "windage," and back in the day, many people were happy to shoot balls we would consider grossly undersized. Based on the research I have done, I'm convinced the "half ounce trade ball" that you see mentioned occasionally in the literature of the time was actually 28 gauge, or .550". In his article on smoothbores in The Book of Buckskinning IV, Charles Hanson indicated the Hudson's Bay Company posts normally stocked balls of 30 gauge (0.538") and 28 gauge (0.550"), and in The Northwest Gun, the same author said James Willard Schultz (an old HBC trader with the Blackfeet) told him the trade gun "...balls were thirty to the pound."

I have Bouchard's book about French trade guns, but I don't have the Gladysz book, and I don't feel qualified to say much about the French guns... other than to say I would love to have one!

Anyway, if you are interested in performance, I think our expectations may be different now than they were among the original trade gun owners. A ball .050" undersized, wadded with a ball of shredded bark, might perform differently than a ball .010" undersized with a snug-fitting patch. I think it's fair to say, though, that these guns did the job they were designed to do.

Best regards,

Notchy Bob
 
Atta-boy, Notchy. Good to see someone actually reading books and articles rather than just relying on the internet.

Would seem that back in the day the 28 and 24 Ga were the most used hunting smoothbores both for Settlers and Indians.

Ferret Master, some of the mid-20th century gun writers and historians did our hobby a great disservice with their mixing of antique and modern terms. Prior to the middle of the 19th century, the common way of referring to a gun's size was in the number of balls to the pound that it shot. In period documents this was often written as "28 to the pound" for English guns or "28 to the livre" for French guns. The livre being the French unit for weight. Modern gun writers tired of writing out "to the pound" and chose to use the modern term "gauge" instead.

The table that Notchy Bob shows above is correct for the bore ID of a modern shotgun. It is also correct for the OD of a lead round ball, the number of which would weigh a pound. But a gun that would shoot a ball 28 to the pound does not have the same bore ID as a 28 gauge shotgun since that would mean the ball OD would be the same as the bore ID. That would be very difficult to load in a muzzleloader, especially with a patch and after the barrel accumulates some fouling. There needs to be some space for the patching and the buildup of fouling. As Notchy Bob said, "The difference between ball diameter and bore diameter is termed 'windage'."

I've read several writers quote a period document that should say "28 balls to the pound" with "28 gauge". From Notchy's table above, a ball 28 to the pound would have an OD of 0.550", and add to this a windage of approximately 0.03", you have a gun with a bore of 0.58". A modern 28 gauge shotgun has a bore of 0.550". See the confusion. A modern barrel of 24 gauge (0.579") is closest to a gun that carries 28 to the pound (0.550"), assuming a windage of just under 0.03".

In the day, smooth bores tended to have more windage than rifles. A smoothbore musket could have windage around 0.05" while trade guns seem to have windage more on the order of 0.03". The windage for rifles back then was closer to 0.01", similar to today. Of course, manufacturing tolerances back then weren't as tight as they are now, so balls-to-the-pound and windage were nominal figures.

Balls to the Pound Equivalents to Modern Shotgun Gauges for Smoothbores
24 bttp
= 0.579" + .03" windage = 0.61" bore or close to modern 20 gauge
28 bttp
= 0.550" + .03" windage = 0.58" bore or close to modern 24 gauge
32 bttp
= 0.526" + .03" windage = 0.56" bore or close to modern 28 gauge

Balls to the Pound Equivalents to Modern Calibers for Rifles
32 bttp
= 0.526" + .01" windage = 0.54" bore or close to modern .54 caliber
40 bttp
= 0.488" + .01" windage = 0.50" bore or close to modern .50 caliber
60 bttp
= 0.427" + .01" windage = 0.44" bore or close to modern .44 caliber

The best systematic study of existing Northwest guns (that I know of) is Ryan Gale's For Trade and Treaty. Most of the Northwest guns in that book run around .60 caliber, so although they may be described as 24 gauge, they are actually closer to 22 gauge.

Notchy is correct regards to modern shotgun gauge, but in 1855, the British government required the bore size in balls-to-the-pound be stamped on the barrel along with the proof marks. If you look at the guns starting on pages 41 and 47 in Gale's For Trade and Treaty, they are dated after 1855 and have "24" stamped on their barrels. Gale lists their bores just below and just above 0.60". These nominal 24 ball-to-the-pound guns are equivalent to a modern 20 gauge once you allow for windage. Starting on page 53 of the same book is a double gun dated 1904 that is stamped "27" while the bore size is given as 0.568". Apparently by this late date, manufacturing tolerances were tighter and the windage was considered to be closer to 0.01" since a ball 27 to the pound has an OD of 0.557".
 
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Phil,

Thanks for all of that!

The bore gauge chart that I use was developed by my brother. Some time around 1980, I was seeing references to "balls to the pound." I found several charts in various books, but there were some discrepancies between them. I mentioned this to my brother, who had a degree in mathematics and was working as a computer programmer and analyst at the time. He developed an equation, based somehow on the specific gravity of lead and the volume of a sphere, programmed a computer to crunch the numbers, and produced a chart for me that has every gauge from 1 to 200, with ball diameter in inches and weight in grains. It has been a very handy reference.

Notchy Bob
 
I have used a 28 ga. flint fowler for some time. It does well with ball and shot. Several years ago I took it to the June nationals at Friendship. At 10 yard trap using a square load, 3/4 of an ounce of shot, I got eight clay birds out of 15. I was content with that.
 
I made a .54 smooth rifle it’s called a 28 gage but I shoot a 220 grain ball so I call it a 32.
I’ve not hunted with it yet but it shoots well to fifty yards.
min pretty sure a .526 ball on top of 70 grains 3f should make Bambi french.
 
I have used a 28 gauge shotgun for over forty years on rabbits. I shoot a light 20 gauge charge: 55 grain FF under 3/4 ounce of shot. It is good up to 35 yards on cottontails. or barn pigeons.
 
Would seem that back in the day the 28 and 24 Ga were the most used hunting smoothbores both for Settlers and Indians. Based on balls sold and Hunting guns delivered. I was wandering if anyone has built either a Trade Gun, Fowler or TULLE fusil-de-chasse in either of these gauges? If so how did they perform with shot and round ball? I have a 20 Ga TULLE fusil-de-chasse and love it. I am thinking of building one of these small gauge guns and am in the process of doing a little research.

Thanks in advance for any and all info,
Ferret Master

I built a Sitting Fox kit, a "smooth rifle" in the Virginia style. It is a flintlock, 28 ga. It took a bit of experimentation and load testing, but it shoots shot or ball very well. I use a load combination of wad, card and wrapped shot to adjust my pattern tightness.
For example, for turkey, 75grs. of FFFG, over powder card, 1/2 inch fiber wad, 1 oz. of shot wrapped in butcher paper, and an over-shot card. Out to 25 yards it does very well with #5 lead shot. When I shoot upland game, I wrap less shot in newspaper, back off on the powder, and the patterns open up. Patched ball is dead on at 50 yards.

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Those paper shot cartridges look a lot like the ones I use. Mine are made from three thickness of newspaper folded over on one end which serves as an over shot Card.. I also make a wax paper cartridge for the powder.. I load: one ripped open powder cartridge,one leather over powder wad, then the shot cartridge folded end out.
 
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