Coning a barrel

[chawbeef]

Would like some advice on this procedure. I plan to take my .50 cal. 1/72 twist barrel to my machinist friend who has never done this before. He would like to know the angle or type of reamer or hone to use and also how far beyond the muzzle. Thanks all in advance................Daniel

 

[coloradoclyde]

Here are some previous discussions, maybe your answer is among them.
http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/223037/

 

[BrownBear]

I have 50, 54, 58 and 62 caliber reamers purchased years ago here on the site, but darned if I know the angle of taper. And geezer memory being what it is, I can't recall who made and sold them either! It's not a whole heck of a lot of taper, ending up with about half an inch of the bore coned.

Purty darned slick for this field shooter and hunter's needs, but I'll leave it to the match shooters and historians to jaw the value or foolishness of coning. My mind is obviously made up. They're my guns after all, and I'm the one shooting them.

 

[Black Hand]

From what I've seen, most of the lands have been reamed away at the muzzle, tapering to nothing within and inch or two.

 

[BrownBear]

...most of the lands have been reamed away at the muzzle, tapering to nothing within and inch or two.

Boy, that's sure a lot longer than mine. Never poked a scope in there, but I'd be surprised if it was as much as an inch.

 

[MSW]

process, but it's really pretty simple ... you put a taper into the muzzle of the barrel by removing the lands of the rifling in the first inch or inch and a half of the barrel.

IF your tool is concentric to the bore, there will probably be no effect on accuracy. All of the tools I have used or seen to do this are a fairly gentle taper, and you put wet/dry sandpaper on the cone with double sided tape and simply hand turn the thing as a mandrel holds it centered in the bore and concentric with the axis. You can go to finer grits of abrasive and end up with a super smooth finish if you like. (I took mine to 1200 grit and stopped there, mainly out of boredom - it loads and shoots with no effort - you can start the ball and patch with thumb pressure.)

There are two types of tool. The first is a caliber specific, made by Joe Woods. Joe is located in Texas, here:

Joe Woods
5311 Briar Street
Amarillo TX 79109
(806) 352-3032

The second is a 'universal' type tool - you can do more than one caliber. A fellow on this site makes them, and much to my chagrin I cannot recall his name. Apologies, unknown tool maker. I'll try to find the contact info... There is a fellow named Ed Hamberg (sp?) 1008 Logan, Alton IL 62002 who also makes this type of tool... to use this one, you put a cleaning jag with a lubed patch on it, and this is what holds the cone in axis with the barrel and the sandpaper cuts the cone. I have never used this type of tool, so I can't attest to its efficacy. I would see no reason that such a tool would be any better or worse (assuming the directions were closely followed) and it would have the advantage of allowing you to cone barrels of different caliber if you were so inclined.

As to the effect on accuracy; I am of two minds. Some barrel makers rant and rail against the process, and say it will ruin your barrel forever, that it's unnecessary, that it will make your hair fall out, your private parts shrivel up, and so on... Other barrel makers say that it probably doesn't hurt. but here's my take on it:

(1) I'm not that great a shot anyway, and I haven't shot for the X-ring in many years, so a minor variation in barrel consistency would show up if I were the shooter ... I'm just not good enough to worry about minute of angle... minute of Bambi?... heck. am I in the right zip code?

and

(2) since I'm not trying to "pot the ace at a mile," whatever makes the shooting more fun, or easier, will probably encourage me to use the rifle more often, thus increasing my trigger time and shrinking the prospective group through the magic of practice... (and WOW - if you could sell the "magic of practice" by the quart, you'd be a zillionaire!)

to do an actual scientific test, you would need a blind random sample, with control groups of more than 32 subjects ... one side coned, one side not coned, with as many variables as possible (weather, shooter error, the phase of the moon, etc.) completely eliminated ... this whole deal would be prohibitively expensive (you would need a sample set of thirty two coned and thirty two unconed barrels, and a boatload of individual shots, and so on, to be 'statistically reliable,' and then you'd have to buy all the powder and shot, and then you'd want to have the barrels shooting as well as you could (think Dutch Soultz' method writ large) and AAAAARRGH!! it makes one's head hurt just thinking about ...

so we default to anecdotal evidence: it works for me, or "I knew a fellow who's girlfriend knew someone who said..."

as for my opinion: go for it.

good luck with your project!

 

[BrownBear]

...you put wet/dry sandpaper on the cone with double sided tape and simply hand turn the thing as a mandrel holds it centered in the bore and concentric with the axis. You can go to finer grits of abrasive and end up with a super smooth finish if you like. (I took mine to 1200 grit and stopped there, mainly out of boredom - it loads and shoots with no effort - you can start the ball and patch with thumb pressure.)

There are two types of tool. The first is a caliber specific, made by Joe Woods. Joe is located in Texas, here:

Joe Woods
5311 Briar Street
Amarillo TX 79109
(806) 352-3032

Thanks for the clarification. I should have been more specific when I said "reamer." That's the process, even if it uses sandpaper. Mine are from Joe, and they're first class. In doing about a dozen of my own guns and even more for friends, none of us have experienced any loss of accuracy that we can spot.

 

[chawbeef]

Here are some previous discussions, maybe your answer is among them.
http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/223037/[/quote]

Thank you Clyde and all others that responded. I will pass this great info on to my Machinist :hatsoff: ................Daniel

 

[wattlebuster]

I have the Joe Woods tools an they work great. I can tell no difference in accuracy.

 

[Richard Allen]

I put over a thousand shots through my Chambers' 50 caliber Lancaster before coning the barrel with Joe Woods' tool.

I kept a log of all my practices and matches before and after coning and didn't find any decrease in accuracy.

I thumb start the ball and load from the pouch and horn with the split hickory rod from the thimbles for several years and seldom open my shooting box or use my range rod until it's time to clean the rifle.

I use Stumpy's Moose Snot to pre-lube my strip of patching and don't wipe between shots unless I stop shooting long enough for the fouling to harden in the barrel.

I mostly shoot woods walks now and don't miss the timed matches at all. Now that I'm closer to seventy than to sixty five I don't feel the urge to shoot in matches all day long.

 

[Coot]

I will put in another plug for the Joe Woods tool. Easy enough to use & by putting a fairly deep coning on my .50 pistol (Jim Chambers kit), it became possible to reload while walking in the woods with no loading stand/bench available. I think maintaining accuracy is dependent on keeping the coning concentric with the bore. The instructions from Joe Woods explain how to keep turning both the barrel and the tool in opposite directions so as to neutralize any tendency to accidentally put more pressure in one area than another.
No regrets on my part.

 

[Onojutta]

MSW, that was a great post.

So, does anyone know if original rifle barrels were coned? I have read time and time again that no one carried a ball starter on the frontier, that PRBs were started by the thumb. Is this because men on the frontier had bigger, stronger, manlier thumbs than us 21st century pogues who feed our families by getting paid to type on computers all day, or is this because they used to cone barrels back in the heyday?

 

[tenngun]

1)yes some guns were coned, a miss understanding of the process led some writers to say the gun was a rifled piece, with a false smooth bore end.
2)Loading with out a starter seems the most common, best guess is the shot a looser patch/ball combo
3) short starters were called loading mallets. They were common on cased pistols. A few iffy discriptions of use are known including clear instuctions from Spain. They suddenly start showing up in loading kits around 1850.
4)Should you show up at a go to a pre 1840 event you may be told they were not in use. Should you go to a juried event, you wont get it passed the jury. Should you be working at an historic demo, loading with out one is best as they do not seem to have been common, and may have never been used on anything bigger then a pistol in America.

 

[Black Hand]

I have read time and time again that no one carried a ball starter on the frontier, that PRBs were started by the thumb. Is this because men on the frontier had bigger, stronger, manlier thumbs than us 21st century pogues who feed our families by getting paid to type on computers all day, or is this because they used to cone barrels back in the heyday?

No - they weren't obsessed with tight loads like today. If it brought down game, it worked. No need for 1/4" differences to hit in the 10X ring. A looser ball & patch combination loads easier and can be very accurate. Coning seems to be a gimmick that makes little difference.

I stopped using a starter quite some time ago - it was unnecessary.

 

[54ball]

The evidence is debatable.

This is one of those things where you have camps and pet theories. Some say that some rifles show evidence of coning. Others say that evidence is simply wear.

My present opinion is that coning if done in the period was very very rare for American longrifles.

The rifles I have seen first hand and the many I have viewed through the years online or in print show no evidence of coning. Many have little or no crown.

As has been said I believe they used thicker patching and smaller shot. The material was different possibly of a courser weave. Think of homespun linen, cotton linen blends, osanbrigs and even buckskin.

In the Tensaw 1813, a woman remembers her father sewing buckskin patches around the shot for his rifle. This was for quick loading. This was the early stages of the Redstick War of 1813-14.

The lube may have been somewhat different as well, mink, hickory nut, bear oil/grease, sperm oil, suet and tallow.

Even the rifling was different. The grooves were sometimes narrow sometimes wide and almost always odd. I cant think of an original barrel cut with even grooves.

In my opinion thin tapered wooden rods(wiping sticks), ballscrew extractors for rifles, worms for smooth bore; tells me that the frontier subsistence loads were somewhat looser and in so being more practical. There was less chance of rod breakage, easier extraction and accuracy that is/was surprisingly good.

Most of the practices of the modern black powder rifle shooter come from the target disciplines of the later 19th and 20th Centuries. IMHO that's very much different than the practices on the frontier.

 

[jerrywh]

I cone every gun I shoot and there are no guns around this part of the country more accurate than mine. If done correctly I believe it can increase accuracy but it depends on the gun and the shooter to some extent. Why. Because if a ball is easier to load it does not get deformed as much when loading. The trick is to make sure the coning is perfectly concentric to the bore. In order to produce this the tool must have a pilot on it that goes down in the bore. All my tools are caliber specific and made of brass. They are nothing more th na long taper that fits the bore and the shaft has a pilot that goes down in the bore about 6". The cone in the barrel only needs to be long enough for a ball to go in. No more than 1/2". I use an electric drill to turn mine. There is no special tapper angle. I would never use a reamer. The riflings are sanded out with emery cloth.
54Ball has a lot of good info. I believe what he says is true. I also believe that they did not use as much powder as most of us do today. Their loads were lighter. As far as the coning on originals I never paid much attention to that. But I do have a question. How much iron can you ware off of a barrel with a greasy rag?

 

[Dr5x]

I have never seen an advantage in coning a barrel which doesn't mean there isn't one..
The one help it might provide is to ensure your patching is well situated around your lead ball, but you can 100% guarantee that by cutting your patching at the (un-coned) muzzle
Then there might be uneven wear of the rifling at the muzzle, Coning might limit or prevent that
OR
it might be a cure for uneven wear of the muzzle rifling caused by injudicious use of a n abrasive ramrod.

When you get those 60 guys to carry out your experiment, please let me know what the results might be.

There is a tendency to keep fussing with a perfectly good rifle in hopes of compensating for some other yet undiscovered shortcomings elsewhere in the loading and even aiming procedures.

U know because I was guilty of a few intellectual goofs back in the olden days (mine).

Dutch

 

[Black Hand]

My opinion is: the greatest limitation of any gun is the shooter...

 

[jerrywh]

I'm 80 years old and been building guns since I was 16. I already did all those experiments dutch is talking about. If you have an accurate gun to start with coning will not help it shoot any better but it will be a little easier to load and if done correctly it will not hurt at all. Also if a bullet is easier to start then it will not be prone to disfigurement. That may help marginally. My 80 year old hands hurt so easier loading is a comfort to me.

 

[Artificer]

I’m with 54Ball that “muzzle coning” was at best extremely rare in the 18th/Early 19th Centuries, if it was done at all.

As other members have mentioned above, when coning a muzzle if you do not have a very precisely made reamer AND a rather precisely made pilot, you cannot help but mess up the bore, rather than doing no damage. Further, because no two barrel bores would have been nearly the same as in modern times, that would have required a LOT more pilots than we need today. So, where is the evidence the average Riflesmith had precision lathes in the 18th/Early 19th Centuries and these tools? The answer is they did not. SOME watchmakers in the period may have been able to have done an OK to respectable job on making those tools, but outside of perhaps some gun shops in Europe, it would have been almost impossible to have found such tools in the average American Riflesmiths' Shops and there are no examples of documentation for such tools, as far as I have ever read. This was precision technology that just did not exist until after the period of most handmade guns in our period.

There are two types of what I will call Muzzle Treatments that we can document in the period. We know gunsmiths filed the barrel muzzle faces as close to perpendicular to the bore as possible. After that it was very common to use some kind of method, normally involving powder abrasives and oil, to take the sharp edges off the end of the bore after the filing was done. This could have involved abrasive impregnated leather being pressed into the muzzle of the bore or other methods. The purpose of this was to take the sharp edges off the very front ends of the lands and grooves ”“ so anything loaded into the barrel would not be cut/shaved. The second treatment involved using hand files to nicely round the front ends of both the lands and grooves of the bore, though this does not seem to have been very common from the surviving specimens. Sometimes this was done rather deeply into the grooves. I have never seen documentation to support this speculation, but I think that was done to ease the patch surrounding the ball into the bore and make it a bit easier to load. Note: This is not a common muzzle treatment today, outside some few folks who do it.

There was Muzzle Wear of the front of the bore of period guns that was done by two things. 1. Wood Ramrods will pick up dust, grit, dirt and sand and these things will act as abrasives to wear out a softer IRON barrel muzzle faster than it will wear a modern steel barrel. So yes, a wood ramrod can and did cause muzzle damage by the fact these abrasives got on and or impregnated into the ramrods. 2. (This one requires additional study than many people usually care to do.) Black Powder mostly burns up within a few inches of the breech in a muzzle loading gun. (This was proven during the Mid 18th century by the British Royal Society or better known as the “Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge,” which was the oldest national organization for the promotion of scientific research in the UK.) Now the GAS that is given off by the burnt powder is what drives the patched ball down the barrel. This gas is flammable, though as the ball travels down the bore, the gas naturally has less pressure and consumes much, if not most of the oxygen from the Saltpetre and the atmosphere in the barrel. HOWEVER, as soon as the PRB clears the muzzle and the Oxygen Rich Atmosphere comes in contact with the hot gas in the bore, there is a FIREBALL that occurs as the remaining gas is superheated and ignited. That fireball is what burns/wears out muzzles and especially the muzzles of the softer Iron barrels they used in the period. So of course there are scientific reasons that Iron barrel guns that got shot a lot, even when using Wood Ramrods, would show noticeable bore wear at the muzzle.

Finally no one knows IF they would have used tighter fitting balls and patches as we do today, because they were JUST NOT AVAILABLE back in the period. Once again, it required technology they just did not have in the period to: 1. Accurately measure the bore size in decimals, 2. Accurately measure and make molds that cast balls as uniformly round and close to bore size as we can today and 3. Accurately measure and make cloth that is as uniform as it is today.

Gus