Dialing in the proper Minie . . .

Gregory Mitchell · Jan 2, 2020

(Disclosure: I have read the recent thread about "wild inaccuracy" from a '53 Enfield, but still wanted to present my own situation in this thread).

I've got my new Pedersoli P53 (3-band) Enfield and I love it. But my first outing with it, using my own home-cast projectiles, shows I have some work to do. The bore of my Enfield will accept a .578 pin gauge but not a .580 -- so it would appear the land diameter is closest to .579. I tried bullets from three moulds, at 55 yds. with 55 grains of Triple 7 2F: 1) Lee "old style" Minie with thin skirt, 2) Lee "REAL" bullet, and 3) Lee "Improved Minie" with much thicker skirt. The first two miked at .575 average with the "improved" Minies miking at about .576-.577. I dip lubed them in SPG.

Only the old-style Minie showed any promise at all -- but even those distributed out to an 8-10" group with some wild fliers (and remember this was at 55 yds.) I couldn't even keep the modern Minies on the paper and the REAL bullets weren't much better. I was shooting from a solid bench rest.

So from TOTW I have ordered some of their Minies called "Enfield" style -- nominally a .577 dia. bullet. I'm going to try those next. Does anybody have any additional suggestions for getting to the proper bullet for my Enfield? Where do we go about getting sizers for the Minie bullets cast at home? I can't find a source for the excellent Pedersoli sizer anywhere. The only Minie sizers I've found are from DGW that are held in a vice and you drive the bullet through with a wooden dowel.

I'm open to all suggestions for getting acceptable accuracy out of this rifle. From everything I've read on here, these Pedersoli Enfields should be capable of holding 3-4" at 100 yds with the proper Minies.

Thanks all!

bang · Jan 2, 2020

55gs sound a bit light. Generally 60-70 will get performance. Most all 58cal military use rifles I've read about call out 60gs to be military load.
My Zouave bore is a bit undersized. My own cast .578 mini would go but was a PITA to get started. The .575 is a mild thumb pressure start to near muzzle level and easy ram. At 68gs fff I've been able to keep them within a paper plate at 50 yards but think due to the thick skirt I'll try 75gs and see how they perform.

Gregory Mitchell · Jan 2, 2020

bang said:
55gs sound a bit light. Generally 60-70 will get performance. Most all 58cal military use rifles I've read about call out 60gs to be military load.
My Zouave bore is a bit undersized. My own cast .578 mini would go but was a PITA to get started. The .575 is a mild thumb pressure start to near muzzle level and easy ram. At 68gs fff I've been able to keep them within a paper plate at 50 yards but think due to the thick skirt I'll try 75gs and see how they perform.

I was going to start with 60 gns, but T7 is quite a bit hotter than BP so I dropped it back a bit. Will bump up to 60 when I get the TOTW Minies to try, but also try a few with my first loading of 55. Thanks.

Road_Clam · Jan 2, 2020

I recently purchased a Pedersoli 1858 Enfield. I do cnc machining by trade and have access to gauge pins. After carefull pinning of my bore i'm at .5785 . While im not quite tooled up to cast , i am working on it. I bought a threaded .577 sizer, and am researching moulds. I have been shooting .577 465 gr Minie balls and with 60 gr of Goex 2F they are showing good consistience. Problem is my Enfield is shooting about 13" high at 50 yds. So im trying to learn how to use the rear sight leaf.

Dphar1950 · Jan 2, 2020

You need to find some real BP. T7 is not intended for sidelock guns, its best with a shotgun primer in an inline. Pyrodex will rot the bore in ways few can comprehend. So find some BP. Its what the rifle and the bullet are designed for.

Dphar1950 · Jan 2, 2020

Road_Clam said:
I recently purchased a Pedersoli 1858 Enfield. I do cnc machining by trade and have access to gauge pins. After carefull pinning of my bore i'm at .5785 . While im not quite tooled up to cast , i am working on it. I bought a threaded .577 sizer, and am researching moulds. I have been shooting .577 465 gr Minie balls and with 60 gr of Goex 2F they are showing good consistience. Problem is my Enfield is shooting about 13" high at 50 yds. So im trying to learn how to use the rear sight leaf.

Its a military rifle. The original velocity was about like a 45 ACP +P load 1000 fps maybe less so its sighted for best mid range trajectory to stay on a standing human to as far as possible with the lowest sight used. So 13" with center of mass hold will be on some part of a human to 100 yards or a little more. If you want it dead on at 50 you need a taller front sight.

Gregory Mitchell · Jan 2, 2020

Road_Clam said:
I recently purchased a Pedersoli 1858 Enfield. I do cnc machining by trade and have access to gauge pins. After carefull pinning of my bore i'm at .5785 . While im not quite tooled up to cast , i am working on it. I bought a threaded .577 sizer, and am researching moulds. I have been shooting .577 465 gr Minie balls and with 60 gr of Goex 2F they are showing good consistience. Problem is my Enfield is shooting about 13" high at 50 yds. So im trying to learn how to use the rear sight leaf.

Where did you buy your threaded .577 sizer?? Thanks

Grenadier1758 · Jan 2, 2020

Your 0.575 minies are too small and you are likely getting gas cutting which is throwing accuracy off. The minie should only be 0.001 to 0.002 under land to land bore diameter. I know that was discussed in the unacceptable accuracy thread. You need to size them to 0.577. The Lee REAL is also probably undersized. It needs to be almost the diameter including the depth of the grooves to engrave the top band with the lands.

Gregory Mitchell · Jan 2, 2020

Grenadier1758 said:
Your 0.575 minies are too small and you are likely getting gas cutting which is throwing accuracy off. The minie should only be 0.001 to 0.002 under land to land bore diameter. I know that was discussed in the unacceptable accuracy thread. You need to size them to 0.577. The Lee REAL is also probably undersized. It needs to be almost the diameter including the depth of the grooves to engrave the top band with the lands.

Thank you sir, this was my suspicion as well, that .575 is too small. BUT THEN -- why were/are .575s the standard issue for Springfield rifles, which are closer to a true .58 cal bore?? It would seem if they're too small for an Enfield they would be WAY too small for a Springfield.

Grenadier1758 · Jan 2, 2020

Reread post #6. This is a military gun and the important feature was to fire many times using a fouled barrel while retaining minute of line of opposing forces. The load for your Enfield would also been with a 0.575" diameter minie. Accuracy would have been pretty close to what you observed.

PastorB · Jan 2, 2020

I am sitting out in the woods right now with my original Colt 1861 Special Musket. Brand new to this forum, looking at internet while waiting for a buck. I saw a question about .575 minie balls. I figure they were sized that way originally so they would load and go boom in any commonly used Civil War era musket. I tried .575 in my musket when I first got it many years ago, it was all that was available locally. Wouldn't group on a paper plate at 25 yards, and my musket has a good clean bore. That was 25 years ago, learned a few things since then. I now use .580 or .581 bullets in my musket. You would swear I'm lying if I told you how accurate it is, 3 shot cloverleafs at 100 yards, with standard 60 grain charge. Couldn't believe how much difference 5 or 6 thousandths make. I have killed many deer over the years with my rifle, hoping to get another before sunset. I order my minies from Pat Kaboskey, a 510 grain traditionally styled bullet, sized and lubed to .580.

Stantheman86 · Jan 2, 2020

.575's were a standard size to ensure they worked with manufacturing variance for bore size.

So far I've found .577 to be a good fit in my Parker-Hale P61's but I'm assuming tolerances are pretty tight for those vs various Italian repros or originals.

.575's give me completely acceptable accuracy out of my Armi Sport CS Richmond , roughly softball sized groups at 100 from standing position, bench rested , maybe baseball sized.

It might shoot much tighter with larger bullets but at the risk of not being able to get 50 down the pipe without cleaning

bang · Jan 2, 2020

Nuttin wrong with Pyrodex. Been using it 20+ years. Treat it as any and clean promptly.

DaveC · Jan 2, 2020

The Brits used a .565 Pritchett bullet with exterior lubricated paper as a a paper patch. These were the types of cartridges preferred by the CSA in all their arms, with Minié/Burton balls, or imported. The U.S. used the same .58 cal. ammunition in the .577 British rifle as in the U.S. Ordnance .58.

I would merely add to what has been posted above that you want to be just a few thousandths, like 2, between the size of your Minié/Burton ball and the bore size. You should only every change one single variable at a time. Use pure lead bullets. I'm using .685s, without sizing them, lubed with 50/50 mutton tallow and beeswax hand dipped in a .687" B. Hoyt-relined original rifled and sighted M1842. I do have a dowell resizer, but I haven't used it yet. Eventually, I'll return to my far-handier 2-band M1841 in .58. Originally, I was having key-holing from skirts that were damaged when the bullet exited the muzzle using the "as issued" M1855 60 grains of powder.

Most Minié shooters use FFFg loads, not FFg, which admittedly is closer to the original "musket powder" used in these beasts. I'd council original black powder. I shoot Goex, because it is American-made, and I want to shoot that in preference to other types. I shoot using the N-SSA-type plastic/polymer cartridge tubes with my Minié/Burton balls in nose first, with the lube on the exterior of the skirt. I have made up M1855, M1861, and M1863 type paper cartridges, and also British Enfield-type cartridges and shot those. The British Enfield cartridges I made had lubed-paper patching, and about 70 grains of FFg as I recall, but this was an exercise in "authenticity" over accuracy concerns.

Good luck and good shooting to you! Keep us posted about how things are going.

Tumbledown · Jan 2, 2020

Dphar1950 said:
You need to find some real BP. T7 is not intended for sidelock guns, its best with a shotgun primer in an inline. Pyrodex will rot the bore in ways few can comprehend. So find some BP. Its what the rifle and the bullet are designed for.

T7 works just fine in my caplock.

Gregory Mitchell · Jan 2, 2020

DaveC said:
The Brits used a .565 Pritchett bullet with exterior lubricated paper as a a paper patch. These were the types of cartridges preferred by the CSA in all their arms, with Minié/Burton balls, or imported. The U.S. used the same .58 cal. ammunition in the .577 British rifle as in the U.S. Ordnance .58.

I would merely add to what has been posted above that you want to be just a few thousandths, like 2, between the size of your Minié/Burton ball and the bore size. You should only every change one single variable at a time. Use pure lead bullets. I'm using .685s, without sizing them, lubed with 50/50 mutton tallow and beeswax hand dipped in a .687" B. Hoyt-relined original rifled and sighted M1842. I do have a dowell resizer, but I haven't used it yet. Eventually, I'll return to my far-handier 2-band M1841 in .58. Originally, I was having key-holing from skirts that were damaged when the bullet exited the muzzle using the "as issued" M1855 60 grains of powder.

Most Minié shooters use FFFg loads, not FFg, which admittedly is closer to the original "musket powder" used in these beasts. I'd council original black powder. I shoot Goex, because it is American-made, and I want to shoot that in preference to other types. I shoot using the N-SSA-type plastic/polymer cartridge tubes with my Minié/Burton balls in nose first, with the lube on the exterior of the skirt. I have made up M1855, M1861, and M1863 type paper cartridges, and also British Enfield-type cartridges and shot those. The British Enfield cartridges I made had lubed-paper patching, and about 70 grains of FFg as I recall, but this was an exercise in "authenticity" over accuracy concerns.

Good luck and good shooting to you! Keep us posted about how things are going.

Thanks a lot, as usual much good info from you folks. Tonight I decided to purchase Lyman's .578 dia. "Blue-Grey" Minie mould, which turns out a 405 gn bullet. Apparently this projectile is well-liked by the skirmishers, and I like the idea of saving lead and recoil by using a lighter ball than the standard 500+ grain OS Minies. Lyman moulds aren't cheap like Lee's moulds, so I hope this one turns out bullets that my Enfield likes.

If nothing else I'm keeping the modern rifle guys entertained at my private-membership range. I'm the only guy in the club, that I know of, who has succumbed to the ML addiction to this degree, and I always get lots of questions and curious onlookers when I haul out one of my Pedersoli Hawkens or now, my Enfield. And of course the modern pistol guys are left scratching their heads, but fascinated, when I'm out shooting one of my many Colt or Colt-clone (or Remington-clone) percussion revolvers -- my first love in the black powder world. The black powder fascination has taken over my shooting, beginning around this time three years ago. I can't get enough.

gemmer · Jan 2, 2020

bang said:
55gs sound a bit light. Generally 60-70 will get performance. Most all 58cal military use rifles I've read about call out 60gs to be military load.
My Zouave bore is a bit undersized. My own cast .578 mini would go but was a PITA to get started. The .575 is a mild thumb pressure start to near muzzle level and easy ram. At 68gs fff I've been able to keep them within a paper plate at 50 yards but think due to the thick skirt I'll try 75gs and see how they perform.

Just about any N-SSA shooter will tell you they shoot less than the service charge for best accuracy, somewhere in the 40 -45 gr 3F range.

gemmer · Jan 3, 2020

Gregory,
Ditch the Triple 7 and get some 3F black. Then, try your different style minies. You want a bullet that is .001-.002 under bore size using pure lead. One thing I noticed about the bullets you casted. If the REAL bullet you casted measures .575-.577, you're doing something wrong since those bullets are intended to engrave into the grooves of the rifling. I've never personally used them but they are similar in design to a maxi ball.

gemmer · Jan 3, 2020

Gregory Mitchell said:
(Disclosure: I have read the recent thread about "wild inaccuracy" from a '53 Enfield, but still wanted to present my own situation in this thread).

I've got my new Pedersoli P53 (3-band) Enfield and I love it. But my first outing with it, using my own home-cast projectiles, shows I have some work to do. The bore of my Enfield will accept a .578 pin gauge but not a .580 -- so it would appear the land diameter is closest to .579. I tried bullets from three moulds, at 55 yds. with 55 grains of Triple 7 2F: 1) Lee "old style" Minie with thin skirt, 2) Lee "REAL" bullet, and 3) Lee "Improved Minie" with much thicker skirt. The first two miked at .575 average with the "improved" Minies miking at about .576-.577. I dip lubed them in SPG.

Only the old-style Minie showed any promise at all -- but even those distributed out to an 8-10" group with some wild fliers (and remember this was at 55 yds.) I couldn't even keep the modern Minies on the paper and the REAL bullets weren't much better. I was shooting from a solid bench rest.

So from TOTW I have ordered some of their Minies called "Enfield" style -- nominally a .577 dia. bullet. I'm going to try those next. Does anybody have any additional suggestions for getting to the proper bullet for my Enfield? Where do we go about getting sizers for the Minie bullets cast at home? I can't find a source for the excellent Pedersoli sizer anywhere. The only Minie sizers I've found are from DGW that are held in a vice and you drive the bullet through with a wooden dowel.

I'm open to all suggestions for getting acceptable accuracy out of this rifle. From everything I've read on here, these Pedersoli Enfields should be capable of holding 3-4" at 100 yds with the proper Minies.

Thanks all!

Gregory Mitchell said:
Thank you sir, this was my suspicion as well, that .575 is too small. BUT THEN -- why were/are .575s the standard issue for Springfield rifles, which are closer to a true .58 cal bore?? It would seem if they're too small for an Enfield they would be WAY too small for a Springfield.

Don't confuse military, battlefield requirements with obtaining the best accuracy out of your musket. The musket in the Civil War was required to still be reloaded after numerous firings. Pin point accuracy took second place to volume of fire. The smaller ball might have been less accurate but that didn't matter when used against massed troops at relatively short range.

Road_Clam · Jan 3, 2020

Gregory Mitchell said:
Where did you buy your threaded .577 sizer?? Thanks

http://www.lodgewood.com/Precision-Sizing-Die-with-Plunger_p_1605.html

On my load development test list is to try between 40 and 45gr of Goex 3F . This load seems to also produce excellent accuracy potential. I understand your using Pyrodex but i also shoot my 1874 Sharps 45-70 , a .50 Pennslyvania flinter, and a 1858 Rem cap n ball, and honestly none show good accuracy with the bp substitutes . So ill echo others and encourage you to try some Goex 2 or 3F. The master BP precision shooters favor the Swiss brand of 1.5F . Good luck !

Dialing in the proper Minie . . .

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