• This community needs YOUR help today. We rely 100% on Supporting Memberships to fund our efforts. With the ever increasing fees of everything, we need help. We need more Supporting Members, today. Please invest back into this community. I will ship a few decals too in addition to all the account perks you get.



    Sign up here: https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/account/upgrades

Going Stir Crazy!

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Walkingeagle

54 Cal.
Joined
Dec 30, 2012
Messages
1,616
Reaction score
2,075
Location
Living in the Past
Starting to go crazy just sitting around this winter. Been out ice fishing a few times, with not a single landed fish to my name, even though those around me are catching. Visit the local archery shop and indoor range twice a week for some shooting and social interaction, which helps immensely. However I am missing the shooting of my muzzleguns. Seems the weather wants to continually mess up any plans made to shoot the “trail” (black powder muzzleloader trail) at my local range. One can only clean and fondle these treasured items so much it seems before the next step must be taken. Hopefully this coming Friday things will work out...
Walk
 
Sounds like you got a nicely set up range.

Wish I had more time at home this winter, have been there 4 days since early Dec. And not even 4 days at once.

Not that it would matter as far as getting some shooting done goes. All the close by ranges are essentially closed. Especially my home one.
 
Good time to do detailed maintenance.
Leatherwork.
Rearrange things so you don't know where they are then try to find it
 
Rearrange things so you don't know where they are then try to find it
Ain’t that the truth!!
I’ve always envied those with the skillset to do all that fine, meticulous craft work, or carving, etc. My fingers don’t allow for such fine work, and never have. Multiple attempts at fly tying, leather work, bead work, or anything as such, which includes finishing carpentry, all end in disaster. My skill more so leans towards mechanical ability and anything that can be “adjusted” with a bigger hammer!
Walk
 
Ain’t that the truth!!
I’ve always envied those with the skillset to do all that fine, meticulous craft work, or carving, etc. My fingers don’t allow for such fine work, and never have. Multiple attempts at fly tying, leather work, bead work, or anything as such, which includes finishing carpentry, all end in disaster. My skill more so leans towards mechanical ability and anything that can be “adjusted” with a bigger hammer!
Walk
Do understand. My fingers and hands tend to cramp. Sewing is sometimes tediously discomforting. But I have been fiddling with leather for years so I've learned a few ways to make it more comfortable. Mainly go slower.
Made these about a month ago during a cold wet spell. 30 hours pattern to finish.
20200127_033957.jpg

New shooting bag
20191122_171353.jpg

20191122_171456.jpg

Rifle sheaths.
20200219_104029.jpg

Long trek 1lb horn.
20191228_150703.jpg

New hot cold range sign.
20200218_185012.jpg

20200218_184942.jpg

Point is keep plugging at it.
I too am more mechanical.
 

Attachments

  • 20191122_171456.jpg
    20191122_171456.jpg
    117.7 KB · Views: 97
Those mocs are teal nice! I mean REAL nice!! You did really good on them, for a fact. If I was to try, well lets just say they would likely resemble a dogs chew toy.
Back about 35 years ago I was fortunate enough to be gifted a pair of hand made, smoke tanned moose hide muck-lucks, made by a family friend of the Cree nation. Not totally crafted in traditional techniques (stitching, eyelets, etc) but I still wear them with pride to events. Nobody has ever shunned me for them.
Walk
 
Well the edge has been taken down. Old Ugly and I visited our local range’s black powder trail yesterday, and it was a great day! The weather was exceptional, several degrees above freezing in fact, with a bright sun blazing away. Snow was somewhat deep as the trail is not maintained over the winter, and snowshoes would have likely resulted in less work, but still we powered on over the full 1000 yards. We both brought our flinters and I did not represent well, likely hitting only 30% of the targets, however my companion only missed 2 targets in total. Was a pleasure watching him shoot that .54 longrifle of his own build. If the weather holds we are planning to return next week for another afternoon adventure.
Thanks for the day Tom, it was great!
Walk
 
I hear you. We've been in a fluctuation of -20c to -50c here in manitoba for most of the winter. Been some really strange weather but it surely does a good job of keeping you indoors. Still got work to do on my Pedersoli P53 to figure out its accuracy issues but once the weather decides to smarten up, I fully expect to be out at the range with any time I have free.

Winters been doing a good job of really nailing down my newfound obsession with muzzleloaders. Already been putting money aside to get myself a nice plains rifle of some form in a more accessible caliber. Just hoping I can pass the black powder bug on to a couple of my shooting buddies. Don't want to be the odd one out.

As far as winter projects, I've made a bit of time to do some flintknapping in my heated garage. Made an awful mess with chunks of stone everywhere, but i've got some nice knifeblades and arrowheads done that were given out as Christmas gifts to friends and family.

Here are a few.

O61SFpX.jpg

7aG8jpj.jpg

L7wLJhT.jpg


If I get my hands on a proper flintlock, gonna have to learn how to set up some proper gunflints. Got a fifty pound chunk of English Flint sitting in the garage. Real bastard to knap into points, but as far as I know there is no better stone to set up gunflints from.
 
Well the edge has been taken down. Old Ugly and I visited our local range’s black powder trail yesterday, and it was a great day! The weather was exceptional, several degrees above freezing in fact, with a bright sun blazing away. Snow was somewhat deep as the trail is not maintained over the winter, and snowshoes would have likely resulted in less work, but still we powered on over the full 1000 yards. We both brought our flinters and I did not represent well, likely hitting only 30% of the targets, however my companion only missed 2 targets in total. Was a pleasure watching him shoot that .54 longrifle of his own build. If the weather holds we are planning to return next week for another afternoon adventure.
Thanks for the day Tom, it was great!
Walk

was a good afternoon, I had a good time and was lucky, my old father inlaw would have said I cheated because the long gun barrel gets me 3ft closer to the targets, we will go again for sure
 
I hear you. We've been in a fluctuation of -20c to -50c here in manitoba for most of the winter. Been some really strange weather but it surely does a good job of keeping you indoors. Still got work to do on my Pedersoli P53 to figure out its accuracy issues but once the weather decides to smarten up, I fully expect to be out at the range with any time I have free.

Winters been doing a good job of really nailing down my newfound obsession with muzzleloaders. Already been putting money aside to get myself a nice plains rifle of some form in a more accessible caliber. Just hoping I can pass the black powder bug on to a couple of my shooting buddies. Don't want to be the odd one out.

As far as winter projects, I've made a bit of time to do some flintknapping in my heated garage. Made an awful mess with chunks of stone everywhere, but i've got some nice knifeblades and arrowheads done that were given out as Christmas gifts to friends and family.

Here are a few.

O61SFpX.jpg

7aG8jpj.jpg

L7wLJhT.jpg


If I get my hands on a proper flintlock, gonna have to learn how to set up some proper gunflints. Got a fifty pound chunk of English Flint sitting in the garage. Real bastard to knap into points, but as far as I know there is no better stone to set up gunflints from.



those look real nice.
were do you get your flint from?
no natural flint for us here in alberta is what ive heard.
ou
tom
 
We have some here, but it's like winning a lottery to find any that isn't freeze cracked.

There is Swan River Chert found up north here, but its incredibly tough material, very quartzy. I found a big chunk of it but I have yet to crack it open to spall. Gonna have to bury it under a firepit this spring to see if I can pop and treat it in one go. Hopefully I get some salvageable stuff out of it by the time it's done. Other materials are stuff like Souris chert (looks like toilet porcellain) and knife river flint out of the Red river and Assinniboine river if you're lucky. Check up on some local geological maps and see where some glacial deposits with a heavy concentration of gravel are in your area. Likely won't be anything large, but you can get lucky sometimes. Here's the swan river chert chunk.

odrGjtV.jpg

Most of the agates/cherts here are freezecracked in my area, so it looks like this most of the time.

5TwFdIF.jpg


I'm saving this one until I can find someone with a stonecutting saw to slabs, fingers crossed that it isn't too cracked up inside.

I spend a lot of time talking to local rockhounds and some folks down in the states to get some good spalled material to work from and have it shipped to a drop-site south of the border here. Saves most of the shipping costs as the international rates seem to double or triple, especially when large, heavy orders in bulk are concerned.

http://neolithics.com is a fantastic site to deal with. Obsidian is a good, cheap starting material if you're looking for an easy to work toolstone, Dacite is great too, but rather too brittle for any long term use. If you're looking for a long lasting material, i'd certainly recommend georgetown, it's a more robust stone and can be retouched for a sharp edge relatively easily if you're good with flaking. I've been using a georgetown blade for a number of years now just for fun and recently retired it as a gift to my parents this christmas.

BEFWhlA.jpg

CcUEPaD.jpg


Heres a few of my other points and blades.

nfSPRPr.jpg

QgyTTua.jpg

VTByQ4p.jpg

fYVsDFx.jpg

UsvJtuf.jpg
 
Back
Top