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chunk guns

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Donny

45 Cal.
Joined
Nov 25, 2003
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Any of you guys chunk gun shooters? I have never participated, but it looks like fun. Any tips? :hmm:
 
Assuming you mean woodchucks, groundhogs and the likes, I do hunt them with muzzleloaders...

Tip: Hay fields are dry and will catch on fire from a flintlock, trust me on this one...

Never use a bale of hay as a rifle rest... :rolleyes: :crackup:

I must say, they do go up quick and spread fast...

Now even a percussion guns will lay a field to flames from the half-burnt powder being expelled from the muzzle, so be careful...
 
Sorry, old eyes are to blame, and I got the large print version to boot!!! :eek: :rolleyes:

Still, my tip was good, boy do those hay bales go up quick, good thing I had to pee... :crackup:
 
I have never participated, but it looks like fun. Any tips?

Don't miss... :haha: You probably saw that one coming somewhere along the line.

Traditional Chunk Gun shooting is shot over a log in the prone position with the barrel, (usually a heavy long barrel) resting on the log/chunk, from 60 yards.

The match may consist of any number of shots at a slab of wood with a charred "X", or a paper "X". It is scored by string measurement from the center of the "X".

You use a spotter dot or something to aim at so your ball will strike center in the "X". This is pinned to the target and you may adjust your spotter when needed during the match. You don't adjust your sights. Though I have been at matches where they do adjust sights and that's wrong. The spotter is always used to aim at. We refer to those who constantly change the spotter, as "chaser's", and those who don't change their spotter as, "stayer's"...

I could go into greater detail but time is short right now. Maybe someone else can pick up where I've left off? They are fun matches! :thumbsup:
 
Chunk guns were normally heavily barreled weapons, made specificaly for shooting off a chunk (log section, etc)
: In the flint fullstock era, of coruse, the forewood rested on the chunk, however later n. with 1/2 stocked weapons, the barel itself was rested. Either would cause high shooting and must be sighted for. This would case the saem rifle to shoot low from an offhand or rested position.
; many hunters today, lack this basic knowledge, about resting the barrel or forewood against an imovable object.
: A very heavy barrel or gun might have less divergence of the ball, perhaps.
: One "chunk gun" I saw a closeup of, had what appeared to be a 1 1/4" oct. barrel, some 36" long on an abreviated 1/2 stock & was only .45 to 50 cal. for patched round ball.
 
I have only seen only 2, in museums, one weighed about 21# + if I recall, the other was about 17-18#. :applause:I have a .45 15/16 42", kinda heavy. :: think I will take it out and give it a try. :hmm: Have heard of up to 603 with a cant bar. I am over 55 and good offhand days are slipping away.
 
By the rules you can shoot chunk matches with any "traditional" gun. Even the custom made chumk guns are quite normal looking. Barrels usually run 1 1/4" or less and around 40-44" long.

Watching the chunk shoot at Friendship is a blast. Much more fun that the "slug gun" matches. The slug guns are the big heavy barreled 20# guns shot from a beenchrest.

Chunk is derived from the old style shooting matches where you shot for meat with the gun you hunted with. Hog rifle, squrrel gun, shoot what you brung! Almost all of the accounts of frontier riflemen suggest that they used a rest or shot from prone unless it was an emergency. Very few accounts of offhand shooting, so these matches closely duplicated the way they shot when hunting.

Remember that shooting match in the old Sergent York movie?
That was a chunk shoot.

:m2c:
 
If memory serves me correctly, in Davy Crockett's day, you could shoot 60 yards off the chunk, or 40 yards offhand. I was told that the NMLRA match is now shot at just 50 yards off the chunk?

Our annual Chunk Gun Shoot is 60 yards off the chunk. We shoot at five record "X"'s, one shot per "X"... We take hours to get our spotter just where we feel we need to be and finally someone will call for their first target, and they will post it with where their spotter needs to be to hit center "X". If you hit center "X" it is called a spider shot, and everyone wants to take a look. I have seen matches stop completely until everyones got a look at a spider shot.

My Chunk Gun rifle is a halfstock with a 1 inch .50 caliber Douglas barrel that is 37 inches long, with 1 in 66 twist, .008 depth rifling. It weights 11.25 pounds. One of the first things I did after deciding to use this rifle as my Chunk rifle was to change the buttplate from a pointed one to a flat "Dickert" one. It sure saves on the shoulder.

My sights are fixed. The front has a globe over the blade and the rear is a buckhorn that I cover with a 1 1/2 inch pvc tube that I spray painted black. This is the rear shader. I highly recommend these two features.

I could go on and on, but I'll stop here. Chunk Gun shooting gets in your blood and there's no cure except finding a match to compete in. :thumbsup:
 
Tried the shaders, :) learned the value of the shaders when I spent a lazy summer afternoon trying to sight in a rifle. Shooting toward the SE, I would get it sighted in, the sun would move,my group kept moving to the right. :boohoo: Tap over the sight, :: same thing. :: Being not so smart, I finaly figured it out, how the moving sun kept changing how light reflected off both my front and rear sight. :applause: :applause:
 
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