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SavageArcher

40 Cal.
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Well after a much self debate, I took the plunge and won a smoothbore off one of the online auction sites. It's an Euroarms Magnum Cape Gun and I like the looks. I haven't examined it yet but from description it seems to have been more of a display piece than a shooter.

I found the load data for it in one of my books but not much more info than that. I even did a search of this site but only found two short posts that mention little more than what I already have learned. Currently I'm going to order some supplies from the Track for it including some .69 RBs.

If anyone has any advice on the proper care and feeding of a single shot percussion smoothie, I'm all ears.
 
If that is the gun I think it is I believe you'll find that even though it may be called a "magnum" the rather light gun weight will make recoil pretty nasty with heavy loads. Does it have choke tubes? If so a .690 ball will barely fit through the choke with no room for patching and wads will be a bit troublesome at the choke as well. Some people remove the tube for loading but that is a PITA. You can bend the card wads to push them past the choke edgewise but fiber wads are best one or two gages smaller, ie; 13 or 14 gauge fiber wads. The overpowder card wads do need to be a tight fit to seal the bore but an undersize fiber wad will be squished shorter and fatter by the "irresistible force" of the powder charge behind and the "immovable object" of the shot charge ahead. :grin:
 
Joe, the gun looks pretty hefty. The 32 inch barrel is octagon at the breech and quickly tapers to round. The lock and stock are English sporter style, which was a big selling point for me.

The load data shows the optimum load for a .690 RB with .015 patch as being 80 grns of 2F or RS. For 1-1/4 oz of shot it shows 80-90 grns.
 
The load data shows the optimum load for a .690 RB with .015 patch as being 80 grns of 2F or RS. For 1-1/4 oz of shot it shows 80-90 grns.
That's a pretty good place to start. I'd go about 80gr. on for the shot load.......eh....probably the RB load too.
 
In an old book of Sam Fadalas he test that very gun. He talks of 90grns being the optimum with 1 1/4oz of shot but he found 80grn of powder was best for the 690 ball. There was no mention of choke in his test piece.
Hope this helps and they look like a good gun.

Britsmoothy.
 
Britsmoothy, that's the same source I used to find my data. I'm sure somewhere in the stacks of salvaged gun mags and books I've aquired there is bound to be some additional infomation on this particular model. I'm pretty sure I can narrow the search between the late 70's to mid 80's and find something.

However the last time I attempted a similar search into the stacks I got sidetracked and spent two weeks reading up on some obsure guns I've never seen or heard of before.
 
The only data I have for this gun gives a muzzle velocity of 1050 f.p.s. with a charge of 80 grains of FFg. As I recall, this gun isn't very heavy, so that may be as heavy as you want to go.
 
I'm pretty sure I'm going to be using this as fowling piece more than anything else, however practicing with some light musket loads sounds like fun.
 
This velocity would be pretty much what you want with shot loads. Maybe a bit more, but my experience has been that anything over 1100 f.p.s. is a waste. The word "magnum" really shouldn't be used in referring to black powder smoothbores.
 
You get the best patterns with shot loads in Black Powder, cylinder bore guns when the velocity stays below the speed of sound. That is why " magnum" is not a friendly term. More powder simply blows patterns.

The round ball has a terrible Ballistics coefficient, and most shooters can easily accept that shooting a single RB from a smoothie, or rifle. However, most don't consider that air is not only dragging on the back of each round pellet in a shotgun load, but its also pushing the pellets apart. There are pressure waves created by going above the sound barrier, off the nose and back of each pellet, and the turbulance created forces pellets apart faster.

Since its difficult to get ABOVE sound barrier velocities with Black Powder, anyway, because of the slow, progressive, burning character of this powder, keeping the MV under that SPEED OF SOUND is the most practical way to get better patterns, and more pellets on a target. If you want more energy down range, you use a larger pellet size, rather than attempt to get it by speeding up the load.

You are, in effect, "reloading" a new " cartridge in the barrel EVERY TIME you load the gun. There are no physical limitations to shooting more shot pellets, as there are in all modern cartridge casings, so you can simply increase the volume of shot in your load to put more pellets on the target as the ranges increase.

An old Article from the predecessor magazine to the American Rifleman, from about 1880, showed a favored "50 yd. load" for the commercial Duck Hunters on the Illinois river at that time was 1 1/4 oz. of #5 shot, over 2 3/4 dram( 75 grains) of black powder.(12 gauge shotguns, both MLers, and the early Breechloaders.)

That load has a MV under the SOS. I have used the load in both my MLers, and, with a smokeless powder equivalent to that powder charge, in my modern choked 12 gauge shotgun. I have killed pheasants with my cylinder bore MLer out at 33 yds. With the modern equivalent in my choked barrel, I have killed pheasants way past 40 yards with the load.

The ducks were shot as they flocked together on the water, and not in the air, but this was how they could maximize their kills to sell ducks to the restaurants in Peoria, and to dealers who transported the ducks by rail to Chicago in early refrigerated RR cars. Ducks were sold for $.10 each back then. That was an hour's wage for most jobs at that time.

Commercial hunting was not banned until the early 1900s in all the states, with the passage of the Lanham Act by Congress and subsequent Migratory Waterfowl Treaties with Canada and Mexico. The States brought their state laws into compliance with Federal laws, by the 1930s, to benefit from Federal excise tax revenue.

All these changes took place as we moved from using ONLY Black Powder in MLing shotguns, to using smokeless powder and breechloading cartridge guns, and finally using barrels that were choked at the factory. With Smokeless powder and choke, patterns could still be made at longer ranges, with the smaller shot size and shot loads that the restricted length of shotgun cases imposed by generating speeds above the SOS. The appearance of plastic shotcups in the 1950s allowed the higher velocity loads that so many shooters have used, and come to expect as " Necessary" for hunting any kind of game.
 
Russ T Frizzen said:
This velocity would be pretty much what you want with shot loads. Maybe a bit more, but my experience has been that anything over 1100 f.p.s. is a waste. The word "magnum" really shouldn't be used in referring to black powder smoothbores.

As the English adage went, "little powder, much shot, shoot far."
 
Yup. And they knew whereof they spoke. When they wanted to throw more shot they went to a bigger bore--something we are limited in doing today.
 
Just ran across an old article on bp shotgun loads from the 1988 Outdoor Life Guns and Shooting Yearbook. They found that equal volume black powder loads (equal volume of powder and shot) gave consistent velocities of 1050 fps. To get somewhat equivalent ft-lbs of energy to a modern shell (about 1200 fps), it required you to go to one shot size larger which then reduces the number of pellets on target.
 
Well my gun has arrived, pretty much in the condition described. A few scuffs and scratches from not so gentle handling and storage. The barrel is like a new gun. I ran a dry cottton mop down bore and there was nothing but the smell of Hoppes no.9 on it. For a gun that was dicontinued over twenty years ago, it's in great shape. If it has ever been fired, it was only a few times.

Only one complaint and that is this gun spent time on the gun show circuit I'm sure of that. That would explain some of the handling marks and worse of all the mushroomed nipple.

The nipple part is what I'm riled about. If I had known I could have ordered extras with my last order I sent to TOTW. Also the nipple is in tight too. It's one of those with the square head on a flange type and my nipple wrench is better suited for removing the slot style. In fact I broke my CVA wrench trying to attempt it. :cursing:

It was a cheap excuse for a nipple wrench anyway. Local True Value store had a few T/C brand wrenches in stock so I'll see if one of those are stronger. All else fail, it's a trip to my shop for nipple surgery.

Now on a positive note. This gun is light and with a 32 inch barrel, points really good. The best information I have on this gun was that there was no choke at all. This would make it a great upland fowler and rabbit gun. I imagine with Bismuth I could use for jump shooting teal and ducks.

At any rate I'm sad I'll have to wait another week or two before shooting it. It's bad enough waiting for a new gun to arrive, it's just as bad to have it in your hand and not be able to go shoot it. :(
 
If you're contemplating casting roundballs for it, consider the Lyman .678 mould. The ball is just undersized enough to allow some patching experiments, won't be too big if it's choked, and Lyman makes top-notch moulds.

FWIW, IMHO 80 grains is about optimum. Plenty of oomph for whitetail, but not so much recoil as to make it unpleasant to shoot.
 
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