Hopkins & Allen Pistol

[painter]

I recently picked up a H&A under hammer pistol in what I thought was 45 caliber as a shooting buddy has one in 45 and I really enjoyed shooting it because the under hammer design was intriguing.
The barrel has no caliber markings. It needed a new nipple, on order, so while I'm waiting I started cleaning it up. Imagine my surprise when a 45 cal jag with a well oiled patch would barely start in the bore, and required me standing on the loading rod while pulling on the pistol to remove it. Glad I pinned everything on the rod I made. I finally measured the bore and came up with ~.443 across the lands.

My question is this...does anyone have one of these that has a tight bore like this one that is closer to 40 cal, and do you use .433 balls?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Zonie]

Back in the '70's, several companies marketed .44 caliber muzzleloaders. A few of them even tried using the modern gun method of assigning a caliber by the size of the rifling grooves rather than the old method of using the bore size.
I don't know if your pistol is marked for caliber but if it says it's a .45, it is showing the groove diameter as being the caliber.

To shoot these .44's, use a .433 diameter lead roundball. Places like Track of the Wolf carry balls in this size. Here's a link

https://www.trackofthewolf.com/List/Item.aspx/127/2

 

[painter]

Back in the '70's, several companies marketed .44 caliber muzzleloaders. A few of them even tried using the modern gun method of assigning a caliber by the size of the rifling grooves rather than the old method of using the bore size.
I don't know if your pistol is marked for caliber but if it says it's a .45, it is showing the groove diameter as being the caliber.

To shoot these .44's, use a .433 diameter lead roundball. Places like Track of the Wolf carry balls in this size. Here's a link

https://www.trackofthewolf.com/List/Item.aspx/127/2

Thanks Zonie. The gun is unmarked wrt caliber. Already have those balls in my cart in preparation.

What threw me was my friends pistol that works fine with 45 caliber balls and typical thickness patches.

I'm sure I could stuff a 440 round ball, and a very thin patch down this bore. I'd hate to dryball it, however.