I don't like to use a ball starter.

[RAEDWALD]

Indeed and described as a 'short iron pin'.

 

[Captjoel]

On another note. While loading my new to me 32 caliber rifle, I was using a short starter that was a little too big for such a small caliber.

The starter did fit down the barrel but would get caught in the patch when I was trying to pull the starter out of the bore.

After a few shots I had a stuck short starter that came away from the wooden palm ball!!
Had to extract it with my pliers!

In the future, I will be using a smaller diameter starter for the 32.

 

[gotlich_drummer]

I use a freebie wooden crab mallet for a starter

 

[Smokey Plainsman]

Someone mentioned short starters were mainly for the heavy target guns. Not necessarily. An original example dating to the 1870s and belonging to author Ned Roberts is shown in his 1940 book The Muzzle Loading Cap Lock Rifle.

In his passages on hunting rifles he describes them being used and how they were carried in the shooting pouch. There are also some other period examples found in shooting pouches. One can be found in Charles E. Hanson’s respected book The Plains Rifle.

Now, this is for the percussion era. There are not many references to their use before then that I am aware of, but you can be 100% certain short starters were used throughout the caplock age for round ball hunting rifles. If you are a percussion shooter (like me) don’t let anyone tell you they are not period authentic.

 

[Stony Broke]

Hard for me to imagine folks wanting to specifically do away with their short starter, as it doesn't amount to much of a project starting the ball or carrying one around in a bag with you.

 

[OldJoe212]

As far as PC/HC goes, if you can think of it now, and make it yourself with hand tools, then, most likely it was used then. Don't make the mistake by thinking these guys were just a bunch of rubes. I have a short started tied to my loading block for each rifle. On the knives I've made, I have a little nub to seat it enough to cut the patch.

 

[Coot]

Sorry but the "they coulda made it" theory doesn't work. With no internet, no movies, no TV, no cheap books, no lending library, people were limited in what they might have been exposed to. Even today, the world is full of stuff that could have been made much earlier but were not simply because with zero prior knowledge, no one had thought of it yet. People rode horses for thousands of years before someone invented the stirrup. Once that person had their totally original thought, the things worked so well that the idea spread like the proverbial wildfire.

 

[Big Mountain]

I never fired tight PRB combos in my rifles. Nor did they fall down the bore, I always used a starter, put often it only required pinky pressure to start the ball. There is a certain amount of obturation (bump up) when the powder ignites behind a soft lead ball.

Me as well. As far as accuracy goes I’m pretty sure it really doesn’t matter wether the PRB is super tight in the barrel. Also, I don’t use a short starter I find that in my 50 caliber a .495 round ball with a .01 thickness patch lubed with tallow is the way I always shoot. It takes pinky pressure to get the ball seated and the ball is as accurate as I can muster. Tight groupings always.

 

[DaveC]

Very interesting. I've been using über-super tight patch and ball combinations. I've tried to avoid using a short starter, but I can't thumb the ball into the muzzle, and I did not use a knife due to concerns with distorting the shape of the ball/ flattening out a part of it.

I'll have to try getting a thinner patch and maybe a thinner patch and smaller ball. I was using a .310 ball with a .015" grease patch with a short starter and metal range rod.

 

[Brokennock]

As far as PC/HC goes, if you can think of it now, and make it yourself with hand tools, then, most likely it was used then. Don't make the mistake by thinking these guys were just a bunch of rubes. I have a short started tied to my loading block for each rifle. On the knives I've made, I have a little nub to seat it enough to cut the patch.

Here we go again. This argument keeps coming up like a bad penny. It is NOT a matter of thinking "these guys were just a bunch of rubes," we see time and time again that our modern thinking is NOT how they thought. For example, it seems pretty logical to us that a belt loop sewn to a knife sheath, at both ends of the loop, is the best way to secure a knife to one's belt, but, while there are few extant sheaths, the few we have, and the period paintings and other reference examples we have, show that the center seam sheath with a folded over flap to keep it from slipping past the belt or sash, was the most common sheath in use throughout the Colonial American times period and beyond. There is no evidence that short starters/ball starters, whatever you want to call them were even needed, much less commonly used until target shooting just for the sake of shooting targets, and the resulting dedicated target shooting equipment, came to be the normal shooting activity of the day.

 

[zimmerstutzen]

part of the need for a starter or a tight or loose patch ball combination has much to do with the rifling configuration. There is so much more than twist, round or square and depth. There is the ratio of width of the lands vs the grooves, whether the grooves are larger than bore radius round rifling or smaller than bore radius round rifling. is there a choke at the muzzle? etc. What works in one probably does not in another. I once picked up a barrel that was impossible to shoot. It had narrow square bottom groove rifling that was almost 25 thousands deep in each groove. It took a 3lb sledge hammer to swage a patch and ball into that rifling to seal the deep narrow grooves usually also cutting the patches. The balls always made a whizzing noise as they flew down range. I was afraid I would break the stock at the wrist with such loading.

 

[VADSLRAM]

This may be heresy but, try an unpatched minnie. They slide down with a gentle tap of the butt of a knife then push easy the rest of the way. Once the charge goes off the back expands to the bore. I shoot both ball and bullet for target but by the end of a good day of shooting I shoot all minnies cuz my old hands just hurt.

 

[tenngun]

This may be heresy but, try an unpatched minnie. They slide down with a gentle tap of the butt of a knife then push easy the rest of the way. Once the charge goes off the back expands to the bore. I shoot both ball and bullet for target but by the end of a good day of shooting I shoot all minnies cuz my old hands just hurt.

Ye heretic!!!!!
what next???? 80/20 wool ( whoops,I do that one) fire resistant canvas tents??? (Whoops, I do that one too) machine sewn (oh darn)
Ahhhhh never mind.

 

[Big Mountain]

Very interesting. I've been using über-super tight patch and ball combinations. I've tried to avoid using a short starter, but I can't thumb the ball into the muzzle, and I did not use a knife due to concerns with distorting the shape of the ball/ flattening out a part of it.

I'll have to try getting a thinner patch and maybe a thinner patch and smaller ball. I was using a .310 ball with a .015" grease patch with a short starter and metal range rod.

I think it will only make since to try .05 inch increments. Every gun is different and bore size may be slightly larger or smaller in each gun. I know that it works for me but with a different twist rate it may vary wildly if the twist is too tight, or more quick. My barrel is a 1/60 twist.

 

[flntlokr]

Very interesting. I've been using über-super tight patch and ball combinations. I've tried to avoid using a short starter, but I can't thumb the ball into the muzzle, and I did not use a knife due to concerns with distorting the shape of the ball/ flattening out a part of it.

I'll have to try getting a thinner patch and maybe a thinner patch and smaller ball. I was using a .310 ball with a .015" grease patch with a short starter and metal range rod.

For a .32 cal, you patch only has to be about as thick as shirt fabric or pyjama flannel. Squishing .02 of patch has to be altering your ball as you hammer them in. Your load should always be comfortably pushable with a wooden rod.

 

[Stophel]

Sorry but the "they coulda made it" theory doesn't work. With no internet, no movies, no TV, no cheap books, no lending library, people were limited in what they might have been exposed to. Even today, the world is full of stuff that could have been made much earlier but were not simply because with zero prior knowledge, no one had thought of it yet. People rode horses for thousands of years before someone invented the stirrup. Once that person had their totally original thought, the things worked so well that the idea spread like the proverbial wildfire.

I couldn't have said that better, myself.

I also think that the average 18th century (and even 19th century) rifleman did not have the luxury of choosing patching material of exact thicknesses. They certainly didn't go around a fabric store with a micrometer... I propose they used smaller balls with thicker patches. This gives you more leeway in patch material. Oh, you might not get the ridiculously tight patch and ball combo for the utmost in one hole MOA accuracy that people today absolutely demand, but you would more easily be able to get something that WORKED well enough. You used whatever fabric (or leather) that you could get.

 

[Brokennock]

I couldn't have said that better, myself.

I also think that the average 18th century (and even 19th century) rifleman did not have the luxury of choosing patching material of exact thicknesses. They certainly didn't go around a fabric store with a micrometer... I propose they used smaller balls with thicker patches. This gives you more leeway in patch material. Oh, you might not get the ridiculously tight patch and ball combo for the utmost in one hole MOA accuracy that people today absolutely demand, but you would more easily be able to get something that WORKED well enough. You used whatever fabric (or leather) that you could get.

Well said as well.

 

[DaveC]

I finally swore off .495" balls in my .50 in favor of .490s... I guess shooting smooth-bores and rifles may have convinced me to use a tight ball... Instead of the service load of a .643 to .65 ball in a .69 *actually a .687 bore* I've been using a .672 coated with lube in the smooth-bore, and a tight ball and patch combination in .50 and .32 rifles both...

 

[Stophel]

...period paintings and other reference examples we have, show that the center seam sheath with a folded over flap to keep it from slipping past the belt or sash, was the most common sheath in use throughout the Colonial American times period and beyond.

While I have seen lots of 18th and early 19th century images of men with knives thrust underneath their belts, I have yet to see one that indicated a flap or any other type of securing mechanism. Most images are frustratingly vague, as usual. Do you know of something that shows this?

 

[mushka]

I use a ball starter on all my muzzle loaders so I am right.............so there. Hahahahahaha