National Muzzleloading Rifle Assoc

[11th corps]

I haven't been on this forum in a while. Yesterday I got a NMLRA magazine in the mail to try and entice me to join again. I will say it has increased in quality dramatically. Also I read NMLRA is now trying to increase membership by catering to in lines as well. What has been your experience with in line shooters? Do some of them eventually become traditional blackpowder shooters?

 

[crockett]

Not in my estimation- they are simply looking to get a few more days deer hunting and use in-lines to do it.
It has been said before but for newbies... In-lines are actually period correct if they are of the original design. The original had a moving bolt with the flint on the tip of the firing pin. It was driven straight forward and hit the frizzen which was at a 45 degree angle and in the barrel. The impact flipped the frizzen up and exposed the pan powder and fired the piece. The system was better in the rain but very difficult to clean and would rust out early- the reason it was never very popular.
But for our purposes- you are usually wasting your time trying to get an in-line shooter interested in traditional firearms. The cross over is no more than the general public.

 

[meanmike8665]

I just came back from the Western National, where I saw a young man carrying an inline and a nice flintlock Southern Mtn rifle. I saw several people shooting inlines and having a good time. Furthermore, when I shoot on a public range I spend more time talking about traditional muzzle loaders than shooting. The number of shooters was down again at the Western National's was it because people shoot inlines there? I doubt it, what I do know is the new President of the NMLRA is serious about why people are not staying members. I hope he is up to the task of making changes.

Michael

 

[coloradoclyde]

Why don't modern inlines shoot with other modern guns?
Why don't they start their own organization?

IMO the only thing the current NMLRA is interested in is increasing revenue....and they don't care how they do it.

 

[11th corps]

I let my membership drop after about 10 years due to the poor quality of the magazine, and the articles that tended to cover historical stuff I could read anywhere if I so desired. I wanted more "gun stuff" in the magazine. I am really only interested in the guns and their builds, shooting, and anything related to that. I have zero interest in re enacting.

 

[meanmike8665]

Modern inlines are muzzle loaders. What do you know about the finiance of the NMLRA and why are they only interested in raising revenue? Again, are you a member?

Michael

 

[meanmike8665]

Yes, I miss those articles also, seems like the folks that wrote the really good stuff are gone, Don Davis, Max Vickery, I have many old magazines and reread them. There was a pistol shooter name Bill Carver his writings could be applied to any competitive shooting. Those men wrote with passion for their sport....muzzle loading competitive shooting. I miss all of them and the ones who taught me, who are now gone.

Michael

 

[coloradoclyde]

Mike,
Modern inlines are not muzzleloaders.....They are modern inlines. Just because they are loaded from the muzzle does not qualify them as a muzzleloader in any traditional or conventional sense of the word...
They are more accurately, a caseless rifle.
They use post muzzleloding era primer, powder and projectiles...the same can be said for their stocks, sights, and barrels...and most importantly their design.
For over 100 years after the end of the muzzleloading era, they did not exist. and not one single American or foreign battle has ever been fought with them.

 

[meanmike8665]

Wow, I so want ask, who died and left you in charge, but I won't go there. By you logic slug guns are muzzle loaders either? You might want to do a little research the NMLRA was not founded on traditional side locks many of the first shoots were modern guns and muzzle loading target rifles! It's a good thing those men were not narrow minded and were inclusive to any one who had an interest in guns that loaded from the front.
Again, are you an NMLRA member?

Michael

 

[Maven]

Maybe I'm nitpicking, but not all of those unmentionable rifles use #209 primers or modern projectiles or propellants for that matter. In fact, I often use patched RB's with mine as well as Maxi-Balls, but mostly with #11 percussion caps, although one breech plug/nipple is strictly for shotgun primers. And yes, I do use real BP in it. (It doesn't wear a scope, but I mounted a Williams aperture sight as the factory sights/sight radius is too short for my taste.) Loaded in the traditional manner, it is most definitely a muzzle loader, but it wouldn't be my first choice for a line shoot or woods walk.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Wow, I so want ask, who died and left you in charge, but I won't go there. By you logic slug guns are muzzle loaders either? You might want to do a little research the NMLRA was not founded on traditional side locks many of the first shoots were modern guns and muzzle loading target rifles! It's a good thing those men were not narrow minded and were inclusive to any one who had an interest in guns that loaded from the front.
Again, are you an NMLRA member?

Michael

:haha: I love your attitude :thumbsup: ...
Now tell me again why the NMLRA;s membership is falling? :hmm: ...I think you encompassed it beautifully.

 

[coloradoclyde]

what I do know is the new President of the NMLRA is serious about why people are not staying members.

Michael

If so, listening to the sound of their own trumpets won't help them any...

 

[Dave Marsh]

Clyde, do you belong to the NMLRA?

Dave

 

[coloradoclyde]

What do you think!

 

[meanmike8665]

Sorry, again. I sign up new members all the time. People who have the foresight to enjoy the sport for what it is, a of fine people who don't hate the success and joy of other who are different.
CC, btw you have single handily driven me from this site, I will not post again to any of your hate.

Michael

 

[Claude Mathis]

Maybe I'm nitpicking, but not all of those unmentionable rifles use #209 primers or modern projectiles or propellants for that matter. In fact, I often use patched RB's with mine as well as Maxi-Balls, but mostly with #11 percussion caps, although one breech plug/nipple is strictly for shotgun primers.

Let me remind everyone that we don't discuss inlines on this web site.

Calling them "unmentionables" doesn't work either.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Mike, I am exactly the kind of person you say that the president of the NMLRA wants to hear from....

Members that didn't renew.

I never said you were going to like what you heard....The truth often hurts...

 

You might want to do a little research the NMLRA was not founded on traditional side locks many of the first shoots were modern guns and muzzle loading target rifles!

Michael

I would like to see your source for that.
Roberts' book, in talking about "the beefshoot at Jim town" mentions an all guns allowed over the log match.
But I have never heard any mention of cartridge guns being in any NMLRA matches from the early ones in Ohio on.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Does anybody have membership numbers from around 2002?
My calculations suggest that they were around 19000 members....That's less than the 30000'ish they report today.... :hmm:

 

[meanmike8665]

Walter Cline's THEN and NOW, the problem is my memory. A group of modern small bore shooters put up the money for a muzzleloading shoot in Feb, 1931. Page 127. They did not shoot against the muzzle loaders but that shoot lead to the beginnig of the current NMLRA.

Michael