over powder card wads

[Dr5x]

Rusty Gun,
If you insist on the need for a card on top of the powder, How do you know the card is lying flat on top of the powder and not jammed in sideways?
I think the wad would be better than a card as that posture on the powder problem would be eliminated.

If you really want accuracy, get a micrometer and fine tune your regular shooting patch.

{ would have written nothing if it weren't for the discovery of what fine tuning your patch thickness can't do to tighten your groups.

Dutch

 

[Dr5x]

Zonie,
There are people who believe I think I have the only way to accuracy.
Far from it. There are all sorts of people who are doing very well without any help or suggestions from me.

All I have to ffer is what I who was all over the place stumbled across accidentally plus a lot of other stuff resulting from an application of logic.
These things worked amazingly well for me and the people I coached at the range suggested I write it up. P wasn't sure I had explained my theories simply and effectively till I start getting feedback



i have been in three hospitals and several different ambulances, am in Dialysis three days a week and require magnifying glasses to continue using the internet. In 6 months I'll be 90 and I'm not sure I'll make that.
I feel that my constant belaboring my thoughts on the Forum are a sort of panicked effort to keep the sport up and prospering. No one will stick with the black powder muzzle loading action if he can't do any effective shooting.

So I may be on the Forum a bit much, That is the reason for it and if it bugs folks I understand,


Dutch

 

[Paul_R]

Dutch I meant no offense and I'm not bothered by anything you post. I apologize for my feeble attempt at humor.

 

[SDSmlf]

Dutch, I have been a member of this forum for a little over 10 years and rarely post, just enjoy reading and learning. You and your recommendations are frequently mentioned in the few posts I make. Have been a 'pupil' of you and your system for years. Always look forward to your comments. Actually wish you would post more. Don't know how else to say it.

 

[Dr5x]

SDSmlf,
I like to think that all I am preaching is to get folks to apply LOGIC to why they are doing.

For instance, If you rare loading carefully and keeping everything as much the same, shot after shot but each time you load it gets harder to get the ball down the barrel all the way to the breech.. Logic tells us that the barrel must be getting smaller.
Logic also tells us that the steel barrel may be varying in size as it heats and cools but its not varying from the temperature that much. It must be something els.
Pnvestigation shows us that each time you fire the rifle, there is a soft coat of black powder residue left on the bore. Further investigation shows that when you fire the rifle a second tim some of that soft coat of crud from the first shot gets baked on the bore and another coat of soft residue is laid on top of the now baked on hard layer from the first shot.

You soon figure, or should, that layer by layer a hard coat of baked on residue has now made your rifle barrel an appreciable bit smaller so the ball and patch combination you are using is, to all intents and purposes firing from a different sized, smaller, bore.

The solution is to remove that soft layer of crud after each shot. Not clean the bore just wipe that soft stuff away so it can't bake on and each shot comes from the same size bore
I suggest a quick wipe with a DAMP wiping [atch between shots which eliminates the problem.

This for some reason is controversial.
There are some goos that apparently absorb this residue quite nicely and there is no build up/. The problem there is that those same goos are too slick and the ball leaveaves the barrel before the powder has done its thing which has the same effect as too light a powder charge as so much of the power is wasted after the ball is gone.


Everything you do in loading affects the group or basic accuracy, If your rifle is doing strange unwanted things there is a cause. Your problem is to determine what that cause is and eliminate it.

What caused me to create my Dry Patch Lube system derives from the same process mentioned above.
Everything in my loading was exactly the same, I thought, but every ball hit well centered. But I was getting some to hit a tad high and some a tad low giving me a vertical string of hits. I had been carefully moistening my shooting patch each time by hand. The target was telling me my manual shot by shot moistening the shooting patches was NOT as equal as I thought, so I figured out how to determine the exact amount of lubrication and how to make it exactly the same no mater what part of the patching strip I used.

It's all just using logic,

Dutch Schoultz

 

[Patocazador]

"I suggest a quick wipe with a DAMP wiping patch between shots which eliminates the problem."


Works for me. In fact, if I don't do it, my .45 flinter is very erratic.

I chew on the patch as I shoot and then it's ready for the wipe due to the saliva. Someone on this forum gave me that tip but I don't remember who.

 

[Dr5x]

Sounds good to me as long as the patch is only damp/ WEt, and a top or two will get in the breech and wet some of the next powder charge.

Dutch

 

[Maven]

Late to this topic, but there are 2 circumstances when I use an OP card wad (either commercial or punched out by me) and they have little to do with using wet or grease patches:

(1) when using T/C Maxi-Balls or Lee REAL's as I find they improve accuracy;

(2) with patched RB's in my smoothbores, for the same reason.

 

[dwr]

Dutch, I have been a member of this forum for a little over 10 years and rarely post, just enjoy reading and learning. You and your recommendations are frequently mentioned in the few posts I make. Have been a 'pupil' of you and your system for years. Always look forward to your comments. Actually wish you would post more. Don't know how else to say it.

+1

 

[Dr5x]

If SDSmlf and Mountainy Manhad my book they wouldn't have to depend on my excessive posting on the Forum.
I think that if all my posts were organized you would see where I have explained my System in great detail
I like to think that by helping folks who are having the same problems I had back in the '7-'s iI may be keeping them engaged in the sport. I also feel the more accurate rifleman will make cleaner kills.
My daughter had some property next a state forest and got to see a lot of deer who had died rather wretched deaths from non-fatal wounds that became infected and caused much misery.
I was about to discontinue because rapidly increasing printing octs as Knew a selling price of 26 or 27 bucks was too much to ask people to pay.

A So I spent $00 bucks getting it digitized which allowed me to keep the old price and add 40 or 50 addiyiomal pages of blather based on my answers to questions asked over the past three decades.

In my experimentation I spent a bunch of mine ( I had an income then) on all the junk offered to make the rifleman's effort less and his accuracy best and found that while they may have been well intended were a real waste of time. If the ord "EASY" is in their promotion I suggest you avoid it and also thee really slick patch lubes which seem to be counterproductive.
I felt that the earlier I could get to a newby the more money he or she would save by not buying all the junk I had wasted my money on.

An earlier attempt to spread the word (mine_ can be found on my web site in the Tips and G&A sections where I tried to do some good at no charge. If I could still read I would check that area to see if there is anything there that is not in the book bus Alas! as theory sy that would be an agonizing effort with magnifying glasses
If SDSmlf and Mountainy Man can't afford the book they might glean some early Dutch wisdom by looking at my web site www.blackpowderrifleaccuracy.com

Dutch Schoultz

 

[FishDFly]

You are valued along with your writing, your writing is in my collection

Folks in the past complained about Paul V., stopped and shared a bottle of Johnny Walker Red with him, nice evening, time well spent.

Continue on and be happy.

 

[Clovis]

Have not tried a card, but do use a couple (2) wonder wads. I settled on using these when I wanted to try to use hornet nest material after the tenants left. I could not make the material the same from shot to shot and gave up and tried one wonder wad over the powder and a patched ball and accuracy improved. Getting curious for the heck of it I tried two wads over the powder and it shot even better. What I have noticed is the ball is much easier to load and I am assuming that the two wads will wipe the barrel and make the loading a lot less of a problem. As a side note, it's interesting when I recover patches they are wrapped around the wads and the patches appear very clean and no burn through areas and the wads have a small amount of fouling flakes between them. Don't know if any of this helps, but it is my limited dumb luck experiences. If it makes a difference I'm using pre-lubed wonder wads.

 

[robinsroost]

Dutch, you sound as you may be a traveling man.

I am always in search of further light........

 

[M. De Land]

I just recently got an idea and started to employ it at a match early in the summer which seemed to work. I need more testing than one match to prove the idea but I did win with a good score.
What I did was make a second loading rod to be used with a stiff brass and now bristle brush.
In practice after the first shot from a clean barrel I re-charge then run the bristle brush down bore to the fresh powder pushing the fouling ahead compressing it lightly unto the new powder.
I now retrieve the brush and employ my regular loading rod and jag to seat a damp patched ball in normal manor.
This does several things:
1. Keeps the fouling in check.
2. Creates a barrier (fouling wad so to speak) between fresh powder and damp patch. I know seating a damp patch ball does the same thing but the brush seems to do it better.
3. Keeps the patented breach from fouling not having to wet patch for barrel fouling control.
4. Maintains a more consistently clean barrel for better accuracy.
I was able to shoot three full relays without cleaning and accuracy did not deteriorate.
More testing is needed to see if the system actually proves out but it seems promising so far.

 

[M. De Land]

I got to thinking after the post that I hope I have not accidentally plagiarized Dutch's system which I am totally ignorant of never having read it.
This is just an experiment I came up with on my own thinking about how to address some of the difficulties I have had over the fifty years I've been shooting muzzle loaders.

 

[M. De Land]

The combination of the stiff brush along with the seating of a damp patched ball between shots is what is maintaining the cleaner bore condition for better consistency over the course of a match.

 

[Dr5x]

M.D>
Have no fear of plagiarizing any of my System. What you are doing, I think accomplishes muh of what I think I am achieving with a greatly simpler method.

If your ball and patch are the correct size for your rifle it should push any of that residue down the barrel on top of the powder if there is still any of that stuff still in there after the quick wipe.

I think what you are doing is over kill and tad of extra work between shots.

However, if what you have come up with works and gives you prize winning groups that's the way to go so stick with it.

The loading procedure is NOT my System. My System is based on patch selection getting the compressed thickness as exactly right for your particular rifle. The next part of the system is determining exactly, as much as possible how slick or non slick your patch lube should be for your rifle powder charge and patch thickness.
Most the rest which is considerable is like door handles on your Rolls Royce.


I appreciate your thinking and experimenting . To me that is the most fun. Realizing everything you do in the care and feeding of your rifle affects the groups you can produce. So controlling all those things it the search you are on and so is the joy of discovering what was causing your groups very.

Continued Good Luck

Dutch Schoultz

 

[Dr5x]

I do not understand the "Traveling Man" reference as I completely 90th year and if you are search for the light I suggest you go out doors.\Preferably in the daytime.

My only choice is to believe it some sort of unspecific criticism which I probable would agree with. I am perhaps over sensitive but I have a lot to be sensitive about, Failing vision resulting in unfortunate typing errors which I cannot easily proof to correct which is God's way of telling me to quit.
Your thoughts?”¦.


Dutch

 

[cynthialee]

You just need a typing and reading squire.

I prize my copy of your papers and they have a nice sturdy folder and a place on my book shelf next to my other self sufficiency books. I think your papers would make a great backbone for a book. Fill in the rest of the book with anecdotes, some fire arms history, basic gun smith knowledge and a few game meat recipes in the back. Leave about 20 empty pages at the back of the book for the reader to compile their own shooting notes.

 

[JeffG]

When shooting patched round ball in my .54 smoothie, put a beeswax lubed fiber cushion wad on top of my powder then my patched round ball. It keeps my patch from getting burnt through. When at the range, or hunting, I always wipe between shots, I keep a patch in my mouth ready to go. ( A tip I picked up reading a book by Toby Bridges 30 years ago..) I find the shot-to-shot consistency greatly improved. :hatsoff: