T/C .50 Flintlock Questions

[svashtar]

Hi Everyone,

Just my second post here, and after shooting for 35 years I'm finally getting into blackpowder and learning a lot.

SO... my buddy sells me his original "never been fired" T/C Hawken flintlock from 1979, serial # in the mid-18,000's. Very pretty wood, pristine brass, immaculate bore. He unscrewed the touch hole and I stuck a bore light in there and never saw such a clean barrel. He had slight surface rust on each side of the front sight, and the front sight itself that looked a bit funny like it had been banged, but I cleaned those areas up and cold blued and it looks OK, and the sight picture from the back end is clean.

He looked up new ones and asked for $300, which I paid. I think now I might have paid a bit too much? but what the hell. He threw in a ball starter, a heavy brass powder measure, two dozen made up loads of some stuff called Shockley's Gold from 60 to 95 grains, 3/4 lb. of Hodgdon 777, a half-pound at least of FFFg for the pan, 20 .490 balls, 50 sabots and 20 or so .451 caliber bullets for the sabots, and an old carrying case. Also the original manual and warranty card he sent in back in '79.

He bought it for the primitive season in PA and never used it.

The problem is, that even though he never fired it, he would regularly fill up the pan with 4F and touch it off to show his kid or others. And since he had never "fired" it, he didn't clean it, and when I took the barrel out there was surface rust and corrosion from that powder on two of the flats by and under the touchhole.

I got most of the rust off and heated it up and cold blued it, so it looks better, but there is some slight pitting and I've noticed that the finish on flinter's tends to take a beating around the touchhole. Is that fairly normal? I'm a bit worried about the very slight pitting there, but am keeping it clean and oiled.

Q: do you think I could tape it off and use one of those guncoat products to just refinish the back 3" of the barrel, from just before the touchhole?

Q2: what is a "touch hole liner" I've read about here? Is there a problem with the standard touchhole on these?

I tried shooting the thing with a .490 ball and some lubed .013 patches but no way. I figure that was trying to put .516 down the bore, and I literally gouged holes in the ball trying to get it down the bore.

So I switched to the sabot and .45 bullets for the day and they seated nicely. I got the elevation at 100 yards on quickly, but the windage was a problem. I cranked and cranked the rear sight to get it to the left, to the point the rear sight looked ridiculous.

I'll try it again with a .005 or .010 lubed patch I just ordered and the ball, and hoping it was just the sabots or something. I also tried drifting the front sight a bit to the left in the dovetail, but that thing didn't budge. Maybe some heat and a brass drift punch and a big hammer will do it. The sights look great and even though, so hell maybe it was just the sabots and a crosswind...?

Honestly, it was an impulse buy and a pretty rifle, but guess I should have checked it out more. I thought the earlier guns were preferable, but now find out about the lock problem (see my other post) so maybe I screwed myself. We'll see!

Thanks for any info, and I'll hang around here for a while and pick your brains and let you know how it goes.

FYI, I learned my lesson after one session with the stock ramrod and ordered a range rod from Cabela's so hopefully that will make things easier next time at the range! (Plus I won't have to bring along a separate cleaning rod.)

Best regards,

Norm

 

[jethro224]

Hi Norm,
Welcome to the Forum! :hatsoff:

First let me remind you that we don't discuss those modern plastic doohickeys that some folks like to wrap around bullets.

As to your questions;
I don't know about taping it off and using the guncoat products. I'd just keep it cleaned and oiled and not worry too much about it.

A touch hole liner IS the little screw in touch hole you mentioned. A standard touch hole with no liner is just a hole drilled right thru the barrel. There are aftermarket touch hole liners available for your T/C that some say are better than the factory job.

A .490 ball and a .013 patch should be pretty easy to load in a .50 barrel. Are you SURE those are the correct measurements? Most people use a .015 or .018 patch. Could be the patches or balls are miss-marked as to size.

Were you using a short-starter?

I'd throw away the Shockey's Gold especially if it is old. Then I'd give the 777 to a percussion shooter and go buy some more real blackpowder. It will work much better in a flintlock rifle.

A crosswind can have a dramatic effect on a slow moving ball or bullet at 100 yards. How fast was the wind blowing while you were shooting? Is the front sight bent over to the side? Try sighting in an inch or 2 high at 50 yards and then moving out to 100.

I think you did OK on the price. Some better deals can be found... :idunno:

 

[cynthialee]

After all the extras he threw in it was an acceptable price. Maybe there are better deals sometimes but they are not often.

I have no answers to your questions though. Never owned a flintlock.

 

[Semisane]

I would call that a fair price, especailly with the extras.

Pour the Shockey's Gold in the garden for fertilizer. Give the T7 away. Get some black powder and have fun.

As for the rusted areas. Clean it up with steel wool and keep it oiled. What's a little blemish between friends anyway? :wink:

I'm greatly surprised you were not able to comfortably load .490 balls with .013 patches in a TC bore. That just doesn't sound right. What were you using for patch lube?

 

[don hepler]

I have the same rifle, and I gave the same price for it. However there was no rust. I got a lot of extra's with it, including a bag of flints, peep sight and globe front sight. I thought it was a fair price.

I use .490 ball with .018 patch,lubed with bore butter, and I have to smack it pretty hard with a ball starter, then it goes easy with the ram rod.

Unless you're really good with open sights, I'd work on getting the rifle to shoot a group at 50 yds. Start with 60 to 65 grains of 3f real black powder and let us know how it shoots.

I really prefer the .495 ball with the same combination, I do use a wad over the powder to protect the patch,from burning.

I do have the newer allen head vent liner, and I have replaced the cock and frizzen to the newer one, but neither should affect accuracy, unless you're having a decernable delay. My rifle fires as fast, from what I can tell, as my custom rifle with Siler lock. If you're shooting black subs, for powder, and getting a noticable delay, you will be flinching all over the place.

Hang in here, there are way more experienced shooters here,than me, that will help.

 

[ebiggs1]

First and most important, USE ONLY REAL BLACK POWDER. Second and maybe just as important, USE ONLY REAL FLINTS. Like Black English hand knapped. These two facts are most important.

Now about your new TC. I watch regularly on web sites and other places for flintlocks that are for sale and $300 bucks with the accessories seems to be average in price. So both of you got a “good” deal. The way it should be, right? There is always the guy that will brag about the steal of the century but they never seem to come my way!

The rifle will shoot those plastic things but why? They cost too much anyway. Get some .490 Hornady round balls. Get some .018 pillow ticking patches and get some Bore Butter to lube them.

Now about the lock. If it is sparking well do nothing. If it isn't you need to have your friend send it back to TC for a upgrade. The lock in the top photo is a new style and the bottom is the old style.

See the difference in the cock right above the screw? This new style cock places the flint at a better angle to the frizzen. Plus the new style has a harder frizzen which strikes many more times before wearing out.
With the new style lock, TC came out with a new touch hole liner. Maybe the best touch hole liner there is, bar none. You should replace this no matter what and I should have listed it at the top as mandatory, too.

To complete:
Use 60 grs of 2F or 3F GOEX black powder
490 Hornady RB
018 patch with Bore Butter
Preferably 4F GOEX for prime 3/4ths pan full and against the touch hole. But your 3F GOEX will do.

Shoot at 25 yards at first to get on paper.

 

[ebiggs1]

Shoot at 25 yards at first to get on paper.

From a bench rest. :thumbsup:

 

[svashtar]

Thanks to everyone for their input, (and thanks for the reminders on the "off-topic" topics.)

I miked the balls at .490 and the patches are new lubed pillow-tick patches at .013, and I used a short ball starter and hit the ball as hard as I could perhaps 20 times and couldn't even get the ball down seated 1/4". I checked and a lot of guys use a .005 or .010 patch, so will try those to start. .018" means .526 going down a .501 or maybe .502 bore and there is no way that is going to happen with this rifle, bore butter or not!

In calling TC the rep confirmed that the twist rate on these is ideal for a patched ball, and that the saboted things won't give good accuracy; I've shot them only because that was what I could get down the bore.

ebiggs, many thanks for the info on the lock and touchhole, and the great pics. I do see the differences, and what you say makes sense. TC will send me a new vent, but told me to fire more with the old lock and see how it worked, and they would replace it if I had trouble. My concern is like most guys though, and just because it's working great now doesn't mean that if it bites the dust next year TC will fix it, so I'm tempted to go with a sure thing now.

(I can tell you from the several calls I've made that the old T/C guys really hate the new S&W penny-pinching management!)

I would just need to figure out out to get it off the rifle and send it to them. As of today the rifle has only been fired about 20 times, but it's probably been dry fired another 100, and it all seems to be working OK. (?) I'll keep an eye on it and get that replaced if it starts to fail.

To Jethro and the other guys, the only thing I'll have to disagree with you guys on is the powder. I don't see any reason other than authenticity to use blackpowder when the 777 burns so much cleaner. I spoke to a guy at T/C who's been there 35 years and he confirmed 2F for the propellant and 4F for the pan.

Bottom line, I get that BP is more combustible I guess, but is the ignition that much better? All I know is the only failures to fire I experienced were the 4F in the pan, probably because I underfilled it, and the 777 and other powder all went bang.

The T/C flints I bought seemed to throw a good spark, but nothing spectacular. I'll get some of the flints you recommend.

This is my first flintlock, but I've fired both 3F blackpowder and Pyrodex in my Kentucky Pistol built years ago, and the performance difference seemed the same but cleanup was a lot easier.

(If there's something performance related I'm missing though I'm sure you'll let me know LOL!)

I'll have lubed patches in .005, .010, and .013, so my theory is the thing just needs to be broken in a bit more and I can get the heavier patches to seat eventually.

Thanks again for all the great info. Just have to train myself to ignore what's going on to my right and focus on the front sight, and start loading round balls and I think my performance will improve.

Norm

 

[svashtar]

Hey, just read hadden's post more carefully and think I get it now. The blackpowder may be dirtier but it decreases lock time in the flintlock? I'm guessing right now from click to boom is about .20 of a second, and that delay is messing with my aim. I figured it was just a matter of more practice.

I'll get some 2F BP and try both and see if I can tell any difference (with the new flints.)

FYI, my friend made up loads from 60 to 95 grains for me, but I didn't go higher than 75. I don't see the need for the heavier loads frankly as I'm not hunting with it. I'm adding 15% to those BTW to get the equivalent BP load, so really that 60 grain 777 load would be like 70 grains of BP if I'm calculating things right.

Thanks again for all the great info.

Norm

 

[Zonie]

The only thing in a flintlock to ignite the powder in the barrel is the flame/heat of the pans flash.

Only a limited amount of that flame/heat can get thru the vent hole.

Black powder ignites around 460 degrees F.

The synthetic black powder replacements ignite around 700 degrees F (or hotter).

This usually makes the synthetic BP lag behind real BP.

Using real BP a flintlock can fire repeatedly within one one hundredth of a second after the trigger is pulled. To our dull senses that can seem like 'almost instantly'.

It isn't uncommon for the synthetic BP's to take more than one tenth of a second.
That sort of delay is easily noticed by the shooter. (That also assumes the synthetic powder even fired. Often it won't.)

 

[Richard J.]

My daughter had a TC that would only shoot five thousandth patches. It would also cut them. Sent back to TC. Replaced barrel and said it was not finished correctly. New barrel shot just fine. This was ub 2011.

 

[jethro224]

To Jethro and the other guys, the only thing I'll have to disagree with you guys on is the powder. I don't see any reason other than authenticity to use blackpowder...

Well, that's because you haven't tried it yet in your flintlock. Try it and you'll see.

I thought you said in your original post that you had a half-pound of 3F blackpowder. Did you mean 4F?
3F will work just fine in both the pan and as the main charge. You wouldn't need to go out and buy 2F and 4F powder to give it a try.
If what you have is 4F then do NOT use it for the main charge! 4F is for priming only!

If you have access to a micrometer it might be a good idea to check the actual bore measurement on your rifle. It may be undersize. It just doesn't make sense that a .490 ball and .013 patch should be that hard to load. You should be able to push that combo in just by leaning on the ball of the short starter with the butt on the ground and the button of the short starter resting squarely on the ball.

 

[ebiggs1]

Something is amiss. :hmm:
I use .018 most of the time and once in a while I use .020 and even ,022. They do load a little harder but still load. 018s do not require any “pounding” on the short starter. Just one whack with the heel of my hand. After that it pushes down fairly easily. :grin:
I know of no one that uses patches 005 and not many use 010. Do a little more investigation on your equipment. :hmm:
Also, more Bore Butter is better than less. Make sure your pre-lubed patches are not dried up.

 

[svashtar]

Thanks guys, and Jethro you are absolutely right and I dropped an "F"! I shot up the 3F BP I had years ago in a .45 percussion Kentucky pistol (about 30 grains per load IIRC), and this half-pound is all 4F and works great in the pan.

I read online that I should only fill the pan 1/3rd full, but that gave me a couple of misfires and 1/2 pan worked consistently better.

Any delay is contributing to poor accuracy, at least for me, so I will switch to 2F black powder (I'll check here for a recommended brand) and see how that works and keep what's left of the 777 for the percussion pistol.

I don't know what to tell you on the patches and ball. What you say makes perfect sense, so maybe it was the virgin barrel, I don't know. I just know that I'm 6' 8" and weigh north of 300 lbs. and have never been accused of being a weakling, and that ball is so torn up by the short ball starter it can't be used again! (I draw the line at using a ball peen hammer to seat them. :wink: )

The new patches I bought were .013 and so slick with lube I kept dropping them.

Bottom line if I can get a .005" down the bore I'll check the patch and see if it's marked correctly after firing, and then go from there.

If it is the barrel, (and I'll slug it and see what I come up with), then I'm boned because T/C insists they have none. (But again, what are they putting on the new ones!?)

I'm placing an order for some black English flints that are 5/8" x 3/4", and will try those with the black powder and hope to see some improvement.

I'll also check into the bore butter, but if the patches are pre-lubed I don't think it will be needed. (?) After cleaning the barrel and giving it a final hot water rinse I didn't want to get it oily, so used some Tetra Gun lube and worked it into the bore, and now it is both treated and super slick

Thanks again for all the invaluable info! :thumbsup:

Norm

 

[Richard J.]

With my daughters 50 they completely cut a .010 patch. A 5 would have parcial cuts when recovered. We found the .005 at Cambells gunshop in Pa. When we found these cut we called TC. They wanted the barrel. Asked for a call back when they found out what was wrong with it.Prompt turn around on the barrel. As far as patches, we have a lot of 50 cal. flintlocks and some like .018. and some like the .010. Dont care why, just so they shoot as accurate as possible. A lot of our vary old 50 cal. ( these go back to 50 or 60s) like the .018 patches. Like I said all these are very accurate.

 

[svashtar]

That's good info Richard, thanks very much. I will expect then to at least get the .010 to work without cutting the patches. I hated to spend the $ on incorrectly sized patches, but have to find the right thickness to fit tightly but not so tight that I can't seat the ball.

 

[ebiggs1]

"I read online that I should ..."

Stick around here long enough and you will LEARN quickly to whom you can trust and to whom you can not. :hmm:
This also extends the learning curve on shooting flintlocks!

 

[Maven]

"Bottom line if I can get a .005" down the bore I'll check the patch and see if it's marked correctly after firing, and then go from there."


There are 100% cotton materials which are both thin and tightly woven, e.g., some bed sheets.

 

[svashtar]

To complete:
Use 60 grs of 2F or 3F GOEX black powder
490 Hornady RB
018 patch with Bore Butter
Preferably 4F GOEX for prime 3/4ths pan full and against the touch hole. But your 3F GOEX will do.

Shoot at 25 yards at first to get on paper.

Hey Guys,

Not to resurrect an old thread, but just an update: My gun seems to be sparking fine, and T/C doesn't have any new locks anyway. I finally got some bread together and have some .490 Hornady round balls in hand, plus some 2Fg blackpowder on order as well as some black english flints from a place called October Country.

I also found a 2-pak of the new style touch hole liners and got one of those installed, and that should help as well.

Also got some bore butter to lube my pre-lubed patches, and based on posts here was also going to get some of the Hoppes + lube for the range and compare the two.

The only thing I can't use recommended here is a .018 patch. With a .490 ball that is .526 going down a .500 bore, and I can't even get a ball started with a .013" patch let alone going higher. Maybe in time.

Again, really appreciate the excellent info. At this point my only concern would be a "soft" frizzen, but so far the original seems to be doing fine.

Best,

Norm

 

[excess650]

L&R makes replacement locks for various mass produced rifles including the TCs.

Hornady also makes .480" roundballs for "tight .50s".

I'm not a fan of "Bore Butter" and don't subscribe to the "barrel seasoning" BS. My favorite patch lube of late is mink oil from Track of The Wolf.

TOTW would also be a source for the L&R replacement lock, .480" roundballs, and flints and most anything else you might need.

If you're in SE or S central Pa a trip to Dixon's near Kempton might be in order.