mrballardman, The only thing I can tell you definitively is that Hudson was quoted as saying during the first decade of the twentieth century that he had abandoned his muzzle loading breech loaders and BP for all but nostalgic reasons because he was getting better results shooting breech seated and smokeless.  Now I'm no expert, but at the time, he was arguably THE expert, so take the statement for what it is worth.  With all due deference to the BP crowd, I don't plan on going to the trouble and expense to start shooting muzzle loaded just for nostalgia I don't have. JMHO  8)

Froggie

mrballardman;
                     I have a Stevens Pope that shoots real good but shoots NO better muzzleloaded than breechseated, using smokless powder.  IMO  muzzleloading is not worth the hazzle of handling the rifle twice as much as needed.   leadball

Hello All,
   I was looking into this for sometime. I wanted to have a flintlock long range Muzzleloader made. Still haven't found all the answers. Getz barrel Co. makes the barrel for these rifles. 
I plan on doing up an Alexander Henry Front loader. Jesse

MRBALLARDMAN, I own two original Muzzle loading outfits. A Pope in 38-55 and a Schoyen in 33-40. I have shot the Pope extensively with straight Black and Duplex loaded with Black and smokeless. Now let me say it does shoot excellently when Muzzle loaded shooting Black powder. No gain at all shooting smokeless. But! it is a lot of work. I have shot it in a 100 shot Offhand match, ten shot strings. And a fifty shot Ofhand match. Too much work!!!!!!. And from the Bench even worse because now you have to get up and down for each shot. I will most likely never do that again. Now for a ten shot match where Black Powder is specified I will. You have to consider. First you must fire a fowling shot or two to condition the bore. Then you park the rifle upright and clean the muzzle, then mount the False Muzzle, then take the bullet starter with the bullet in it and mount it on the false muzzle, then drive the bullet smartly into the bore the full distance of the starter rod, then remove the starter and using the seating rod gently push the bullet all the way down to where the seating rod seats on the false muzzle, now remove the rod,and park it somewhere, now remove the false muzzle and park it somewhere, you may now pick up your Rifle and insert the loaded case and close the breech. You are now ready to fire. Bring the Rifle to battery and fire. And now the whole process starts again. Now this Rifle will probably weigh somewhere between 12 and 15 lbs. And at the beginning of each relay you will need to fire at least one or maybe two foulers just to get the barrel slicked up again. Now when seating the Bullet thru the false muzzle, if you do anything that is in any way different when driving the bullet thru the false muzzle or seating it, then that shot MUST be fired off target as it will not shoot to zero. Every time you hit the bullet or push it, it will bump up just slightly and that will make it shoot different. The advice about the bullet scraping the bore clean is absolutely correct. After driving a bullet thru the false muzzle and seatiing it you can push it on out thru the chamber and the bore looks like it has been cleaned, practically no sign of fouling at all and a slight film of lubricant left from the bullets passage thru. Also when shooting Muzzle loading you WILL use soft alloy's. I had for years been shooting an alloy of 50/50 linotype and pure lead. The first time I tried to Muzzle load this alloy I found I could not drive it thru the False muzzle cleanly and that I had to hit the bullet starter so hard my hand was all beat up in half a dozen shots. I found that 30/1 lead tin to be a good alloy and have also used 25/1 but I can feel it getting stiff when driving thru the false muzzle. I plan to try some 40/1 in the future. I have a feeling that for bench shooting you would do just as well to just setup to run a wiping or cleaning rod thru the bore with a wet patch and then a dry patch. All in all unless you are strict traditionalist type of shooter I feel that having this type of rifle built would be an expensive way to go and that with a little experience you will not bother. By the way I have shot both rifles extensively breech seating and using a duplex load of 10% smokeless to Fg Black and found that for me offhand they shoot as well as I can hold. The fouling is very light and does not seem to be an issue. Straight Black is another issue. fouling will accumilate so quickly that within ten shots you will start thowing wild unless you wipe the bore. Hope this hepls in some way. Regards, FITZ.

Richard, the Toggle Link system you describe did work but for some reason not many were built. Not sure why. It may have been that they were developed about the time smokeless came and Muzzle loading was on the way out. Or the other reason may have been that when you use an alloy of the right hardness (read soft!) they were not needed. My experience has been when using bullets that are designed for muzzle loading and of the right alloy it is not difficult driving them thru the false Muzzle and fully the length of the bullet starter rod with your hand. But get the alloy just a little too hard and its an altogether different ballgame. One thing you MUST do when seating a bullet either muzzle loading or breech seating is to do it smoothly and completely in one motion. Any repeated driving or smacking of the bullet will cause it to be in a different state and it will not shoot to zero.
In case I was not clear though, the point I was trying to make is that Muzzle loading is a lot of work. And it takes from the shooter energy that could better be spent shooting.
One thing that has been lost in describing the scores shot by great shooters of the past is the time. They shot unhurried and some cases took all day to shoot a ten shot string. In our world we have anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes to shoot a complete string. And in most cases there is another shooter waiting for your position. In collecting and looking at many Muzzle loading rifles that have been for sale over the past 30 years it is quite common to find them with rung bore's. It is usually about 4" down from the Muzzle. This comes from a shooter getting distracted while going thru the loading procedure and forgetting to use the seating rod to push the bullet all the way down to the chamber just ahead of the case. The cartrdge is loaded and fired and the charge of Gasses rush up the bore and see the bullet as an obstruction and BAM! you have a rung bore. Another cause is forgetting to remove the False Muzzle and when the Bullet passes thru it the sudden rise in pressure will bulge the barrel right at the Muzzle and also shoot the False Muzzle downrange about 25 to 35 yds. I have come close to doing this myself and so now have stiff piece of heavy weight fishing line tied to the False Muzzle and when I am shooting it is tied off to the bench or something else nearby so that I cannot bring the rifle up to shooting position without noticing the Muzzle is holding me back. Again I am not saying this is a bad process because it does work. Just that I have found it to be tedious procedure and very tiring. Now if someone were to run a match where Muzzle loading was the required method of shooting so that everyone was on the same playing field that would be better. then we would all be dealing with the same problems. Well, enough for now. Regards, FITZ.

Waterman,

  Have that Pedersoli tape, and all I can do is shake my head. There must be a reason for it, but I haven't figured it out.


  But, you never know about advertizing. i.e. -  I don't know if this ad is true, but going the rounds on the Web is a .jpg of a supposed H&K ad that shows a semi-auto pistol with a loaded magazine in the foreground. The cartridges are in the magazine backwards.  Now I have seen people at the range and ML'ing matches who do seem to think you need to "whang" the ball a few extra times after the ball/bullet is seated. Maybe they get this idea from the ML'ing shotgun shooters who seem to think you need to keep whacking on the over powder wad till the ramrod bounces. Then there is even a tool you can buy that will seat recalcitrant cartridges in BP fouled barrels/chambers so you don't have to use a stick and hammer to get the action closed. Yes Virginia, people really do this! I've seen it.

  That "thumb screw" you see on a false muzzle is called a "blinder" and is used exactly as you mention. The problem with it tho is that most aren't of a size to always show up well in a scope. The two I own are just a rod that is used more for making sure the FM is lined up correctly when loading. It would work ok with iron sights, but I've never shot either with them. It's almost a given that if you shoot a FM gun long enuf you'll shoot it off some day. I came close a coupla times till I learned to do as "Fitz" mentions. Tie it to the loading bench.

PETE

Boats,

  That article in "Muzzle Blast" was written by Lester Cox, and I believe was done over several issues.  It goes into very small detail on how to convert a regular barrel over to having a FM. I've got a copy of the whole series of articles he wrote about it and it looks like a doable project if you have the tools.

  But, I'm not sure if I'd really care to have a ML'ing barrel maker make me a FM barrel. Most seem to use 12L14 steel in their barrels, or some other free machining material, with their low yield strength. It's probably ok for ML'ers but I personally wouldn't want to use that material for a cartridge gun.

  I tend to agree with you about the hassle of using a FM gun, but for offhand shooting it was fairly popular in the old days, so guess people like Pope felt there was an advantage to using it.

  Pope's thinking, as expressed in his brochure,  was that if you breech seat a bullet small fins will be extruded off the base. These being small and thin there is the possibility they will interfere with the bullets flight. If a bullet is loaded from the muzzle then there won't be any fins that could possibly affect the flight.

  Possibly loading from the muzzle is superior but with todays short relays it becomes more of a liability.

PETE