44 days, Bit over 6 weeks

[Blackpowder Burn]

I've used the Accurate 43-215C, which is John Korts design, for years.  I use it in a 24" barreled rifle with no issues.  Lubed with SPG I can shoot it indefinitely before cleaning.  I'll shoot an entire 12 stage match over 3 days before cleaning.  It takes about 3 patches and a pull of a bore snake to clean the bore.

[Roosterman]

I quit shooting cowboy matches in 2010. I moved 40 mile farther away from what was already a long trip. I shoot lever guns and revolvers these days, all loaded with real black powder. I have my own range so I step out the door and let fly when ever the mood strikes me. Shooting smokeless powder is BORING.  I do shoot smokeless in my schuetzen rifles and most of my M95 winchesters.
I was just thinking yesterday how much fun it would be to organize a "woods walk" shoot using all steel targets. 1 lever gun in  any caliber and one revolver. No place to put it on......

[Roosterman]

BTW, this used to be a hoppin' place, sorry to see it slide. I still learn alot here. With out the '76 forum I'd be lost since I have been gathering up the rifles and learning to load for them.

[Bunk]

it has been too cold to shoot, Coffinmaker is on vacation, and i have been busy with my nifty  '51 Navy Krist Konversion to spice up the conversation.
What is others excuse?
Working out a .375" .38 Short Colt cartridge for the Navy.
Anyone else shooting this baby with  it's original .375' outside lubricated bullet?
Warming up in Central  Texas so old Bunk will soon be back at it.
Stay  warm
Bunk

[Froogal]

Yep! Too cold here also. My pistol range is right out on top of the ridge where the wind hits from every direction.

[Navy Six]

Bunk, I have a pair of Uberti 51 Navies with the Kirst cylinders that I shoot the .375 heel bullets in. I find the 38LC brass accomodates the heel bullets with plenty of room using about 17 grs of 3F Swiss. As far as the weather, supposed to get in the low 40's this week so off to the range I go.

[Bunk]

True, but I scored 300 Starline .38 Short Colt head stamped cases and using a 125 grain Colt cartridge Works bullet and 8.0 to 8.5 grains of FFFg will ring the chime in steel targets.
That load gives somewhere north of 800 rounds per pound of FFFg.
Plus without a lined barrel switch cylinders and shoot percussion.
Two guns for the price of three, good deal right?
respectfully
Bunk

[Crow Choker]

Thought I'd drop in since I started this thread about no posting on the Darkside, but in reality, posting thorough out the CAS Forum is a shadow of what it used to be. I love shooting and when cold weather hits here in the Midwest, ya I do slow down my shooting. Clubs don't have matches and shooters don't physically interact as much. In younger days a Saturday or Sunday afternoon shoot in the winter on a nice day didn't stop us. Cold weather and wind did of course, but one thing that didn't slow down was talking about shooting. Notice that 'The Muzzleloading Forum' is busy as ever including the Pistol section. Alot of talk about cap and ball.

Guess my thought is if ya love the sport, a shooter can talk about it, likes, dislikes, plans, etc. any and all of the time Don't know why going to APP should slow down the 'gab', shootin is shootin. Even the stinky APP needs to be cleaned from a revolver don't care what Coffin says about being able to wish it away. IMO real Darkside shootin is with black powder no matter how much APP is colored with pretty accolades. It's like going out on a date with an ugly girl and pretending and trying to convince everyone she's the hot gal in the class all the guys want to take out. Just ain't-a gonna fly!!!    Ifin that wanna-be APP is all ya can get after really searching for the real stuff, hey better than keeping the guns idle. See where Graf's have black in stock, but of course ya have hazmat and I think a minimum order. Get together with 2-3-4-5 shooters and have a big order, split the hazmat and live happy. APP needs load development, care with bullets, it ain't any cure-all for the trials and tribulations ya get with BP, but good Ol BP has been around for al long long long time and will continue.

Can understand some may only have interest when weather is nice and hibernate. We all get older, but there's alot of members here alot older than I who post on a regular basis. Helps keep an interest and keep ya young in mind and heart IMO. Anyway all the best to everyone this New Year, safe and fun shooting. Pulled out my Walker and WhitneyVille Dragoon last night and fondled them. Gonna be busy Mon-Wed this week but looks like low thirty's, sunny, non windy days later. That's tolerable for cap busting with black powder shooting. Think maybe I'll fire up those two old hoglegs and do some shootin. Good to see more postin going on. 

[greyhawk]

Yeah, blowing out 44-40 cases to .45 was one of the other work-arounds I was referring to.  I have thought about that but I have rifles in 32-20 and 44-40, and shoot plenty of BP .38's, so my 45 Colt rifle just sees smokeless (it's my Wild Bunch rifle).  Now, as to your comment above, I'm not sure what you are referring to.

Rim diameter of the 44/40 case is bigger than the 45 colt  - might only be an issue with some models of wheel guns?

[greyhawk]

Well, just to add my 2 cents worth. Sometime back I laid in a supply of Goex and Old Eyensford. Mostly 3F, then I learned that black powder and .45 Colts do not necessarily play well together, so that combination has been placed on the back burner, at least for awhile.

I then bought a .36 caliber percussion revolver, only to learn that the caps needed to make it go bang are extremely scarce.

SO, my stash of black powder got relocated to a secure and protected place, NOT in the house.

Maybe Santa will bring me a .44-40 rifle and a sleigh full of brass.

Annealing case necks aint hard (unless you make it into something slow and difficult)
stand em in a tray of water about half depth 50 at the time - set this up in a semi dark room - have at it with a propane torch, as each one gets to low red heat tip it over in the water with a short stick or piece of wire. rinse and repeat - dont take long at all to do a couple hundred

[Froogal]

Annealing case necks aint hard (unless you make it into something slow and difficult)
stand em in a tray of water about half depth 50 at the time - set this up in a semi dark room - have at it with a propane torch, as each one gets to low red heat tip it over in the water with a short stick or piece of wire. rinse and repeat - dont take long at all to do a couple hundred

I may just need to try my hand at annealing.

[Crow Choker]

Might do the same. I don't have much problem with FF loaded 44 Colt cases, but alot of my 45 black rounds have pretty sooty black brass when shooting and dirty gun frames. 45 Revolver shooting only, no rifle. The 44 Colt rounds I shoot in three of the four conversion Colts stay pretty clean, even shooting them in a 66 Yellowboy Mod 66. Think I'll do around 100 45's and see if that helps. No problems with cracked mouths. The 45's get shot in a 45 Colt chambered Model P type Colt Jaeger and Old Model Ruger Vaquero. Like the feel of the old model vs the new which I do have in .357.

[John44]

Well hell I'll step in here even though I rarely post. I'm 34 and been here reading sense I was 21. I have learned so very much. I have never been to a match. I've only been able to get a hold of couple of guns need. And I've only just started to reload, it's been a terrible time to get started. I did manage to get 50 .45 colt loaded up with some 777 2fg. That was fun! But getting the stuff has really been troublesome for the last couple years. Truthfully more modern arms tends get priority, but you can thank libs for that. It's not been for lack of interest or desire. One poster mentioned younger stereotypes wanting  polymer lever guns or revolvers,  no. In fact I've been seeing interest trend towards more classical stuff. The market is flooded with 87 versions of Glock favored pistols, it's become burdensome to tell them apart. I'm here because I'm interested in history and historical guns. I have ZERO  interest shooting light .38 specials as fast as possible for time. I want to know what it was like to shoot these guns back when they were getting used for real.
John44
Edit to add: a heart felt thank you to all the old time posters for sharing your knowledge historical guns and ammunition over the years, it's been much appreciated at least by me.

[David Battersby]

 Difficult to talk about black powder levergun cartridges and not see John Kort mentioned.   I miss the man.
Well folks , I am somewhat of an outsider but I have posted a few times in a coupe of  different threads. I don't shoot CAS but I do shoot Lever Action Silhouette. This past weekend I finished loading this years supply of 44WCF. A little over a thousand rounds.  Most are reduced loads , what I call Henry Rimfire Equivalent. They are the Accurate 43-220 , 27gr of Swiss 1.5F, a .140 thick card wad and CCI#300 primers.  If you saw what a full power load does to 40 meter chickens, you would understand the quest for an accurate reduced load.      Then a few 100 round boxes of the same bullet with 37gr off Swiss 2F and no wad.
Why do I shoot black powder in my Uberti Winchester 1873 ? It is fun, no doubt about it.  The friends giving me a hard time about the smoke and the boom. The look on the faces of anyone new . Once there was a young couple that stopped everything  because they knew somebody's rifle just blew up !   
The cleanup is so easy, there is no reason not to.
It is literally the most accurate load I have come up with for this rifle.
It is powerful enough to knock over the full size 200 meter rams.

Again, Mr John Kort you are missed.   I owe him thanks for his guidance . Myself, Savvy Jack and others try to pass on the knowledge he gave to us.

This spring I will be doing load development with my 1894 Winchester 38-55 with Swiss 2F.    Got my fingers crossed.

[Lucky R. K.]

  This spring I will be doing load development with my 1894 Winchester 38-55 with Swiss 2F.    Got my fingers crossed.

You might want to try some 3F Swiss also. I have had very good results with about 45 grains of Swiss 3F and a 250 grain RNFP 20/1 bullet from an original Winchester mold.
Lucky 

[Tascosa Joe]

Is John Kort the man who posted under the alias of 30 WCF and 44 WCF? 

[Bunk]

Hello Crow Choker,
I shoot plenty of gunpowder and have for many many years. But ran into a literal jam with my1851 Navy when set up with the Krist conversion. Using FFFg in the .38 Colt case (.375" bore) the cylinder stopped revolving without help after five rounds from fouling.
The same results with GOEX, Olde Einsford and Du Pont. All FFFg but with a case that holds 8.5 compressed grains  FFg was not a viable option.
When APP was tried the difference in fouling allowed 15 rounds (which was all I loaded) and the cylinder  was still turning freely.
No it is not real Gunpowder but otherwise the conversion parts wold be in a box and I am out big $$$$$.
So, since I started this game with Laflin & Rand Orange Extra Sporting powder, Du Pont Gunpowder in oval cans and corrosive percussion caps used in an original Address Col. Colt NY 1851Navy I have burned enough Gunpowder to allow me to use APP without comment thank you very much.
Respectfully
Bunk
Registered Curmudgeon

[David Battersby]

Is John Kort the man who posted under the alias of 30 WCF and 44 WCF?

Yes.   
There are few firearm forums or searches for 44WCF, Swiss Black Powder that you could do and not find him.

[Tascosa Joe]

I thought that was him.  He was a wealth of knowledge about shooting BP.  Sadly most of us who participate in the BP sports are starting to age out.  I miss a lot of those old guys like him and Ottawa Creek Bill.

[Froogal]

Just to make conversation----- I am curious. The .45 ACP was introduced in 1906, or maybe before depending on what source is used. Would those early .45 autos have been loaded with black powder?

Just curious.