Sight in distance for .62 rifle

[Justin Urbantas]

I'm getting my .62 rifle together,  and will probably be test firing it this week. I'm curious what distance you guys would sight your big bore rifles for to get the best trajectory. I'll probably be shooting 90-120 gr ffg or 1.5fg with a .610 ball from a 31" barrel. This will be my big critters rifle (moose, bear, elk)
Cheers

[Daryl]

'Bout zero'd at 110yards, Justin.
How many sights? If 2 of them, I would sight it for 100 and 150.
Level with the wings of the 150sight should give 200yds.
With a plinking load of about 85-90gr., the 100yard sight should be "ON" at 25 and 50.

[smylee grouch]

Hi Justin, my 62 flint rifle has only one rear sight blade and I shoot 110 gr. Swiss 1&1\2. I have it sighted to shoot just above point of aim ( 3 inch  or so) at 50. It shoots a 610 ball around 1775 fps mv and is a couple inches high at 100 and only a few inches low at 146 yds.

[Scota4570]

https://www.ctmuzzleloaders.com/ctml_experiments/rbballistics/web_apps/rb_ballistics.html

[hanshi]

I've always sighted deer calibers - .45 & .50 and a .600" smoothbore at no less than 50 yds and a point blank range of up to 75 yards.

[mountainman]

For my .62 cal. 48'' barrel made by Bobby Hoyt, I use 80 grains of 2F powder and a .600 round ball with 0.20 thick pillow ticking patch material greased with bear lube combo.
 I have good results with this load, I have gotten a deer already at 120 yards, dropped it, right in it's tracks!!
Almost forgot to mention, but I zeroed my rifle in at 30 yards, and it held true out to more than 100 yards!

[Daryl]

This is with a 1,700fps load with a .615" ball @ about -4C.
https://www.ctmuzzleloaders.com/ctml_experiments/rbballistics/web_apps/rb_ballistics.html

 8      1616   2029    0.4     0.0     0.014
10     1593   1973    0.6     0.0     0.018
15     1544   1853    1.1     0.0     0.027
20     1493   1733    1.6     0.0     0.037
25     1445   1623    2.0     0.0     0.047
30     1397   1516    2.3     0.0     0.058
35     1353   1422    2.6     0.0     0.069
40     1313   1339    2.9     0.0     0.080
45     1273   1259    3.1     0.0     0.092
50     1237   1188    3.2     0.0     0.104
75     1097   935     2.8     0.0     0.168
100    1011   795     0.0     0.0     0.240
125    942    690     -5.4    0.0     0.317
150    883    605     -13.8   0.0     0.399
175    830    535     -25.8   0.0     0.486
200    780    473     -42.2   0.0     0.580
225    732    417     -63.4   0.0     0.679
250    686    366     -90.4   0.0     0.785
275    642    320     -124.2  0.0     0.898
300    600    280     -165.7  0.0     1.018
325    559    243     -217.2  0.0     1.148
350    520    210     -279.6  0.0     1.287
375    483    181     -355.6  0.0     1.437
400    447    155     -447.0  0.0     1.598

Mountainman, your load with a 30yd. zero would be dropping about 18 to 19" at 120yards.

[alacran]

All I have done with my .61 rifle is what I know amounts to a plinking load of 85 grains. I sighted it in 1 inch high at 50 yards and it is 3 to 4 inches low at 100 yards. That is with a .595 ball. It is a about 30 grains lighter than a .615 ball.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Justin:  If all you are using the rifle for is hunting, then sight it in level sight for 100 yards.  Then find out how you have to hold the sights for close up shooting, like a grouse's head at 20 yards, and an elk at 150.  My personal .62 cal Hawken rifle uses 127 gr. FFg GOEX, .022" denim patch, and .613" ball out of a Lyman .610" mold.  I have it sighted dead on at 25 yards, level sight.  For 100 yards, I raise the silver front sight blade above the level rear sight ujntil I can just see the front sight's base on the barrel.  That gives me a centre hold on a 100 yard target.  I've killed two moose so far with the rifle and neither was more than 80 yards.  But the rifle gets far more use shooting steel on trail walks and targets for postal matches than it does for hunting.

[Daryl]

A consideration. For shooting trail walks, I use a squib load of 85gr. 2F GOEX in my .69. Zero'd at 25yards, it is also zero'd at 50yards - with the same sight holding (bead in the V) that
with the hunting load of 165gr. is zero'd at 100yards.
Thus, my 3 sights are now zero'd at 100, 150 and 200 with the hunting load, and 25/50, 100 and 150 with the squib load.

[Marcruger]

I would suggest that the sights and the shooter dictate a lot of that.  I have shot some rifles with brass bead front sights that cover an entire target at 100 yards.  How do you do refined sighting with that?  To me it is not ethical to shoot at an animal where I cannot place a round in the vitals.  That is just an example. 

If you can hold a tight group at 100 yards consistently, and can see that far on a game animal, then sight for 100 yards.  I won't trust my eyes with open sights past 50 yards on an animal.  My plinking practice is done at clay birds on the berm at 50 yards.  I can hit those pretty regularly offhand at 50 yards.   100 yards?   My eyesight will let me down. 

Also, those big roundballs lose energy pretty fast.  Another reason to limit the range. 

Just my thoughts.   God Bless,   Marc

[Daryl]

Just like they say about gambling, "know your limit and play within it".

[bigsmoke]

In my English style sporting rifle, first, It had 1:104 rifling.  Wide Grooves, narrow lands.  I think it was .006" deep.
For plinking/ target shooting, I used 135 grains of Ffg GOEX.  Personally, I could never find an advantage to Swiss, of any granulation.  The hunting load was 200 grains Ffg which gave me a muzzle velocity of 2,005 fps.  I used hand cast .610 pure lead round ball  out of a Lyman (I think) s/c mould.
I developed my load at 25 yards and sighted in at 50 yards.  I tried shooting at a 1' x 2' gong at approx. 200 yards, holding about a foot over it and missed every time.  Then, I decided to shoot center of it.  What a joyous sound it made.  And did that thing bounce.  I thought it never would settle down.
I really did enjoy shooting that rifle, but I liked its big brother even more.  That was a .72 caliber sporting rifle.  I sure do wish I hadn't sold them over the intervening years.  Oh, and by the way, I believe Lt. James Forsythe had it completely right when he talked about big game and big guns.  Sir Samuel White Baker was right on the money as well.  Read their books before you get excited about buying or making a big bore rifle.  Very informative.
John (Bigsmoke)

[Daryl]

We used to have a 300 yard range at the in-town limits, range. On it's 2x4 cross piece, hung a steel plate, a saw blade, about 2' in diameter.
At rendezvous, we used to use the "upper" range as well as the lower trail walk range. EVERYONE, including Taylor and our departed friend Leatherbelly,
hit that plate first shot when using my .69. I was loading 165gr. 2F with a .682" round ball with a spit-wet, 12 ounce denim patch. I had chronographed
that load at 1,550fps. I could not get anyone to shoot it a second time, so I did, time after time & each time, ringing that plate. Having a sight filed just
for that shot, made a bit of a difference, of course. My sights back then, had a standing sight for 50yds(squib load of 82gr.) & 100 with hunting load, 100yds
with squib but 150yards with the hunting load, then 150 with squib but 200yds with the hunting load of 165gr. 2F. The third leaf was filed expressly for that
300yard plate.
After that range was eliminated and the maximum was 200 meters, I removed the standing short range sight, and just left the 3 leaves, which fold flat. A sight
picture over the folded sights gives me a 50 (squib) or 100yard zero with the hunting load. Raising the first leaf, gives the same zeros, due to the leaves not
folding exactly flat, but a slight rise.
Forsyth wrote than the extra thickness of the barrel's breech should give the close range point blank zero with all the leaves folded. His folded flat, mine don't
and thus give the necessary elevation, even though the my barrel is 1 1/8" straight octagonal. The sight boss and folded blades give the necessary elevation.

[Dphariss]

In Montana with. Hv load i like about 1” high at 100 makes the point blank good to 115 120 yards