Priming Again

[northmn]

Due to a comment made by Bob Miller on another thread concerning priming I decided to give a quick test to my flintlock.  When Larry stated that placing priming up against the touch hole made for faster ignition it made sense as the flash does not have to "jump" to the charge as far.  My concerns have been about the issue of powder dribbling into the vent itself.  We have all heard that long pfffft before ignition that some blame on the touch hole being filled with primer.
I just went out and set off a charge in my hunting rifle.  I not only primed up against the vent but took a pick and packed it in to attempt to get the fuse effect.  It went off PDQ without that long pffft.  I have a 20 bore that likes to have a little primer picked under neath the main charge, but I always left the vent itself open.      I am using a vent with fairly thin walls.
Wonder what really causes that long ignition time

DP

[Dphariss]

Due to a comment made by Bob Miller on another thread concerning priming I decided to give a quick test to my flintlock.  When Larry stated that placing priming up against the touch hole made for faster ignition it made sense as the flash does not have to "jump" to the charge as far.  My concerns have been about the issue of powder dribbling into the vent itself.  We have all heard that long pfffft before ignition that some blame on the touch hole being filled with primer.
I just went out and set off a charge in my hunting rifle.  I not only primed up against the vent but took a pick and packed it in to attempt to get the fuse effect.  It went off PDQ without that long pffft.  I have a 20 bore that likes to have a little primer picked under neath the main charge, but I always left the vent itself open.      I am using a vent with fairly thin walls.
Wonder what really causes that long ignition time

DP

Damp powder in my experience.

The packed vent might be slower but would likely need Larry's timer to prove.
Unless its really long hole and really packed tight like a solid rocket booster.
Dan

[Daryl]

The long ignition is probably as Dan said - damp powder.   Too, the vent becomes clogged or partially clogged with fouling - this happens fairly often with my .40 when using 2F, never with 3F, but rarely with the .45 or .62.  There are times - maybe once out of 80 shots when using either powder, where the pan goes off and upon pricking the vent, I find the hole filled with hard fouling, which blocked the flash from igniting the charge.  This is the fouling blockage I talked about -- happens fairly often with the .40 and 2F, but not in the other guns.  It wasn't due to low pressures, either, becasue that 75.0gr. charge of 2f produces just over 2,200fps in that rifle.  Perhaps the fouling on the vent-cover (side) part of the frizzen got pushed/scraped into the vent and blocked it - that I can understand with a not-quite snug enough fit of the frizzen against the barrel.  Shooting allows the fouling to build up on that 'scraper' part of the frizzen, then the fouling gets scraped/pushed into the vent to block it completely, or partically. Partially might give the fuse effect?

[Larry Pletcher]

When I did the "low vent position / close to the barrel" trials, the prime covered the vent.  The WL liner had a .030" web. With the vent covered the times were very fast - .037  if memory serves.  Faster than other priming positions.  As a comparison, I believe that the "high vent / close to barrel" trial average was .038. No significant difference.

This might be heresy, but I've been thinking that a barrel charge and a pan charge with only .030" between them should be thought of as a single charge.

I'm a firm believer in CLEAN, CLEAN, CLEAN.  We've always been told that a good flint shooter is the one who manages his lock well.  I think this applies to managing the vent well too.  My gut says if the prime ignites well, a slow fire is caused by fouling.

IMHO,
Regards,
Pletch

[roundball]

"...This might be heresy, but I've been thinking that a barrel charge and a pan charge with only .030" between them should be thought of as a single charge..."

Those wheels are always turning Larry... ...and IMO, that's actually a pretty profound idea

[northmn]

Funny thing is that some rifles seem to have a unique personality.  I remember on where the best way to get good ignition was to stick the vent pick in the touch hole and leave it there while loading.  My 20 bore has a coned breech which makes me wonder if I am not getting a bit of hangup somewhere as it seems empty behind the vent.  I prime and forch 4f through the vent and into the charge and get good ignition.  Sometimes a flash in the pan if I do not.  Really makes me rethink a lot of old truisms.  Maybe a low touch hole is better

DP

[BrownBear]

I'm so inexperienced with flinters I should probably zip my yap, but I have to say so far my shooting mirrors Larry's hypothesis:  Clean seems to be the big deal.

I'm more of a hunter and general field shooter rather than a range rat or match shooter.  Based on that I've made it a habit on my range tests to slosh my rifle around a bit, just as though I was carrying it in the field.  In my real life away from the range the prime is going to shift a bunch before shooting, no matter how I load it. 

So far my sloshing hasn't made a whit of difference in apparent ignition time, telling me prime position is pretty low on my list of concerns.  But let the fouling build up even a little, and that's a different matter.  I'm only basing that on experience with 3 rifles and one smoothie so far, but it's universal among them.

[SCLoyalist]

...... as it seems empty behind the vent. 

Northmn,  A few months ago  I was getting semi-frequent shots that just didn't sound right when the gun went off.   Turns out that my .54 would blow some of the main charge out the touchhole when I rammed the ball down.  I don't know if I'd ever have figured out what was happening if the guy on the line next to me hadn't mentioned that he was getting sprayed on the leg with powder when I loaded.   Anyway, I measured the touchhole, found it to be a bit large.   I put in a White Lightning and the problem went away.  

So, you may be blowing a little powder out the vent and creating a void if you don't have the touchhole plugged with a 'pick while loading.

SCL

[Larry Pletcher]

Some time back when we were timing cupped/vs flat breech plugs, something unexpected showed up.  We were using a removable vent (spanner wrench), and I forgot the diameter of the vent.  I used a drill bit to confirm the diameter and pushed out a nicely formed  "tube" of fouling:





  I may have posted these pics before - can't remember.

My gut says that the vent diameter gets smaller as we shoot unless we clean it carefully.  Maybe large diameter vents are more forgiving because we don't clean them often enough.

BTW I have nothing against small diameter vents, but I like .067" (#51 bit) vents because I can get a pipe cleaner through them.

Regards,
Pletch

[northmn]

At this time, for the larger bores, I am using a 49 drill bit (.073) for the touchhole, holding to the theory of proportions in that a larger vent may not have the same effect on a large bore as a small bore.  I also have a .060 vent in my 25.  I really cannot tell much difference in realiaility.  The 25 has a standard flat faced breech and a good lock and is very reliable.  Beginning to rethink touch hole size.  The vent in my 58 deer gun is .073, and may have a self priming tendency, but with 2f it seems to be fine.  Need to go out and shoot a few with the vent packed with primer as I did the 58.  I hae used a round toothpick to stop self priming while loading 3f in one rifle.  Seemed like when the ball was seated, the charge packed and the self priming was not an issue.  When I packed priming in the touch hole I took my vent pick and kept puching it in until it did not want to push anymore, more or less.  My liner is built something like a White Lightening.

DP

[hanshi]

Out of habit I drill out the vents in all my guns with a 1/16" (.0625) bit.  With 3f I've occasionally noticed powder granules blown out through the hole when loading.  With this size vent never was the amount significant though it was detectable.  With 3f as the main charge, even a vent this small sometimes permits a very slight amount of self priming.  Normally picking the vent is unnecessary during shooting but is occasionally required.  A pipe cleaner can still be inserted in this size hole though just slightly snug.  During reloading in the woods a pick made of very fine spring wire is normally inserted in the vent during the reloading process.  A FITP is not permissible while on a hunting trip.  When a new gun or new liner comes along not only is the hole modified but the inside cone is opened a bit more with a Dremel tool.  With this protocol FITP and/or hangfires are significantly reduced or eliminated.  They still happen from time to time but so far only (knock on wood) at the range. 

Our first experience with flinters was more than 40 years ago yet we are constantly learning something new almost daily.  At this point these practices and "facts" have become almost a ritual:
1.  Drill vent liner to 1/16".
2.  Open inside cone a bit.
3.  Load (in the field) with the vent hole plugged.
4.  Always expect a trace of self-priming to occur with 3f.
5.  Try for 1/3 to 1/2 (max) pan full of prime.
6.  Wipe flint, frizzen and pan (thumb works fine) with each reload.
7.  Ignore the movement of prime as gun is handled.
8.  TRUST the gun.
                             Just MHO.

[omark]

most of you guys have a lot more experience than i do, but my 2 cents worth. as i lift my rifle to shoot, i just give it a quick twist to the left to move the prime over to the vent. the other thing i do is carry a brass wire vent pick to help eliminate vent wear. i carry it in a hole drilled between the toe of the stock and the back of the trigger guard.   mark

[Simon]

While I don,t have experience with a large number of different locks,I find that the heighth of the vent hole above the floor of the pan has a lot to do with how much prime to use.  On one of my rifles the vent is totally above the top of the pan and it likes a full pan of prime.  If  I use a half pan of prime or less it's not 100% reliable.  This is a large lock and a full pan is a lot of prime 5-6 grains, I think.  On another rifle the vent is exactly in the sun set position ( half above and half below the top of the pan) and the pan is not very deep.  A 1/3 or a little less of prime is reliable. this would be about 1-2 grains   altho I believe that it is faster with a full pan of Prime..

I have found that the vent has to be kept clean and I think that this is harder to do if there is a lot of moisture in the air. I have shot in very dry conditions (10-12-% humidity) and in damp condition (75-80%).  I think the damp conditions would be where the pipe cleaner would be better altho I have never used one. I have gotten as many as 10 shots without picking the vent in very dry conditions, but in damp weather had to pick for every shot.

I don,t know if this means anything to anyone else, but to me a full pan of prime and a clean vent is best.
     

[Daryl]

I got to using a full pan on all of my flint rifles and .62 smoothbore.  Works for me.  If I don't completely ignore my flint and the buildup of fouling around the pan and on the frizzen's base, ignition is extremely fast on all of them.  I dont' wipe the pan, but looked at it when priming every shot last Sunday - about 60 shots fired, maybe 70.  There seemed to be never more than 1 or 2 shot's of fouling on the surface and wiping that off fora  few shots didn't do anything positive that was noticable.  What did make a difference was cleaning the fouling off the frizzen and off  the pan's anvil so that it sat flat.  the negative I noticed that was after a number of perfectly fine shots, maybe 30 or 40, the frizzen wasn't closing off the pan and I started to get missfires, even though I could see sparks every 'trip' of the cock.  Taylor said "The sparks aren't going into the pan".  I scraped the fouling off with my patch knife and ignition was restored.  The change in striking angle must have caused the direction of spark 'throw'.

I was shooting bevel down with a quite thin 'white' flint, which was striking the top of the frizzen, just barely down from the curl and scraping full length.  That was evident by the scrapes in the fouling.   After the frizzen wasn't closing, the flint was striking further down which not only reduced sparks, but sprayed them out to the left and ahead of the pan - for some reason.   Trunign that flint over made the sparks hit the pan perfectly, but only struck 1/4 of tghe frizzen's face.   Some flints work best one way or the other, I've found - depends on their thickness and angles.  At times, bevel up strikes too low - turn it over and bingo - perfect ignition and visa-vis.

[hanshi]

Locks, like the rifles they're mounted on, can be individuals, for sure.

[northmn]

Went out and tried it again today.  Took a vent pick and cramed the priming into the vent and the main charge.  Noticed a slight delay but nothing a flintlock shooter should have a problem with.  I hit the target, a coffee can shooting offhand at deer distance.  The reliability is more important than the ability to shoot out an X ring anyway.  Mostly deer hunting I use a rest on the stand or something else.  I rarely shoot offhand.  When experienced shooters, like Bob obviously is,  claim something different from the "common knowledge" I get taught it makes me want to experiment a bit.  Hope they do not find it offensive, as I appreciate their input.  My mother was from Missouri.

DP