Original Jaeger rifle twist

[rich pierce]

IIRC, RCA #42 has a fast twist barrel, less than 1 in 48", though the caliber is sub- .50.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

I've been looking at images of German rifles in a couple of publications including "Steinschloss Jagerbuschsen", and there are no rifles that I can remember that have steel ramrods.  All have wooden rods that are relatively small in diameter.  I cannot see a hunter hammering on the end of one of these with a mallet.
The British issued a mallet with every second Baker rifle, to be used to start the patched ball into the muzzle.  If I can remember correctly, it had a 6" handle, but I don't remember the handle's configuration.  When I made the mallet for my buddy's Baker, I used a dense section of moose antler crown turned to about 1 3/4" in diameter, and inserted a piece of 1/2" hickory for the handle, fitted with a brass end and we use it like a short starter.  With the Baker's steel rod, this makes loading the rifle very easy, allowing for a very tight combination, and consequently, superb accuracy.
Perhaps there have been similar "mallets" found in European hunting bags, and someone deduced that these were used to pound the ball down the bore.  In my considerable experience, I have found that a bore sized ball can be loaded with a .020" well lubed cotton patch, with a 3/8" hickory rod, once the ball is flush with the muzzle.  For at this point, the combination has the dimensions of the inside of the bore - no bigger - and can be easily pushed down the bore to the powder, in 6" increments.  The rifling has compressed the patch into the lead on the lands, and fills the furrows fully, thus allowing no gas cutting, burn out or cut patch, and consequently, fabulous accuracy.

[westerner]

When examining my blown out patches, I got the impression gas cutting and burning did the damage, not friction from the rifling or bore.

              Joe.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Joe, if the patch is cut, torn or even stretched too thin on entering the muzzle, it will show up on the ground as badly torn, and or burnt. It amazes me that the crowns on these old German rifles is so apparently sharp.  The furrows are usually filed into a sort of funnel, but the lands are often quite sharp.
I took a leap of faith with my Virginia rifle and having found the thing to be delightfully accurate and easy to load, I filed the muzzle into those decorative hollows in the bottoms of the grooves.  I am pleased to report that it did not take away anything of the barrels superb accuracy, and made loading even easier.

[Acer Saccharum]

Taylor, what do you think about leather being used for patching in the jaegers? I guess you'd have trouble getting consistent thickness, but certain leathers are quite compressible, and would fill those deep grooves nicely.

[Artificer]

When examining my blown out patches, I got the impression gas cutting and burning did the damage, not friction from the rifling or bore.

              Joe.

That's all I used to think it was from as well as every rifle barrel I shot with round balls, except for originals, was 1 in 48 or slower twist.   They all had good crowns that didn't tear the patch when loading.  

My speculation is that when the rate of twist is faster (and with the same ball/patch/powder load) friction increases throughout the bore or maybe just when the ball starts down the barrel for a little way.  Now, it may be with even period lubrication on the patch, the increased friction may not account for much, though.
Gus

[Stophel]

Modern high velocity rifles with very shallow grooves often have turns of one in 10 or 12 inches...

[Z. Buck]

Stophel, i know the M4 the army issues me shoots what the army likes to call a "hyper-velocity round" with a 1-7 twist, no granted i as a gun builder know that "hyper-velocity" means nothing quantifiable and is just a way of the military saying "so fast it doesn't need to be heavy" to alleviate all of the questions of the 5.56s knock down power

[Dphariss]

Thanks Taylor,

If I remember correctly, the British units that carried the Baker rifles were issued wooden mallets to drive the balls down their barrels.  This may have been mostly to overcome the powder fouling when firing many rounds in combat though.

I always thought that beating down oversize balls in rifle bores was more experimental than practical, even if it was done at times in the past.  It would seem that you could never keep the ball uniform nor uniformly fill in the grooves that way.
Gus

They had one mallet for two riflemen. It was used as a starter. Or so I have read. The balls were not so tight as to really need a mallet at all times or they would have issued them 1:1 with the rifles.
Dan

[Artificer]

Taylor, what do you think about leather being used for patching in the jaegers? I guess you'd have trouble getting consistent thickness, but certain leathers are quite compressible, and would fill those deep grooves nicely.

Not Taylor but,

The consistant thickness would be the problem.  It has often been stated that leather was sometimes used in ALR's.  I'm not sure if that was more when something else could not be obtained as the thickness would matter, of course.  To get any kind of consistant thickness, it would have to be animal skins that were processed to fairly standard thicknesses at least by local tanners or from places the skins could be readily purchased.

I have no original documentation for this, but something like vellum could have been used for this purpose.   About 1/4 of the original 180 copies of the Gutenburg bible were printed on vellum and many of the medieval documents of import were printed on vellum, so it was widely known in Europe. 

Gus

[Artificer]

Thanks Taylor,

If I remember correctly, the British units that carried the Baker rifles were issued wooden mallets to drive the balls down their barrels.  This may have been mostly to overcome the powder fouling when firing many rounds in combat though.

Gus

They had one mallet for two riflemen. It was used as a starter. Or so I have read. The balls were not so tight as to really need a mallet at all times or they would have issued them 1:1 with the rifles.
Dan

Taylor mentioned this as well, so it sounds to me like it was for loading fouled bores in combat?
Gus

[Artificer]

Stophel and Zack,

We teach the rates of twist in M16/AR 15 rifles and what bullets were meant to be used by them as the rates of twist went from 1 in 14 down to 1 in 7.  Proper stabilization of the size bullets was and is important for each bullet weight from 55 gr to 80 gr.   However, modern bullets have a copper allow jacket that is oversize from the bore and thus forces the jacket into the lands and grooves.  With the exceptions of rifles like the Ferguson and Hall's Breechloading rifles (as two more well known examples), this did not generally happen in the ALR era.

You just can not get as tight of a mechanical fit in the rifling grooves with patched balls, Minie' balls, Picket Balls or belted balls that are loaded from the muzzle - even though there is some expansion of the balls with some of these.
Gus

[der treue Hesse]

Hello All;

For what it is worth;

I have a mid-eighteenth century Prussian military jaeger rifle.  The barrel length is 28", cal. is .67, and the rate of twist is 1:37"

Thanks,
Todd

[Stophel]

Excellent!  Thank you.  This is about the same as mine (a later gun) of about one in 32".

[Jim Kibler]

Here's a question to ponder.  What was the driving force for the thransition to slower twist rifling in the longrifle?  Many of the earliest examples still with us have been found to have a twist comparable to some of the Jaeger twists mentioned.  What caused the transition to slower twists?

[Acer Saccharum]

Would availability of good powder make a slower twist more practical(in that higher velocities could be obtained)?

Maybe the Germans used fast twists, but what did the English/French/Dutch use?  Maybe the move to a slower twist implies a cultural blending as well as a technological move?

[James Rogers]

Taylor, what do you think about leather being used for patching in the jaegers? I guess you'd have trouble getting consistent thickness, but certain leathers are quite compressible, and would fill those deep grooves nicely.

Not Taylor but,

The consistant thickness would be the problem.  It has often been stated that leather was sometimes used in ALR's.  I'm not sure if that was more when something else could not be obtained as the thickness would matter, of course.  To get any kind of consistant thickness, it would have to be animal skins that were processed to fairly standard thicknesses at least by local tanners or from places the skins could be readily purchased.

I have no original documentation for this, but something like vellum could have been used for this purpose.   About 1/4 of the original 180 copies of the Gutenburg bible were printed on vellum and many of the medieval documents of import were printed on vellum, so it was widely known in Europe.  

Gus

There are 18th century references to loading with thin leather in Germany as well. Here is one at hand.

  ..................  Befides the method of loading a rifle  barrel, by driving down the ball with  an iron rammer, there are feveral  others which we mall mention.  In  Germany they fometimes charge them  in the following manner : a piece of  thin leather or fuftian is cut of a circular  fhape, and fo large as to cover a  little more than one half of the ball ;  this piece is then greafed on one fide*  and being placed over the muzzle, the  ballball is laid upon it, and both thruft  down together ; by this means the leather  or fuftian enters into the rifles,  and the bullet being firmly embraced  by it, acquires the proper rotatory motion  in its paflage through the barrel.  If this method be equally effectual, it  is certainly much more eafy and expeditious  than that already defcribed.  Some of the old pieces of this con-  ftruction, were charged by taking out  the breech every time ; and we are informed,  that the pieces ufed by the  Heffian yagers, are charged in the fame  manner as the common fcrew-barrel  piftols. By far the moft expeditious  way of charging rifled pieces however,  is, by means of an ingenious contrivance  which now generally goes under  the name of Fergufon's rifle-barrel,

An Essay on Shooting 1789

[James Rogers]

I do not know where authors got the idea that Jaegers used an iron rod and a hammer to load their guns.  Once it is seen in print, it seems, the myth gets perpetuated until it becomes a universal truth.

Must have started early on by contemporaries of the time.
Here is an account written in 1789.
The mallet seems to be described as a mallet rather than a shortstarter type implement.
Wonder if the writer actually saw or witnessed the use of one or just wrote about what he had no experience with like many authors do today. 

 Thefe pieces are charged in various  ways. In general, the ball, which is  fomewhat larger than the caliber before  it was rifled, is driven down a-top  of the powder, by means of an iron  rammer, ftruck with a mallet, whereby  that zone of the ball which is in  contact with the fides of the barrel,  becomes indented all round, and is  moulded to the form of the rifles.  When the piece is fired, the ptbjec-  tions of the ball which fill the rifles,  being obliged to follow the fweep of  the fpiral, the ball thereby acquires a  L 2 rotatoryrotatory motion upon ah axis that cor-  refponds with the line of its direction j  fo that the fide of the bullet which  lay  foremoft in the barrel, continues foremoft during the whole of the  flight.



An Essay on Shooting 1789

[Dphariss]

Thanks Taylor,

If I remember correctly, the British units that carried the Baker rifles were issued wooden mallets to drive the balls down their barrels.  This may have been mostly to overcome the powder fouling when firing many rounds in combat though.

Gus

They had one mallet for two riflemen. It was used as a starter. Or so I have read. The balls were not so tight as to really need a mallet at all times or they would have issued them 1:1 with the rifles.
Dan

Taylor mentioned this as well, so it sounds to me like it was for loading fouled bores in combat?
Gus

The Baker was used with two different ball sizes. One for accuracy, a 22 gauge for patching  and 20 bore for the paper cartridges, for rapid loading in tactical situations. I would have to read up to freshen my memory. Bailey details all this in "British Military Flintlock Rifles".

Dan

[Acer Saccharum]

I'd think you'd hear the enemy a-tunkin' away on their iron ramrods with their iron mallets...a dead giveaway.

[Artificer]

Here's a question to ponder.  What was the driving force for the thransition to slower twist rifling in the longrifle?  Many of the earliest examples still with us have been found to have a twist comparable to some of the Jaeger twists mentioned.  What caused the transition to slower twists?

I agree with Acer that improved powder would be significant. 

What I have never been able to find is much in the way of original reference sources on the quality of black powder made in the different countries of Europe much before the 1780's.  At that time France became self sufficient in saltpetre and was known as making the best and cheapest powder in Europe. 

The sheer numbers of surviving powder testers from the 18th century attest to the fact that uniformity and quality of black powder must have varied widely.
Gus

[Acer Saccharum]

Dupont was French, eh?

[Dphariss]

Here's a question to ponder.  What was the driving force for the thransition to slower twist rifling in the longrifle?  Many of the earliest examples still with us have been found to have a twist comparable to some of the Jaeger twists mentioned.  What caused the transition to slower twists?

I agree with Acer that improved powder would be significant. 

What I have never been able to find is much in the way of original reference sources on the quality of black powder made in the different countries of Europe much before the 1780's.  At that time France became self sufficient in saltpetre and was known as making the best and cheapest powder in Europe. 

The sheer numbers of surviving powder testers from the 18th century attest to the fact that uniformity and quality of black powder must have varied widely.
Gus

Greener did not think much of French powder in the 1890s.

Dupont made better powder in America to begin with but by the time the premium powders of the lte 19th century were being make Dupont was making low, middle and better grades but not best as far as I can tell from the writings of the time. The serious shooters did not use Dupont at least not by choice.

But the powder made in America when Dupont decided to immigrate was very poor.

Dan

[Artificer]

Dupont was French and it seems he learned his trade from Director of a French Arsenal - Antoine Lavoisier.  Lavoisier had made great strides into combining theories of combustion with Boyle's gas laws.   I remembered part of that from reading about it a number of years ago, but I also found this link:

http://www.aeragon.com/o/me/bp.html

[Artificer]

Dan,

I did not know that about Greener, but I did know that the British retook the lead in black powder quality in the 19th century.  I don't know exactly when it was done, but they must have had high quality powder

Prior to DuPont, American powder making was in it's infancy.  

Bofors Industries of Sweden was begun in 1646 and they claim to have been the main manufacturer of black powder in Europe shortly afterwards.

The British had powder mills around the same time and because of the Mercantile System in America, much if not most of the powder used here probably came from there in the early to mid 18th century - except of course for the colonies France or Spain held.  The British obviously knew how to make good gunpowder as their Navy become the best in the world with their guns and seamanship.  

I don't know if the Swedish powder came to America, but we do know that steel from that region was brought in for clock makers and was preferred by gun makers (who could get it) for springs.  That powder could have been brought here by the Dutch, but most likely in limited quantities.

I found an interesting tidbit on fireworks.  It seems the two best sources in Europe in the 17th century were from Italy and Germany.  The fireworks makers in Nuremburg were considered the most technologically advanced and I'm speculating they made better powder.  That could mean germany had very good powder as well.

It seems Great Britain was more loose with applying mercantilism than most other countries until the end of the French and Indian War in 1763.  Then they really tightened down.  I'm just guessing most of the powder available in the colonies that fed the early ALR's (until the Revolution) would have come from Britain, though I could be entirely wrong.


Gus