Well, it took me from August to now to get a chance to shoot the Ferguson !!!! However, I was out at my test facility in the Mojave Desert shooting some experimental armor plate with 30-06 AP and I managed to get a a half an hour between tests to try out the 18th century version of an assault weapon. I made a batch of "Fergie Lube" per Bryan Brown's instructions. I heated and lubed the breech screw. I cast 15 rounds each of .615, .620. and .650 ball and coated each one by dipping them in the melted lube with tweezers. I used 3F Schutzen powder and loaded a fairly consistent 53 grains with each round. The weather was very dry and about 75 degrees F.
I started with the .615 ball and, since I did not have the time to play with adjusting the sights, I decided to fire three rounds at 25 yards just to see where they would print with the sights just as I installed them at the bench. All three hit about an inch high and three inches left of point of aim. I left the sights alone and set out a new target. I fired 5 rounds of the .615 ball and all went well. The shots grouped in a vertical line at the expected high and left position from target center. After these first eight rounds, the breech was getting a little stiff to operate but, having taken Bryan's warnings to heart, I made sure I opened it right away so it wouldn't freeze up on me. Having used the successful Fergie Lube, I was a little surprised that I was having trouble so soon in the firing string. However, I had spoken to Dave Person on the phone the night before and he had given me a clue. When I made up the lube I made it approximately 2/3 Crisco and 1/3 bees wax by volume. When I applied it to the breech screw threads, I did so hot and then let it cool. When I installed the breech screw, most of the lube was scraped off the threads as the breech turned in. So I think the problem is that I don't have enough Crisco in the lube and it was just a little too hard. It actually worked very well on the balls, since, if the lube had been much softer it might have been wiped off just during handling. However, I think I need a softer version for the breech.
At any rate, I partially cleaned and relubed the breech screw and continued. With a new target, I fired 5 rounds of the .620 ball. Although the group was more circular, I did not see any significant difference in point of impact or scatter. I was running short on time, so I changed targets once again and fired 5 rounds of the .650 ball and, again, did not see any significant difference in group size or point of impact. Again, though, this was all at 25 yards, so you would not expect much variation.
At any rate, I was very pleased to get a chance to shoot the darn thing after waiting so long to do so. Anticipating the vertical blow by at the breech, I did not wear a hat. However, next time I will at least wrap a bandanna around my forehead (no longer protected by much hair) as I sustained some light powder burns in that area. (It might also help to move my head back some ....duhhh !!)
Great fun and a very comfortable gun to shoot. Cleaned up easily with cold water. (I pulled the barrel and just used a garden hose with a nozzle to blow all the fouling out of the barrel - took about 10 seconds. Cleaned the lock the same way and then dried and WD-40'd everything.
More later. Have an armor experiment test report to write in an hour.
