Bob and I took a break from gun work to do some shooting. Here he has shot a .54 Hawken I made a long time ago, he said 1993. I hand-sawed the stock out of his West Virginia black walnut plank. A left-handed Davis lock is not a mirror image of a right handed one and gave me a lot of trouble to fit. Here he shot 80 grains of Goex 2F and .530 balls at 50 yards. He used pillow tick patches, they worked well.
This is a Track of the Wolf Kit Carson that we built a couple of years ago. He finished it. Same load.
He bought this rifle years ago and thought it was a TC with a 1 in 24 inch twist. He checked his records and it is really a Perdersoli Hunter/Target rifle, .58 caliber, with a 1-48 twist. I polished the crown, he said it was hard to load. The only balls I had were some I'd cast, they miked .5703 to .5705. I used .016 white linen that crushed to .010 for patching, but had to hammer the short starter to get the ball into the bore. No thicker patch would have worked. It amazed me they held together. I shot Olde Eynsford 1 1/2F measured with my 80 grain OE 2F measure. I put a wet patch on my seater jag, so wiped the bore down and back as I seated a ball. Once started, they seated easily enough. No other bore wiping. The rear sight has a screw adjustment, turned out it was loose. First shot high. Turned it full down, way low. Up some. Then up some more. I liked this rifle. I also like .562 balls in a .58. You can enlarge the picture by left-clicking it, then left click again when the little + sign comes up.
