Chokes in a muzzleloading shotgun

[rudyc]

I remember hearing somewhere that a muzzle loading shotgun will generally pattern tighter than a breech-loading shotgun with the same choke restriction.  Any truth to that??

I think it has something to do with a lack of forcing cones in the muzzle loader.

My Beretta over/under has no choke and I can dust clays and kill pheasants out to 25 to 30yds without a problem. 

Got any thoughts about chokes in a muzzle-loader??

thanks in advance,

rudyc

[Feltwad]

I personally believe for a muzzle loading shotgun  barrels should be traditional and true cylinder  the choke boring is the early breech loading period
Feltwad

[northmn]

The choke boring came in, in the 1870's.  Open chokes are surprising effective beyond what most think.  I have nailed many birds with no choke out of a BP shotgun at surprising ranges when they permitted duck hunting with lead.

DP

[Daryl]

'Rudy - black powder shotshells as well as ML's loaded with shot have the potential to shoot better than modern shotguns with identical chokes.  This is what I've found in cross-referencing several guns.  Now, that's not much of a test group, but ML's & BP shotshells used in Imp Cyl, Modified, Improved Modified and Full chokes constriction consistantly beat modern ammo in modern guns.  BP shotshells were used in the same modern guns.  The ML tested was a Full choke which consistantly shot extremely tight patterns right off the bat wiht typical BP shotshell-type loads, whereas the modern full choke needed a lot of load development in different smokeless powders and wads to come close.  The BP shells consistantly shot very tight centre concentrations which is what gives range to the gun.

[northmn]

One of the big reasons BP tends to pattern a little tighter is that the pressures are 1/2 to 2/3 that of modern shells.  They use the lower pressure trick on turkey shells that have a hatfull of shot but low velocities.  The old original chokes were a little tighter than those they use today for the plastic shotcup.  I have a flintlock I made out of a modern shotgun barrel that was full choked, I had a little trouble getting it to pattern with one large enough to suit me.  I think a skeet choke which is about .003- .005 at most works pretty good in a ML as it does hold back the wads as it was designed to do to avoid donut patterns. Some rifle barrels have been made choked so that this small amount does throw a roundball fairly well.  In that light weight 12 flinter, I use RB's very sparingly.

DP 

[Daryl]

My 20 bore English styled smoothbore, made by A. Hunkeler has about .005" choke- a weak Imp Cyl.  Loading round balls is exceedingly easy, once they are short started,yet it doesn't blow patches & is fairly accurate.  So far, inlearning to shoot this gun, I've not done better than 4" at 50 yards off the bench with round balls, nor have I treid shot in it yet, but expect it to throw very good patterns.

DP is spot-on about the lower pressures with BP shot loads, in comparrison to modern shotshells typical 11,500PSI standard- 3 1/2" mags, or 2 3/4" trap loads - all are loaded to the same pressure.  Specialty ammo might be laoded to lower pressures, but it isn't common. With black powder loads, one must be careful about wad pressure to have consistancy, shot to shot.  50 pounds pressure on the wads was the old standard and works well in either shotshells loaded with BP or with shot in a ML.  If you handload smokeless powders, you can reduce pressures and improve patterns to match those that work well in black powder, but handloading is usually necessary.

I believe the Amercian Roper developed a screw-on choke around 1850.

[rudyc]

Thanks much for the info and your thoughts.

I have a set of 16ga Ithaca twist barrels that have been breeched for muzzleloading.  Have been thinking about how much to open the chokes in the barrels as they are choked tight and tighter now.

Right now I'm thinking cylinder for the right barrel and skeet for the left.

rudyc

[Daryl]

I'd go skeet or Imp/Cyl and Modified, myself, but if it's mostly an upland gun (probably), Imp/cyl in both tubes would be perfect.

[rudyc]

I'll be using the gun for informal clays shooting, trap, skeet and sporties. However the primary use will be for upland game / pheasants, grouse, bunnies and even some duck hunting as I have a pretty good supply of Bismuth and tungsten matrix.

My go-to chokes in all my modern doubles are imp cyl / improved modified, but given the fact that the BP guns tend to shoot a bit tighter I won't be using that tight of a combo.

Also a bit concerned about wads when using the tighter chokes.

rudyc

[Daryl]

The nice aspect of BP shotguns, is it's easy to adjust the load and therefore the pattern to suit the circumstances of the current hunt.  Imp cyl shoots better, generally more evenly than a straight cylinder bore.

[roundball]

MY .62cal Flint GM smoothbore barrel that I had Jug Choked Imp.Cyl. Plus...throws an outstanding pattern...and with the Jug Choke, there's no issue with seating bore sized wads.

I think I mentioned before that I'd made a terrific "reverse operation" discovery with it...where unlike typical ML somoothbores when adding more wadding opens up a doughnut hole pattern, this Jug Choked GM barrel throws a TIGHTER pattern using a full 1/2" wad compared to just a 1/4" wad...giving me the flexibility of actually manipulating the IC+ choked barrel into throwing a Full choke pattern.

(If the .62cal Full choke Virginia is not here for the April Turkey season, I'll use the GM IC+ barrel with full sized wads to go after a Tom)

The other .62cal GM barrel I had Jug Choked 'Full' (which I've already sold) followed the norm...when I move from 1/4" wads to 1/2" wads the pattern started opening in the middle like a doughnut.

Love playing with those smoothbores...

[arcticap]

I remember hearing somewhere that a muzzle loading shotgun will generally pattern tighter than a breech-loading shotgun with the same choke restriction.  Any truth to that??

I guess that I'll provide the flip side of the coin with my answer because I believe that modern muzzle loading shotguns need to be choked one constriction tighter to equal the patterning ability of breech loading shotguns.

Maybe with some tweaking the patterns of muzzle loading shotguns can be tightened up but more often than not the amount of shot needs to be increased to fill in the holes in the pattern. And if the velocity or amount of powder is reduced too much in an effort to tighten up patterns then the effectiveness & the overall performance of the shot load will suffer.