How much can I "cheat" on my touch hole liner?

[Steeltrap]

My barrel is 7/8" and I will be installing a 1/4-32 White Lightning touch hole. My lock is smaller in size so right now if I drill the TH dead center, it would be about .100" above the pan line.

From my best guess I can drill the TH about .050 "lower" than center on the barrel flat.

Does that make sense?

[Mike Brooks]

Touch holes, better a little high than a little low.

[Bill Raby]

No reason that it needs to be on the center of the barrel flat.

[Daryl]

Seems to me, the timed ignition tests showed a vent covered with priming, gave faster ignition than one higher.
A 1/10" is quite a bit.
My first SMR barrel had a VERT high vent hole, about 1/10", might have been .150" above sun-set location.
Ignition was spotty. We made a new vent with a lower hole right at the sunset location and ignition immediately improved.

[smylee grouch]

Does the pan have enuf metal so you could grind it a little deeper?

[Daryl]

My barrel is 7/8" and I will be installing a 1/4-32 White Lightning touch hole. My lock is smaller in size so right now if I drill the TH dead center, it would be about .100" above the pan line.

From my best guess I can drill the TH about .050 "lower" than center on the barrel flat.

Does that make sense?

You can make it lower, NP. .050 is 150% better than .10".

[Steeltrap]

Thanks Gents. I’m pretty sure I will be under the .050 distance when it’s all done.

[Bill in Md]

Set it so you can fill your pan with flash pan to the top without the hole being totally covered. More flash powder means quicker ignition if everything is set right

[Eric Krewson]

It has been my experience that a full pan goes off slower than a pan that is about 1/3 full, too much burn time I suspect.

[smylee grouch]

That fire starts at the top of the pile regardless of how big the pile is. If the pile isn't covering the vent it shouldn't make any difference. The bigger the pile the more surface area to catch a spark. JMHO

[Daryl]

I've always felt the more prime, the hotter the flash. The hotter/larger the flash, the more likelihood of ignition.

[Hungry Horse]

Good grief, I have a friend that owns  French musket built from surplus parts, that no doubt was assembled in America to fight the Revolutionary War. That muskets touch hole is below the bottom of the brass pan, and a channel has been cut down so the touch hole is exposed to the priming powder. And believe it or not, it works, and somebody risked their life on it working. So yea, it will work.

Hungry Horse

[Steeltrap]

I've always felt the more prime, the hotter the flash. The hotter/larger the flash, the more likelihood of ignition.

I'm not saying you're wrong on this....but powder ignites at a given temp and doesn't technically get any "hotter" than that. (Like water boils at 212....but you will never get a temp reading of 213)

It may be a bigger flash....but not a hotter flash.

[Steeltrap]

Does the pan have enuf metal so you could grind it a little deeper?

The flash hole on this one will never be below the pan line.....ever!!

[smylee grouch]

Steeltrap, in my first post I used " deeper " when I should have used " wider ". As I implied  in another reply you want to catch the sparks with the prime so more or a wider area of prime should increase the likelihood of catching those sparks.

[Steeltrap]

Ahhhhh….I understand your question. The answer is no.

[Clark Badgett]

Good grief, I have a friend that owns  French musket built from surplus parts, that no doubt was assembled in America to fight the Revolutionary War. That muskets touch hole is below the bottom of the brass pan, and a channel has been cut down so the touch hole is exposed to the priming powder. And believe it or not, it works, and somebody risked their life on it working. So yea, it will work.

Hungry Horse

That musket would sure be something to see. With a brass pan I would guess it to be post war.

[Hungry Horse]

 Not so, The lock is an early musket lock made in the Mubeuge armory sometime about 1745. Obviously the brass pan that showed up on the 1777 model muskets was the rest of the armories copying a good idea. Interestingly this lock doesn’t have a double throat cock, but it does have good clear arsenal markings.

Hungry Horse

[Clark Badgett]

Not so, The lock is an early musket lock made in the Mubeuge armory sometime about 1745. Obviously the brass pan that showed up on the 1777 model muskets was the rest of the armories copying a good idea. Interestingly this lock doesn’t have a double throat cock, but it does have good clear arsenal markings.

Hungry Horse

Except there was not any known French armories making brass panned locks prior to the 1777 model. However, starting in 1794 several American gun makers were shipped various parts of French muskets left over from the Revolution to assemble into muskets as close to the 1766 pattern as possible. The 1728, 1746, 1754, 1763, 1766-1770 & 1774 all used iron pans. This does not rule out the possibility of an experimental lock, but that would quite rare and suspect.

[Top Jaw]

I have a pretty high TH on a Haines and it goes off as well (maybe better to my mind) as my 3 other custom flinters.  It’s a white lightening liner opened to 1/16”.  Builder must have marked it wrong, because it’s very high out of the pan.  I can’t tell any difference with a half a pan of priming in a well tuned lock. 

[Bob Roller]

I cobbled a flint lock rifle together about 22 years ago with a GM 1"x 42 X 58 caliber and a Ketland lock with a big pan.The flash hole was brass and was made by me with a 1/4x28 thread and counter bored 5/16 diameter counter bore to seat it.The flash hole was a #44 drill hole and slightly enlarged form the OUTside with a 4/0 taper pin reamer.The breech I made was made from 1144 "Stressproof"and counter bored with to a depthj that JUST cleared the flash hole and I used 3 flute end mill that was 7/16 when new and was resharpened to .400 diameter.
Walnut full stock from Pecatonica,steel trigger guard and butt plate and single trigger completed  and it was as fast as any caplock I ever shot and I wish I still had it.I primed with DuPont 3fg and had a 1/2 pound can of it.I have never seen another 1/2 pound can of any kind of black powder.OK,rant over.
Bob Roller

[Steeltrap]

I don't think I posted this.....but I resolved the issue by scraping the barrel channel lower. I was still in the build process where this could be done without affecting anything else.