slow ignition

[Harnic]

I guess it is a good stalling technique Daryl...

[Pete G.]

If the vent is just barely ahead of the breech then some of the inside part of the cone of you liner may covered. A lot of the old guns had a sort of tapered groove filed into the face of the plug to alleviate this. You might want to try pulling your plug and lay it against the outside of your barrel to see how the plug and the liner match up. If the plug end overlaps the liner by any appreciable amount use a small round file to create a notch for the vent.

[Dphariss]

In my experience coning the outside of a vent is a mistake.
Vent liners similar to the White Lightning should be installed so that the length of the drilled vent is very short. .030 max. Almost nothing is best with the WL internal design or similar.
This puts the charge right next to the priming. Never needs picking or very seldom and this is usually because a flake of fowling has gotten in the way to insulate the main charge.
I have never seen a lock slowed down by filling the pan. Light priming charges are the prime cause of flashes in the pan right in there with using coarse powder. Yes, using ffg makes my rifle less reliable.
If the vent is right or even close and its properly primed the main cause of slow ignition is the lock. Its wood bound or it needs modifications.
Poor spark due to a bad frizzen, hardness or alloy or the angles are wrong and its throwing the first sparks in front of the pan and some finally get into the pan and light it. Changing the angle will usually fix this. Another thing is a too weak frizzen spring that lets the frizzen move too readily.
if I had a slow lock with decent springs I would bend or otherwise modifiy the cock to point the jaws down a little more.

Dan

[Daryl]

After loading, I see powder next to the pan when looking into the vent. It's always there, 2f or 3F for the main charge. I've had flashes in the pan only when using 2F for the main charge. Each time this happens, I look at the vent and there is a small piece of fouling blocking the vent hole.  It doesn't happen when using 3F for the main charge.  I am asuming the 2F blows more fouing out the vent, or in larger pieces than 3F.  This is in my .40 barrel. I've not had it happen with the .45 barrel, which is interesting. I'm assuming when I pull the cock back, a small piece of fouling falls from the side of the flint and sometimes blocks the vent - or the vent gets blocked by a piece of fouling as I close the frizzen after priming - I can see no other cause. It happens quite infrequently, but it happens. It cannot happen as the charge goes off as the .070 vent blows hard when the charge ignites - getting 1,850fps with the load so pressure is fairly high. If I was shooting squib loads, I could see that as being the cause - this isn't the case. As I said before, I always prime with 4F.  It's rate of burn(consumption) in the pan iseems faster or it develops greater heat on flashing. With 4F, ignition is noticably faster than when using 3F or 2F for priming.

[Dphariss]

Daryl
I tend to get slower ignition and more misfires with FFG Swiss in the pan of the Manton lock. But its a hard high polished powder and may not light from sparks as easily.
I also think that FFFFG is hotter, it makes more heat faster due to its faster burn rate (near 4 times FFG) the smaller grains should also "light" easier. The faster heat rise has to make for a faster light through the vent.
This has been tested with timers by Larry P. and FFFFG is marginally faster. But this is just for ignition time in the pan. How fast it lights the main charge would need another battery of tests. But if it ahsa faster heat rise which I think it must then it has to get the ball out the barrel faster.

Dan

[Larry Pletcher]

Daryl
I tend to get slower ignition and more misfires with FFG Swiss in the pan of the Manton lock. .. . . . . .This has been tested with timers by Larry P. and FFFFG is marginally faster. But this is just for ignition time in the pan. How fast it lights the main charge would need another battery of tests. But if it has faster heat rise which I think it must, then it has to get the ball out the barrel faster.
Dan

Hi Dan.
I saw your post as I was getting ready to leave for Friendship.  I agree with your conclusion.  In the last experiment, I timed from pan ignition to barrel ignition.  But, I was comparing vent location and priming powder location  instead of the differences between powders.  However using what I learned,  a similar series of tests could be done where priming powder was the variable. 

It seems like I've worked all around your suggestion:
different powders - but lock only - (ffg, fffg, ffffg, Null B)
pan to barrel ignition - vent locationy only
pan to barrel ignition - powder location in pan only
pan to barrel ignition - vent diameter (cylinder hole)

It seems logical to do
pan to barrel ignition - with powders used in the orignial "lock-only" test.  I think that is the test your last sentence calls for.

Regards,
Pletch

PS - at Friendship I hope to discuss a project with Jim Chambers.  He suggested a test to compare barrel ignition speeds between percussion and flint using small Silers because of interchangeability.   Added to this is the possibility of a mule ear lock built on a small Siler plate, giving us 2 percussion and the flint for comparison.  Too many ideas and too little time.

[roundball]

7/8 x .45 cal. liner is drilled out to 5/64 and edge of liner is 1/64" ahead of breech plug. face of breech plug is also highly polished. 3f for main charge and 4f in the pan

Are both powders from those cans proven tpo be fast in other Flintlocks?
Reason I ask is that I got hold of a few cans of Elephant 3F one time and it was absolute junk...wouldn't even ignite fast enough in caplocks...finally poured it all out into 10ft lines on the ground and burned it off...

[Dphariss]

7/8 x .45 cal. liner is drilled out to 5/64 and edge of liner is 1/64" ahead of breech plug. face of breech plug is also highly polished. 3f for main charge and 4f in the pan

Are both powders from those cans proven tpo be fast in other Flintlocks?
Reason I ask is that I got hold of a few cans of Elephant 3F one time and it was absolute junk...wouldn't even ignite fast enough in caplocks...finally poured it all out into 10ft lines on the ground and burned it off...

Elephant had a lot or two that they pressed too hard and made too dense and this might have been what you had though I have not heard of this before.

Dan

[roundball]

I forget the lot# (cans are up in the attic) but I recall it was made in '99...a number of people ended up with that junk...it literally had identifible little pieces of wood visible it in...have seen many posts about poor quality of Elephant powder over the years...my conclusion is that there cost cutting measures probably impacted their product quality in the years immediately prior to going out of business completely.

[Daryl]

Wood chips in the powder- sounds like Canadian commerical grades of toilet paper sold to BC Correction centres -