54 lyman great plains

[original]

ok i am now back to this page.   i am new to the flint lock world.  i found out that the flint lock that i was told was not the hunter and is the regular gpr.   after seeing how much cheaper the roundballs are i am happy the salesman made a mistake.   anyway i got the basics down and now just looking for any info that the more experienced guys can pass along to me.  powder charge, maintenance, bullet selection for hunting etc .  thanks everyone.   

[Swampman]

.520 to .530 roundball and 60-80 grains of Goex 3f will work perfectly.  You can use 3f for priming too.

[trkyman1]

You will need to put 100 rounds down the barrel before you settle on a load. They take some breaking in. I shot several loads out of mine one shot great the other not so good. Then after breaking in the barrel Im shooting one ragged hole at 50yrds with the load that would not shoot well before break in. That info was handed down to me from another gpr user on another site. Just passing the info. Great rifle.

[lakota]

If you feel like you need a little more punch for hunting you could try some ball-ets from Buffalo Bullet Company. They have more mass than a round ball but work in round ball twist barrels. But a .54 caliber ball already has some good punch to it

[Semisane]

For hunting, I feed my .54 GPR flinter 95 grains of GOEX FFFg.  It does real well.  Took my first flintlock buck with it last year at 88 yards.  Fifty grains FFFg makes a real nice target load that shoots to nearly the same point at 50 yards.

[mtbugle]

I also just last night got to my gpr flint 54 that I havn't shot yet. Sat will be our getting aquainted date. The gpr's are the roundballguns and come in both cap and flint. The hunters by name are the faster twists for elongated bullets. I am finding that the sights are very small in the notch and wide on front blade. Last night I filed the notch a little bigger so I can see around the front sight better.( narrowing the front sight may have been preferrable but more time consuming. Thanks for the load info guys.
Thanks Don.

[Semisane]

I filed the notch a little bigger so I can see around the front sight better.( narrowing the front sight may have been preferrable but more time consuming.

You did it the correct way MT, at least that what works best for me.  That wide flat front blade is sweet for hunting and works fine on the range.  I have no problem centering a target on the sight.

[mtbugle]

Thanks Semisane. It did work well today. Fired it up at 50 yards running 85 and 90 grains with .530 and .535 balls. holes all touching, sweeeet. I am about 3-4 inches high at 50 and seemed to be good for elevation at 100. We had verry windy day so was hard to get group at 100, seemed we were 10-12 inches left due to wind. Also when I thought all hell was going wrong I found my rear sight was not tight any more, so reset each shot for a few at 100 yds. when got home I put a soupcan shim under and re inserted. nice and tight now. front seems to be staked at 4 courners. So think I am good to go now. Season opens for deer sat. I also put in a longer screw for set trigger. It is real nice now. not the creapy heavy way it came. Do you think I should stake rear sight as well or just leave tight with shim?
Thanks Don.