1853 Enfield knocks at the door...

[bagdadjoe]

I tried not to let it in, but here it is.  It's a Euro Arms (Armi) 3 band "London Armory" in pretty decent shape. Wood is really nice, a little surface rust near the muzzle on the outside that should come off.  Bore is perfect.  A fellow was using it for re-inactments and lost interest apparently.  Never had a ball down the barrel.  I'll fix that .  Ordered an "original" minie-ball mold last night.  500gr hollow base. 
The down side is....I bought it with part of my mold money for the Gibbs    Still inching toward getting it fired up as well.  Platinum nipple is in the mail.....

[Semisane]

You're a great American bagdadjoe, and have done the right thing.

Give me your worn, your rusted,
Your unfired barrels yearning to make smoke,
The wretched refuse of your dark closet.
Send these, the homeless, the neglected, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

[bagdadjoe]

   man, that's so heavy......

[Muddly]

Ah the blessed '53... Mine ( Euroarms) has stood up to MANY a Yankee charge over the past 13 years with nary a misfire. I've fired over 1500 blanks and 1200 ball rounds through her. She also has 5 yankee deer to her credit. Her best load is a Lyman 575213OS lubed with the melt and dip version of Bore Butter, over 60gr of 3f Swiss black. Hits right to the sights at 100 and knocks the snot out of anything in its way. Groups in the 2 1/2 to 4 inch range. ENJOY

[bagdadjoe]

I shot it four times the other day...just had to.  Shot almost to point of aim at 50 yds with 70 grains of 2F Pyrodex Select...all I had on hand.  I'm hoping to pick up some real black next weekend at Friendship.  First shot, fouler, was low and left, #2 was about 3" left of the point of aim, followed by #3 about 2" to the left of that and in my excitement upon hitting the target at all, I neglected to swab the bore for #4 as I had done before and it went another 4" to the left of #2.  I just mixed up some beeswax/lard/olive oil lube which is a lot stiffer than the beeswax/olive oil patch lube I used on the first 4 which I hope to try out today with a slightly stiffer charge of powder.  It was dry, dry, dry here and hot as the doorknobs on the Gates of Hades...  Hopefully, now that things have cooled down and I don't have to contend with sweat in the eye and mosquitos, maybe I can have a decent range session (how's that for a limp alibi?)  The thing I noticed most was the amount of dust hanging in the air around for a long time in the target area and the big grooves left in the rock hard dirt...