Well, I have to say I am thoroughly hooked on flint rifles now. I bought an Austin & Halleck .50 cal. flintlock Mountain Rifle a couple months ago from my local gun shop. Up until then all my experience with blackpowder rifles had been with percussion guns, so I have to admit I was a little iffy about about the dependability of the flintlock.
Since then I have run a pound of powder through it, experimented with different patch thicknesses, and right now Im down to shooting 5 shot groups at 50 yards that consistently have 3-4 shots clover-leafed and 1 or two flyers that are never more than 1" away from the rest of the shots. I know this rifle is capable of putting 5 shots inside a quarter sized group, I just have to tweak my load combo a little more.
My main problem with the rifle at first was a widely varying ignition time and I have to admit it was givin me fits. That problem was solved with drilling the touch hole out a tad, now, the ignition is instant...I literally can tell no difference between it and shooting a percussion rifle, the ignition is that fast.
Its a shame that Austin & Halleck are no longer in business...as they made one hell of a fine rifle as far as i can tell. The local shop has 2 more of theyre Mountain rifles left, both percussion guns...I may just wind up with one of those too before its over with.
Right now my load is 80 g. of FFFg Goex, .490 rb over a .021 pillow ticking patch cut at the muzzle, lubed with ballistol oil.
