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Post by armando on Oct 27, 2021 16:29:52 GMT -7
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Post by hawkeyes on Oct 28, 2021 6:08:46 GMT -7
Interesting, thanks for sharing.
“ a rifleman on service should have a small leathern bag fixed to his belt, with about thirty balls, tied up in greased patches”
I'm sure he's referring to an "American rifleman" potentially... However he could also be referencing a British soldier and his tied cartridges. I'm rather positive the British military didn't place any regards to accuracy in their training so the idea here is he's referring to a soldiers cartridges.
However I would speculate he is referencing an account from which he noticed regarding our rifleman. Now the idea of a leather wrapped ball is intriguing... Leather by far would create an excellent gas seal and potentially increased accuracy. Given ball of the day was undersized by our standards loading would be much easier. This may warrant some experimental efforts..
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Post by paranger on Oct 28, 2021 6:45:10 GMT -7
Leather patched balls were apparently de rigeur in their use with jaeger rifles on the continent, and the 95th Rifles of the Napoleonic era seem to have used them for their first round, if memory serves.
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Post by Black Hand on Oct 28, 2021 14:25:03 GMT -7
Automotive chamois would work quite well...
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Post by artificer on Nov 10, 2021 14:36:10 GMT -7
Interesting, thanks for sharing. “ a rifleman on service should have a small leathern bag fixed to his belt, with about thirty balls, tied up in greased patches” I'm sure he's referring to an "American rifleman" potentially... However he could also be referencing a British soldier and his tied cartridges. I'm rather positive the British military didn't place any regards to accuracy in their training so the idea here is he's referring to a soldiers cartridges. However I would speculate he is referencing an account from which he noticed regarding our rifleman. Now the idea of a leather wrapped ball is intriguing... Leather by far would create an excellent gas seal and potentially increased accuracy. Given ball of the day was undersized by our standards loading would be much easier. This may warrant some experimental efforts.. Do we have enough information to make that general assumption other than when someone had to buy a replacement mold for his rifle? It would seem to me that we don't, because there seem to be only a tiny number, if any at all, of 18th century rifles in their original "Non Freshed" Bore Size and with their original molds made or supplied by gunsmiths who built the rifles. The reason I bring this up is because experimental archeology at Colonial Williamsburg and other places have proven the gunsmiths who at least finish bored their barrels (even if they didn't make barrels and only used rough bored barrels supplied by others) were quite capable of finish reaming bores to as tight of specs as many if not most of our modern made barrels, especially if they began with the mold for the rifle and used the cast ball as a gauge with whatever they thought would be suitable "windage" in the bore. (Windage is the period term for the difference between the diameter of the ball and the diameter of the bore.) To use the cast ball as a gauge, did not require modern precision tools or gauges. Taking the ball from the mold, they could have wrapped paper one time around it, but just so the paper did not overlap. Using period paper and the ball, they could easily have come up with a windage of only around .010" or ten thousandths of an inch difference between the ball and bore size, if they wished. Now I can't document they did that, BUT I've never found period directions on how gunsmiths decided the acceptable windage, especially in their rifle barrels. We do have documentation period paper was used by riflesmiths to shim barrel reamers and with rifling cutters to set the depths of rifling in their barrels, though. Oh, for those who don't have a machinist or gunsmithing background, a difference of only .001" or One Thousandth of an Inch in ball to bore size can easily mean you would have a devil of a time pounding a ball down a bore to .001" larger bore and the ball would easily slide all the way down the bore by gravity alone. About five or six years ago, I got into a discussion on the other forum with La Bonte, who many remember was the professional Saddler and Leather Smith Chuck Edwards, about using leather for patches in rifle bores. I confess I also thought then that to use a greased leather patch in a rifle, it would require a loose ball to bore size fit. Well, Chuck set me straight from his own experimentation of using scrap brain tanned leather as rifle patches. He said he had no problem used the scraps of brain tanned leather (greased with period correct grease) and not trying to select belly leather that is "stretchier" compared to leather from around the animal's shoulders, which is the thickest part of the hide. Chuck used them in rifles with ball sizes only .005 less than bore size and it was easier than many folks target loads with the patch thickness they use in barrels. With the ball sizes .010" less than bore size it worked really well. Bottom line is that brain tanned leather greased with period greases works VERY well with our modern and "tighter" ball to bore sizes. I also asked Chuck about using Bark/Veg Tanned leather, tanned the way it was done in the 18th century, for patch material. He had not experimented as much with that, though sheep hides tanned that way were not a problem. He was pretty sure Possum, beaver and some other skins from small game would work as well. (Note: plenty of animal skins on the frontier and tanned in their own home "tan vats" would thus easily work.) He didn't know about bark/veg tanned cowhide, because of course without serious skiving down the hides, it would have been too thick, so he had strong reservations about cowhide. Gus
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Post by hawkeyes on Nov 18, 2021 6:02:54 GMT -7
Interesting, thanks for sharing. “ a rifleman on service should have a small leathern bag fixed to his belt, with about thirty balls, tied up in greased patches” I'm sure he's referring to an "American rifleman" potentially... However he could also be referencing a British soldier and his tied cartridges. I'm rather positive the British military didn't place any regards to accuracy in their training so the idea here is he's referring to a soldiers cartridges. However I would speculate he is referencing an account from which he noticed regarding our rifleman. Now the idea of a leather wrapped ball is intriguing... Leather by far would create an excellent gas seal and potentially increased accuracy. Given ball of the day was undersized by our standards loading would be much easier. This may warrant some experimental efforts.. Do we have enough information to make that general assumption other than when someone had to buy a replacement mold for his rifle? It would seem to me that we don't, because there seem to be only a tiny number, if any at all, of 18th century rifles in their original "Non Freshed" Bore Size and with their original molds made or supplied by gunsmiths who built the rifles. The reason I bring this up is because experimental archeology at Colonial Williamsburg and other places have proven the gunsmiths who at least finish bored their barrels (even if they didn't make barrels and only used rough bored barrels supplied by others) were quite capable of finish reaming bores to as tight of specs as many if not most of our modern made barrels, especially if they began with the mold for the rifle and used the cast ball as a gauge with whatever they thought would be suitable "windage" in the bore. (Windage is the period term for the difference between the diameter of the ball and the diameter of the bore.) To use the cast ball as a gauge, did not require modern precision tools or gauges. Taking the ball from the mold, they could have wrapped paper one time around it, but just so the paper did not overlap. Using period paper and the ball, they could easily have come up with a windage of only around .010" or ten thousandths of an inch difference between the ball and bore size, if they wished. Now I can't document they did that, BUT I've never found period directions on how gunsmiths decided the acceptable windage, especially in their rifle barrels. We do have documentation period paper was used by riflesmiths to shim barrel reamers and with rifling cutters to set the depths of rifling in their barrels, though. Oh, for those who don't have a machinist or gunsmithing background, a difference of only .001" or One Thousandth of an Inch in ball to bore size can easily mean you would have a devil of a time pounding a ball down a bore to .001" larger bore and the ball would easily slide all the way down the bore by gravity alone. About five or six years ago, I got into a discussion on the other forum with La Bonte, who many remember was the professional Saddler and Leather Smith Chuck Edwards, about using leather for patches in rifle bores. I confess I also thought then that to use a greased leather patch in a rifle, it would require a loose ball to bore size fit. Well, Chuck set me straight from his own experimentation of using scrap brain tanned leather as rifle patches. He said he had no problem used the scraps of brain tanned leather (greased with period correct grease) and not trying to select belly leather that is "stretchier" compared to leather from around the animal's shoulders, which is the thickest part of the hide. Chuck used them in rifles with ball sizes only .005 less than bore size and it was easier than many folks target loads with the patch thickness they use in barrels. With the ball sizes .010" less than bore size it worked really well. Bottom line is that brain tanned leather greased with period greases works VERY well with our modern and "tighter" ball to bore sizes. I also asked Chuck about using Bark/Veg Tanned leather, tanned the way it was done in the 18th century, for patch material. He had not experimented as much with that, though sheep hides tanned that way were not a problem. He was pretty sure Possum, beaver and some other skins from small game would work as well. (Note: plenty of animal skins on the frontier and tanned in their own home "tan vats" would thus easily work.) He didn't know about bark/veg tanned cowhide, because of course without serious skiving down the hides, it would have been too thick, so he had strong reservations about cowhide. Gus I'm referring to the nominal caliber size as we see it today. So I stick to my previous posting as every period gun I've had the opportunity to examine was indeed "undersized" to our standards, not much else to say in that regard. Concerning tight tolerances, absolutely... Its amazing to see what the ole boys were able to do, never ceases to amaze me. You mentioned leather patching... An area I'd like to dedicate some R&D time to. I could see some thin brain tan making an exceptional patch. Now question would be... Are these pre cut patches or potentially a strip much like ticking to be cut at the muzzle?
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Post by paranger on Nov 18, 2021 7:07:30 GMT -7
To the best of my knowledge, the leather patches used by the 95th and Jaegers on the continent were pre-cut. Certainly could be done either way, but I would think dimensional tolerances when cutting them might be trickier on leather due to differences in thickness and compressibility(?)
Certainly a topic worthy of experimentation. It is interesting to note that Germanic Jaeger rifles are sometimes described having leather patched balls "hammered" home with some sort of mallet.
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Post by artificer on Nov 18, 2021 11:08:41 GMT -7
Do we have enough information to make that general assumption other than when someone had to buy a replacement mold for his rifle? It would seem to me that we don't, because there seem to be only a tiny number, if any at all, of 18th century rifles in their original "Non Freshed" Bore Size and with their original molds made or supplied by gunsmiths who built the rifles. The reason I bring this up is because experimental archeology at Colonial Williamsburg and other places have proven the gunsmiths who at least finish bored their barrels (even if they didn't make barrels and only used rough bored barrels supplied by others) were quite capable of finish reaming bores to as tight of specs as many if not most of our modern made barrels, especially if they began with the mold for the rifle and used the cast ball as a gauge with whatever they thought would be suitable "windage" in the bore. (Windage is the period term for the difference between the diameter of the ball and the diameter of the bore.) To use the cast ball as a gauge, did not require modern precision tools or gauges. Taking the ball from the mold, they could have wrapped paper one time around it, but just so the paper did not overlap. Using period paper and the ball, they could easily have come up with a windage of only around .010" or ten thousandths of an inch difference between the ball and bore size, if they wished. Now I can't document they did that, BUT I've never found period directions on how gunsmiths decided the acceptable windage, especially in their rifle barrels. We do have documentation period paper was used by riflesmiths to shim barrel reamers and with rifling cutters to set the depths of rifling in their barrels, though. Oh, for those who don't have a machinist or gunsmithing background, a difference of only .001" or One Thousandth of an Inch in ball to bore size can easily mean you would have a devil of a time pounding a ball down a bore to .001" larger bore and the ball would easily slide all the way down the bore by gravity alone. About five or six years ago, I got into a discussion on the other forum with La Bonte, who many remember was the professional Saddler and Leather Smith Chuck Edwards, about using leather for patches in rifle bores. I confess I also thought then that to use a greased leather patch in a rifle, it would require a loose ball to bore size fit. Well, Chuck set me straight from his own experimentation of using scrap brain tanned leather as rifle patches. He said he had no problem used the scraps of brain tanned leather (greased with period correct grease) and not trying to select belly leather that is "stretchier" compared to leather from around the animal's shoulders, which is the thickest part of the hide. Chuck used them in rifles with ball sizes only .005 less than bore size and it was easier than many folks target loads with the patch thickness they use in barrels. With the ball sizes .010" less than bore size it worked really well. Bottom line is that brain tanned leather greased with period greases works VERY well with our modern and "tighter" ball to bore sizes. I also asked Chuck about using Bark/Veg Tanned leather, tanned the way it was done in the 18th century, for patch material. He had not experimented as much with that, though sheep hides tanned that way were not a problem. He was pretty sure Possum, beaver and some other skins from small game would work as well. (Note: plenty of animal skins on the frontier and tanned in their own home "tan vats" would thus easily work.) He didn't know about bark/veg tanned cowhide, because of course without serious skiving down the hides, it would have been too thick, so he had strong reservations about cowhide. Gus I'm referring to the nominal caliber size as we see it today. So I stick to my previous posting as every period gun I've had the opportunity to examine was indeed "undersized" to our standards, not much else to say in that regard. Concerning tight tolerances, absolutely... Its amazing to see what the ole boys were able to do, never ceases to amaze me. You mentioned leather patching... An area I'd like to dedicate some R&D time to. I could see some thin brain tan making an exceptional patch. Now question would be... Are these pre cut patches or potentially a strip much like ticking to be cut at the muzzle? Hawkeyes, Sorry it has taken a while to answer. I had a bit of a problem with the Pfizer Booster Shot, then Fios did some kind of maintenance, which cost me another day. I may be a bit thick from the shot effects today, but I'm afraid I don't understand what you meant by your statement of " I'm referring to the nominal caliber size as we see it today." - in relationship to bore to ball size? Could you explain more, please? I don't believe Chuck mentioned whether he pre-cut the brain tan leather into patches or cut them directly from scraps he had on hand, not unlike cutting a cloth patch from a scrap piece of cloth. I do remember he was adamant about greasing the patch with a period grease. Gus
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Post by hawkeyes on Nov 18, 2021 15:26:15 GMT -7
I'm referring to the nominal caliber size as we see it today. So I stick to my previous posting as every period gun I've had the opportunity to examine was indeed "undersized" to our standards, not much else to say in that regard. Concerning tight tolerances, absolutely... Its amazing to see what the ole boys were able to do, never ceases to amaze me. You mentioned leather patching... An area I'd like to dedicate some R&D time to. I could see some thin brain tan making an exceptional patch. Now question would be... Are these pre cut patches or potentially a strip much like ticking to be cut at the muzzle? Hawkeyes, Sorry it has taken a while to answer. I had a bit of a problem with the Pfizer Booster Shot, then Fios did some kind of maintenance, which cost me another day. I may be a bit thick from the shot effects today, but I'm afraid I don't understand what you meant by your statement of " I'm referring to the nominal caliber size as we see it today." - in relationship to bore to ball size? Could you explain more, please? I don't believe Chuck mentioned whether he pre-cut the brain tan leather into patches or cut them directly from scraps he had on hand, not unlike cutting a cloth patch from a scrap piece of cloth. I do remember he was adamant about greasing the patch with a period grease. Gus Hope your okay! I got the J&Johnson jab, one and done, zero problems minus feeling fatigued which is normal... Certainly hope your reaction is without complications. Some have encountered bad adverse problems. Anywho what I mean by my above statement concerning bore size, let's use for example a modern, say .54 caliber. We know this particular gun will shoot for argumentative sake a .530 ball. Yes various other calibers can be made to suit a barrel of today, but with our modern mindset we want to have a relatively small margin for error as some are keenly focused upon accuracy and everything down to the thousandths. Rewind... While we know there wasn't per say an "off the shelf exact caliber" variations existed in ball size between every mold made. Potentially small variations but to our modern way off thinking concerning precision, much looser of a tolerance. Given the examples I've handled the two come to mind at a local museum up North in Lodi Ohio. Both guns of early 19th century origin, each with what is mentioned to be their original molds in very good condition. Between the two they both seem to measure in-between our modern .45/.50. Both firelocks are rifled and they very "could have" been re-bored at one point in history. If that be the case, that would justify the difference in bore size compared to the mold. Regardless, each mold indeed was what I'd consider undersized to our standards, or a nominal size. Does the above make any sense? Haha, Typing what my mind is trying to get out sometimes gets lost in translation. There was an elder fella that would bring a modern copy of an original rifling machine to several events across the area. What an absolute amazing piece of equipment, utterly fascinating to watch. The sheer dedication to the particular task of rifling alone is mesmerizing in itself.
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Post by artificer on Nov 18, 2021 17:05:34 GMT -7
Hope your okay! I got the J&Johnson jab, one and done, zero problems minus feeling fatigued which is normal... Certainly hope your reaction is without complications. Some have encountered bad adverse problems. Anywho what I mean by my above statement concerning bore size, let's use for example a modern, say .54 caliber. We know this particular gun will shoot for argumentative sake a .530 ball. Yes various other calibers can be made to suit a barrel of today, but with our modern mindset we want to have a relatively small margin for error as some are keenly focused upon accuracy and everything down to the thousandths. Rewind... While we know there wasn't per say an "off the shelf exact caliber" variations existed in ball size between every mold made. Potentially small variations but to our modern way off thinking concerning precision, much looser of a tolerance. Given the examples I've handled the two come to mind at a local museum up North in Lodi Ohio. Both guns of early 19th century origin, each with what is mentioned to be their original molds in very good condition. Between the two they both seem to measure in-between our modern .45/.50. Both firelocks are rifled and they very "could have" been re-bored at one point in history. If that be the case, that would justify the difference in bore size compared to the mold. Regardless, each mold indeed was what I'd consider undersized to our standards, or a nominal size. Does the above make any sense? Haha, Typing what my mind is trying to get out sometimes gets lost in translation. There was an elder fella that would bring a modern copy of an original rifling machine to several events across the area. What an absolute amazing piece of equipment, utterly fascinating to watch. The sheer dedication to the particular task of rifling alone is mesmerizing in itself. Thank you. I had a slight bit of unease from my first Pfizer shot for a few hours, but had virtually no ill effects from the second. This booster shot, though, has meant a sore arm until just a couple hours ago and a sort of malaise or feeling like one is just a bit beyond beginning to get sick. Not any big problem though. Just took a nap and I'm feeling better. OK, just because they didn't make bore sizes as exact as ours in calibers, that doesn't mean the gunsmith who finish reamed the bore could not make the bore fit the ball from the mold he had made for it, as tight as our barrels are today. Let's say the ball from the original mold actually measures .471" in diameter, no matter what size may or may not be marked on the mold. When using the ball cast from the mold as a gauge and wrapping paper around it without overlapping (to see if it would slide easily into the muzzle without too much additional "windage"), the bore could easily have been finish reamed to .481". Now of course in the 18th century and until about the 1840's when affordable vernier calipers that could measure to .001" were invented, the gunsmith would not have known the exact size of the bore or ball, but that didn't matter to him or his customer, as the ball from the mold would have been a tight fit with patching in that barrel. I know since most of us are at least used to reading about precision measurements, even if we have never used a pair of inexpensive digital calipers that reads to lower than .001" measurements, we moderns don't think like they did long before such measuring instruments were available. That can easily lead us to assumptions that were not necessarily true. As to the two original early 19th century rifles and molds you spoke of in a museum near Lodi, Ohio. Those most likely were plain Iron barrels, as steel barrels were not yet that common. Iron barrels required "freshening" the rifling and to a somewhat lesser extent the bore (lands) much more often than in our experience with modern steel barrels. This has been documented in the Corps of Discovery Journals by most all of the writers with Lewis and Clark. One of the Sergeants, who had some artificer/gunsmith training, freshened most, if not all their barrels on the journey when they came back to his cached tools. Still, it would be interesting to see what size balls those molds cast and what size the bores are today in those rifles. Gus
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Post by hawkeyes on Nov 19, 2021 5:06:25 GMT -7
Good topics of discussion Gus, appreciate your view points on those areas. I'll dive in later once time allows for more discussion.
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Post by artificer on Dec 8, 2021 14:26:02 GMT -7
Good topics of discussion Gus, appreciate your view points on those areas. I'll dive in later once time allows for more discussion. Looking forward to it! Gus
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Post by artificer on Dec 8, 2021 23:24:29 GMT -7
As an important side note to this discussion, I've often thought about how spare bullet molds would have been sold in retail shops, as we know they were indeed imported and sold that way.
A period shop keeper was not a gunsmith or blacksmith and certainly was not one who had the few precision instruments available, as their cost would have been well outside his/her budget. No doubt they had rules and perhaps even cloth tape rules, but those were nowhere close enough to measure ball size to bore size. I also don't believe the average customer would automatically believe a mold marked in the same balls per pound as his rifle or smoothbore would have taken that for granted as fitting his gun bore.
Using Occam's Razor or the Kiss Principle, whichever way you wish to describe it, I've always believed at the retail shops any halfway intelligent shop keeper would have poured molten lead into each mold to form the ball and just left it in the mold. That way his customer could actually try the ball in his gun to see if it fit at all in his gun and in the case of for a rifle, fit it closely enough for his needs. Of course, I can't document this, but it just makes period sense.
What I don't know and have never been able to document is how tight a ball to bore fit would have been considered acceptable for either a gunsmith or even that average retail customer. Realizing ANY mold of any size that fit in the barrel would have been acceptable in an emergency, I still believe they would have tried the cast balls from different sizes and chose the one they thought fit best.
Gus
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Post by brokennock on Dec 9, 2021 2:46:09 GMT -7
Gus, your mention of retail molds marked in balls per pound raises another question I've often wondered on. Does that mold actually drop a ball that weighs that fraction of a pound? If so, what bore diameter was a gun built with when a customer wanted a gun to shoot that many balls per pound? If I order a rifle to shoot 36 balls to the pound and the barrel is bored to .506" it won't shoot a ball .506" in diameter with a patch. Thus, if I have said, ".50 caliber" rifle and buy a mold marked for 36 balls to a pound, they will be too big. We're the rifles overbored to accommodate the patch, or were the molds adjusted to throw a ball reasonably smaller, or, did folks just know to buy a mold for a few more balls per pound?
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Post by artificer on Dec 9, 2021 3:25:57 GMT -7
Gus, your mention of retail molds marked in balls per pound raises another question I've often wondered on. Does that mold actually drop a ball that weighs that fraction of a pound? If so, what bore diameter was a gun built with when a customer wanted a gun to shoot that many balls per pound? If I order a rifle to shoot 36 balls to the pound and the barrel is bored to .506" it won't shoot a ball .506" in diameter with a patch. Thus, if I have said, ".50 caliber" rifle and buy a mold marked for 36 balls to a pound, they will be too big. We're the rifles overbored to accommodate the patch, or were the molds adjusted to throw a ball reasonably smaller, or, did folks just know to buy a mold for a few more balls per pound? That's a great series of questions for which I don't have the answers. I believe Spence has said he has an early 19th century mold and it is marked in balls per pound. If I remember correctly, he said those balls were undersize for that caliber. That seems the most likely way they would have done it, but I personally can't document it. Gus
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