I'm really liking this 62-caliber

tddeangelo

Handloader
May 18, 2011
2,019
2
Took a deer tonight with my "new" long rifle (got it in late 2014)...2nd one so far with this rifle. Both have simply been dead on impact.

I took a pic of the deer as it fell, but it is not really forum-friendly unless folks want to see the blood and gore, lol.

Here's a more civilized one...

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Congratulations, Tom. Has to be gratifying to see the new smoke pole function as you hoped.
 
You guys should see the "not so nice" pic I took of her as she was when I walked up to her after the shot.

I've shot deer with 300 magnums, 264 magnum, 45-70, 12ga slugs, etc. I've never seen anything like this one.
 
Talk about impact..... Imagine fighting during the civil war. There is a reason their were so many amputations. You get hit in the leg w/ a .62 or .54 ball for that matter..... Sorry not to be morbid. Rifle looks beautiful, glad its working out for you. CL
 
Congratulations! And what a beautiful rifle...

Yes - a buddy of mine is quite an elk hunter with his "Hawken" using round ball exclusively. It's never failed him. Off the to of my head, I can't remember if his rifle is a .50 or .54 though...

Guy
 
truck driver":2fgii6of said:
Those pure lead Balls due expand for sure.


I'm not sure it did, to be honest.

The holes coming and going aren't much different in size. Same story on the doe I shot with this rifle last winter, too. 600 hole in, 600 hole out. Blood shot area is very, very small.

I'll lose more meat to what looks like a hit from another hunter that is puss-filled on top of her back than I will to the ball I put through her.
 
Tom. I'm use to hitting a rib and the hard bone does make them expand some and the only way I could keep from a pass threw with the little .45 round ball. 100grs of ffg always got the job done.
 
I'm shooting 120gr 2f under a 0.600 round ball. From the wound channel, which hit ribs and spine, I don't see much by way of a bigger hole exiting. Doesn't mean it didn't deform, but it didn't make any significant larger hole.

If anything, the entrance hole is bigger than the exit, lol.
 
TD, what type Round Balls were you shooting? Home cast or extruded balls from Speer or Hornady.
Many years ago I cast all my round balls from pure soft lead. If I could not make a good scratch on the ball with a fingernail then it was too hard for hunting. This piece of advice came from some real old timers I used to gab with at shoots and rondy's back in the 70's.
Those soft balls would really open up big and flat and if not DRT, then the tracking job was easy and shot.
Then I loaned my casting gear to a friend and it never found it's way home.
So using the extruded balls from Speer and Hornady my blood trails got a lot longer with less blood. Most of the shots had almost the same diameter going in and coming out. I think these hard balls are pushing a lot of vitals aside rather then opening up and smashing through doing damage.
Your post just got me to thinking about this.
 
Darkhorse":1snk6nt0 said:
TD, what type Round Balls were you shooting? Home cast or extruded balls from Speer or Hornady.
Many years ago I cast all my round balls from pure soft lead. If I could not make a good scratch on the ball with a fingernail then it was too hard for hunting. This piece of advice came from some real old timers I used to gab with at shoots and rondy's back in the 70's.
Those soft balls would really open up big and flat and if not DRT, then the tracking job was easy and shot.
Then I loaned my casting gear to a friend and it never found it's way home.
So using the extruded balls from Speer and Hornady my blood trails got a lot longer with less blood. Most of the shots had almost the same diameter going in and coming out. I think these hard balls are pushing a lot of vitals aside rather then opening up and smashing through doing damage.
Your post just got me to thinking about this.
I was using my own cast balls from soft pure lead. I did use the Hornady and Speer balls for target shooting.
Yep if you can't peel the lead with your finger nail it is too hard. Most of the commercial lead balls are work hardened.
 
I have enjoyed black powder firearms since I was a Freshman in High School. I've always liked the clean, and classic lines of the Pennsylvania and, or Kentucky rifles.
I do like the Hawken ones as well, but not like a beautiful Pennsylvania rifle.[emoji7]
Any black powder rifle .54 and above in caliber are devastating to big game. Usually when the smoke clears with one of those big suckers, you'll find a dead animal on the ground right where you were shooting, or not too far away.
Your rifle is great looking, and congrats on the deer you bagged!

HawkeyeSATX a.k.a. Bryce
 
I've been shooting purchased balls that are cast, not swaged or extruded. I forget the brand offhand. Not a major bullet maker, though.

I scored some close to pure sheet lead for cheap and have been casting my own for this coming season. Took a few runs with a lot of rejects to get the hang of it, but now I think I found my groove and my next session I should be able to make a big pile of round balls. I have about 150 pretty good ones now that I made.

The lead I got was sheeting from a hospital radiology room. Not perfectly pure, but dang close. And I got it for real cheap, so it worked out nicely. Got 400lbs of it and cleaned it all up into ingots and have it waiting to be cast as needed.

HAWKEYE, that rifle sports a 46" Hoyt barrel in 62 with a pretty beefy breech and very slender waist. It is not light, but it carries like it is. ;)
 
The trick to casting bullets is to get the mold hot and keep it hot along with a constant alloy temperature.
 
So I've discovered.

Being a lefty doesn't help. I have to keep more tension on the sprue plate than I should because I ladle pour and to tip the mold to the dipper, the sprue plate will fall open of its not snug (I hold the mold in my right hand and pour with my left).

But my end results are looking decent now with some practice. I need to start shooting them to see if they shoot as good as they're starting to look.

I'm anxious to take a deer this winter with a ball I cast.

The lead I'm using isn't pure, but it's darn close. A pure lead ball of 0.600 diameter mathematically would weigh 324gr. My balls cast from the X-ray lead weigh right at 320gr, +\- about 2gr. So they're close but not 100%. I think they'll work, though. They're very soft and don't frost when molded (so little to no antimony in it).

I run the lead and mold hot and the results have been looking good.

I have a 36-cal long rifle coming my way sometime soon. That'll be easier on my lead stash.
 
Tom,
Getting the lead too hot is bad also and will cause the alloy to crystallize. I would get a casting thermometer to check my alloy temp till you get use to reading the color for the right temp.
 
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