muzzleloader loads

[walleyewess]

I'm wondering what is a good bullet for muzzleloaders. I normally use powerbelts and have no problem with accuracy. But from what I have hear they aren't very good when it comes to penetration and expanding. I have yet to kill a deer with my muzzleloader but have heard of multiple stories where people only start finding blood 50+ yards away and then finding the deer another 50+ yards from that. suggestions would be great I would like to pick some up soon and start practicing while I have a good amount of time to do so.

[Crow Hunter]

If you do a search back in the muzzleloader forum there have been some threads discussing what people use, there is no shortage of opinions on what works well. There is a fair amount of variation in barrel inside diameter from different manufacturers and even model to model from those manufacturers, so the best thing to do is to try different bullet/sabot combinations to see what accuracy you can achieve with your particular gun. I personally stopped using powerbelts after reading some articles on terminal performance of various bullets. I now use Hornady .45 caliber XTP pistol bullets in a Harvester crush rib sabot. I get good accuracy with this combination, sighting in at 100 yards. I have only shot one deer with it so far, the deer made it less than 30 yards. Good luck.

[leechlake]

I've killed 4 elk with Powerbelts and recovered quite a few of the bullets. Most looked like they expanded nice and a few hit bone and you could see it in the bullet. Zero of the elk died very fast and two of them I shot twice. The biggest I shot right behind the shoulder into the lungs and by the time we went looking for him which was only about 15 minutes he was still alive but died soon.

I like powerbelts because they are accurate in my gun and very easy to load. The killing fast thing has always bothered me and I'd guess 4 elk that all didn't die fast is more of a trend than a fluke.

[lakevet]

I'm wondering what is a good bullet for muzzleloaders. I normally use powerbelts and have no problem with accuracy. But from what I have hear they aren't very good when it comes to penetration and expanding. I have yet to kill a deer with my muzzleloader but have heard of multiple stories where people only start finding blood 50+ yards away and then finding the deer another 50+ yards from that. suggestions would be great I would like to pick some up soon and start practicing while I have a good amount of time to do so.

Been doing the muzzleloader thing for about 20 years now. Deer shot muzzleloading by our family party over that time into triple digits.

Accuracy is number one. Use a projectile your gun likes. Be able to consistently put the projectile under hunting conditions where it needs to go.

Lack of blood trail right away happens more often with muzzle loaders, but have seen deer shot with center fires (30-06, 308) thru the upper chest cavity double lung not leave blood trail for 100 yds on snow, only to find dead a few yards after blood starts. If you do your part, the deer will be dead, just need a little tracking. 50 yds is not far, especially late season with snow. Tracking is a skill set that is critical for all hunters to be as proficient as they can be. Practice it every chance you get.

Our group has used just about every type of projectile made.

Our experience is the best at leaving blood trails is a .54 round lead ball. There is a reason plain lead is outlawed in war by the Geneva convention.

If you really are worried about it, get close enough to confidently shoot them in the neck/spine. Getting close is the fun part!

And you are absolutely dead on by practicing a lot now. Great job!

Have fun!

Lakevet

[flipper]

Powerbelts were the first bullet I used several years ago. They are nothing more than a lead conical with a very thin copper coating and a plastic skirt. I got good accuracy from them but found they have a tendency come apart. I think if I was to use powerbelts it would be one of the heavier ones with a fairly light charge.

There are many different sizes of sabots available so you should be able to find one that doesn't load to hard in your barrel.

Myself I have settled on using my own homecast conicals which weigh from 440 to 500 grains depend on which one. Most of these have a fairly large flat meplate, they are very accurate,mushroom nicely and hold together very well.

My roundball gun is a Lyman 54 caliber Great Plains Rifle with a 1 in 60 inch twist. The roundball is also deadly on game with proper placement.

My shots are less than 100 yards so the flatter shooting light bullets really are of no advantage to me.

Hope this helps some.

[charliepete]

I have mentioned it here before, but I had an awful experience the only time I used a Powerbelt on big game. I like them from an accuracy, cost, and ease of load perspective, but their terminal peformance isn't on par with even a middle of the road big game bullet. I shot a medium sized bear in a bait at 20 yards and took him through the ribs. There was no exits hole and the bullet completely disintegrated after striking the near side rib. I recovered the main bulk of the bullet and found that it retained about a 1/4 of it's original weight. The rest was sprayed bullet fragments. I recovered there bear within sight of my bait as I had made a good shot, but I couldn't help but wonder what would have happened on a bigger animal, at a further distance, contactign shoulder intead of rib bone. I switched to Barnes tipped MZ bullets and haven't had any further issues.

[lakevet]

Consider also how fast you are pushing your projectile. Too much velocity can be as bad as too little with some projectiles performance. 80 to 100 grains of powder plenty for thin skinned whitetails out to 100 yards in our experience.

lakevet

[swamptiger]

I've only shot one elk with a Powerbelt, and it dropped in it's tracks.

But it was one of the heavier solid tipped bullets they make, not one of the lighter hollowpoints.

[walleyewess]

Thanks guys for sharing your info I'm going to take a look at the barnes sabots. but one more quick question. when you are using sabots in the field, do you run a patch down the barrel before you reload or what? thanks

[Bowfin]

Barnes TEZ in 250 grain for me. In the field I usually don't run a patch through every time I load as I can shoot 777 3 or 4 times and still seat my bullet fine and accuracy isn't much affected.

[Whoaru99]

Thanks guys for sharing your info I'm going to take a look at the barnes sabots. but one more quick question. when you are using sabots in the field, do you run a patch down the barrel before you reload or what? thanks

I used Barnes Expander MZs with great success.

[mechanictim]

I have used Hornady XTP 44 cal. 300 grain bullets for 20 years and shot deer from 30 out past 100 yards. I always get complete pass throuhs so have not recovered any bullets. The blood trails have been good to spectacular with blood spraying out from both holes. As for running a patch down the bore between shots, if your not in a hurry for a quick follow up shot I would say yes run the patch no matter which type of bullet or sabot you are using.

[Bowfin]

Whenever I run a patch down, I shoot a primer off to clear out any gunk I may have pushed into the breech plug hole. Depending on the situation when out hunting, many times I don't want make the noise of shooting off a primer so I will load up 3-4 times between cleaning my barrel.

[WaveWacker]

I am a huge, huge fan of the TC shockwaves shot through my TC Omega.

[Eric Wettschreck]

I'm wondering what is a good bullet for muzzleloaders.

I've tried various different combo's and quite honestly I've had the best results with the ball and patch combo and 80 to 100 grains of powder.

Very accurate if you don't "overload" the powder.

[TruthWalleyes]

I'm shooting barnes expander mz

50 cal .451sabot

250 gr mzfb

[Gordie]

44 cal. Hornady XTP's was a great, loaded with 100 grains of Pyrodex pellets. That combo put a lot of veni on the table. I have also used the powerbelts, but stepped it up to a 295 grain bullet and had no troubles with those

[TruthWalleyes]

I'm shooting barnes expander mz

50 cal .451sabot

250 gr mzfb

After shooting 3 of these this weekend I'll be picking up the Barnes T-ez. If they both group the same I'll use the mz for my 1st shot and the T-ez for a dirty barrel reload. If they don't group the same I'll just shoot the T-ez. The MZ loads incredibly tight!

[sportfish]

I use hornady SST bullets , and won't use powerbelt ever again

[midwesthunter]

250 gr Barnes T-EZ for me.

[paceman]

I use hornady SST bullets , and won't use powerbelt ever again

Yep me too.....

[Wanderer]

Thanks guys for sharing your info I'm going to take a look at the barnes sabots. but one more quick question. when you are using sabots in the field, do you run a patch down the barrel before you reload or what? thanks

I like the Thompson Center seasoning patches between shots if I have the time. I hate the ram rod on my TC Pro Hunter FX due to it being too short. I have to screw on the extra jag to get to the bottom of it and without the palm ball on it, my hand can't take the pressure needed to seat the sabot on the powder after even two shots.

The seasoning patches make it much more bearable plus I like the consistency of shooting under the same conditions inside the barrel each time.

Do yourself a favor - mark your ram rod when seat your load on a clean barrel so you know how far down you need to go. After a shot or two, the residue causes enough resistance that you might think you've made it home but really haven't. The mark will keep you from guessing.

For the record: I'm shooting Hornady FTX 250 grain bullets with the black crush rib sabots and 100 grains of White Hots. With my scope properly mounted (used in MN shotgun zones and out of state), I'm shooting 1 inch groups at 100 yards. I do feel patching the barrel between rounds helps make this consistency possible.

I used to shoot Powerbelts from my .54 cal and no problems with consistency, accuracy, or bullet fragmentation. They actually didn't even expand a lot. But those were HEAVY bullets pushed by 120 grains of loose 777.

[toddb]

Hornady SST .50/.45 250 grain with 85 grains Blackhorn 209 (weighed charge). accurate and as clean as it gets.

[Bambito]

For those of you who use the Barnes tez 250 grain, I'm guessing your pretty accurate at 100 yards? And if so how is the knock down power at that distance? We have shot tc shockwaves for the last few years and I'm tired of them. Used them in encores and my wife and I just traded them in for omegas. ( tired of the cleaning process with them) what would u recommend for new omegas under 100 yard shots usually .... 250 grain or 290 grain tez? Thanks

[TruthWalleyes]

If your just shooting under 100 go with the heavier bullet for better kinetic energy. I have the 250 t-ez and am very accurate at 100yds, still yet to sight it out further, and haven't taken an animal with it yet.