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Firing Muzzleloaders
How do you fire a muzzleloader? It's easy, although not as simple as firing a modern firearm. Load, prime, and take your firing stance.
All muzzle loading starts with powder, then greased patch or wad, then the projectile, making sure to ram the projectile home tight on the powder charge. A blown breech will result if the ball is left halfway down the bore.
For Flint and Matchlock shooters, priming is done with a little powder in the pan, most experienced shooters do not fill the pan entirely.
With a caplock, you would push the cap tightly onto the nipple instead.
Firing
There are two things
you must remember about firing a muzzleloading firearm:
First, locktime,
(time from trigger release to ignition), is
longer, making it necessary to hold
steady as the gun discharges, a skill similar
to a bow shooter's "follow through".
Secondly, a person
dedicated to learning muzzleloading accuracy should learn from the beginning
to shoot standing,
a muzzleloader behaves differently when rested on a bench rest.
Triggers
Many modern muzzle
loading firearms manufacturers make much of "double
set" triggers. This arrangement involves two
triggers in tandem inside the guard. The first
is the Release trigger, or Hair Trigger,
the second is called the "Set Trigger"
because it is pulled back first, before the shot, setting the spring that
gives the hair trigger its light release. The alternative, of course, is
the single trigger.
A lot of new shooters
will derive some benefit from the double set trigger, it goes off with
about an ounce of trigger pull, which helps the new shooter make a clean
shot without having to worry about jerking the gun off target.
(It requires a lot
of practice to use a good single trigger well.)
But.... everything
has a downside,
and the downside of double set triggers is twofold: First,
you have the additional operation
of pulling the set trigger just before the shot, (in
hunting, the gun should never be kept "set", it is too easy to set
off the hair trigger, and an unexpected discharge could ruin your whole
day).
Second,
the set trigger makes a noise
as it is pulled back, this ranges from a silvery click on a fine firearm
to a loud clack on an inexpensive one.
That noise can spook
a deer and ruin your shot.
Most experienced and accomplished shooters prefer the single trigger, a well made one, with a pull of between 3 and 4 pounds pressure for safety, this is called a "military trigger".
Shooting Position
In observing experienced shooters, you will notice the stance and hold they take is very similar from one shooter to the next. the feet are planted at about a 45 degree angle to the shot path, the off hand supports the gun and holds it firmly to the shoulder, the shooting hand supports the gun's wrist and performs the delicate trigger pull. They lean just slightly into the shot, and most let the barrel rise naturally after the shot.
Dry Practice
Some black powder shooters practice "dry" firing, standing in a room taking a spot on the wall as a target, and practicing trigger release, noting whether the gun's sights are still on the spot after release. Care should be taken never to let a caplock hammer drop on a bare nipple, and never to let a flintlock arm drop without the resistance of hitting the frizzen. either action could damage the lock.
Please Read This:
If you are given advice by someone, think twice about it, if it makes no sense, question it until the advice is corroborated by at least one other unrelated source.
