Ep. 110: High Performance Muzzleloaders with Arrowhead Rifles
01:14:34 Share

Outdoor adventure won't wait for engine problems. Things like hard starts, rough performance, and lost fuel economy are often caused by fuel gum and varnish buildup. Seafoam can help your engine run better and last longer. Simply pour a can in your gas tank. Hunters and anglers rely on Seafoam to keep their engines running the way it should the entire season. Pick up a can of Seafoam today at your local auto parts store or visit seafoamworks.com to learn more.

The only thing better than a successful hunt is celebrating your feet during the after-the-hunt moment. With a smooth taste made to be enjoyed on the rocks or with your favorite mixer, Pendle and Whiskey is perfect for winding down around the fire or putting your feet up after cleaning your game. If you're looking for the perfect drink to celebrate after a great day hunting,

I'm sure a lot of you guys remember the old ceremonial hunting tradition of eating the heart.

out of the first animal you kill. Meat from those organs are among the most nutrient-rich foods on the planet. You can get those same benefits your ancestors craved via convenient daily capsules from Heart and Soil. Find out more at heartandsoil.co. And remember, use code MEATEATER for 10% off your purchase.

Welcome back to another episode of Cutting the Distance. Today's guest is the owner of Arrowhead Rifles, Luke Horak. Arrowhead is known for smokeless muzzleloaders. They're getting more into that custom centerfire rifle and then also muzzleloader components. How are things going, Luke? Great. Yeah, I just got back from a cow elk hunt over in New Mexico. So back at the grind, but feeling refreshed. Yeah, nice, nice. It looks like you and your dad have been going out there for maybe a couple of years doing the cow elk hunt. Yeah.

Yeah, he actually, he went last year. He bailed on me this year because he's got, he drew on range Oryx in March and he's a kind of a Midwest homebody. So getting him out for two hunts in the season is kind of tough, but yeah. So I took a buddy over this year. It looks like you guys were successful according to Facebook. Yeah. Yeah. You got to do any other hunting or has that been it for the fall?

Yeah, actually, Jim, over there at Marsupial Gear, I went on impromptu antelope hunt with him over in New Mexico as well back in late August. And got, you know, like a 70-inch buck, had a fun hunt over there. And then I'll head down to Mexico for a coos deer in January. Yep, yep.

um we were just talking talking about that a little bit ahead of the show you know we've been you know dar really well and i've been going with you know jay and dar down there and it's it's a it's a really fun hunt there south of the border so yeah this would be my first year not going in four years i'm a little little sad i decided to take on and help coach our high school boys basketball so it'll be another little fun fun adventure but that january hunt is going to get in the way of that so i'm gonna take a year off but

Um, yeah. So back to like how, how I got ahold of you, how I, you know, I guess introduced, you know, through me just buying stuff cause I didn't know what I was doing. Um, I'd bought a 700 ultimate muzzleloader, um, you know, two years ago, uh, Washington state where I live changed the ignition system law finally. Um,

We had number 11s and muskets. We went to 209s were illegal as long as they were open and breached. And then ultimately, they went to all modern ignition systems, I believe. And don't quote me on any of these to our listeners. Don't quote me on those. But I remember I had shot just a Northwest Traditions muzzleloader forever because I knew I was safe with muskets and then…

I went right from that gun to, to the ultimate. And, you know, I probably do things wrong because I jump on the internet and start reading, you know, and there's, there's mixed reviews. But one thing that started to, to jump out as I was developing loads for this, this ultimate was you can't load too much, you know, Blackhorn 209 because you're going to, you know, I guess,

I'm going to describe it way worse than you can, but basically you're going to start to gas vent and gas cut your breach plug. Right. Right. So the, yeah, these higher, you know, higher performance muzzle loaders if you, if you have leakage one time, generally you get gas cutting, which is just, you know, the, the gas escaping from the ignition, but it'll actually like burn a channel through your breach plug and,

You may slow it down, but once it leaks once, it's just gonna get worse and worse. - Worse and worse and keep cutting back.

me being conservative didn't have time to mess with it i uh i load and once again don't check my math it i would because i was just doing it by volume i so i said all right 100 grains by volume which i think converted like 73 grains by weight like a very mild load yeah um so i jumped down to just 250 grain federal borlock bull it was easy to load i got it to shoot well out to 100 and went hunted and killed an elk with that um but then the more i read the more i'm like man this really intrigues me these guys are getting you

you know, and I'm, we're going to put a disclaimer on all of these, like my load data that we're going to talk about stuff that Luke may talk about. Like you need to work up to all of those. Like, don't just take a number and go put it in your gun because there's pressure. There's differences. Like you need to make sure that works in your gun and it could be dangerous to go out and, and do those. But, you know, so,

you know, my mom always says I'm the hardest guy to ever buy for, for Christmas. What do you want? I said, well, if you can get me an arrowhead, like gen two breach for this gun and some modules like that, that'll work. Like we'll, we'll go with that. And, uh,

So I didn't have any intention of muzzleloader hunting this year. Got lucky, drew a tag and realized that the muzzleloader season, I'm not going to get into all the conditions of my tag. It's very complex. But basically I had to switch over to a muzzleloader on September 28th, which I thought I was going to be able to use my modern rifle. But since there was a general muzzleloader season in that unit, I, so I'm like, I was in a rush. You know, I was installing the, and then, you know, all,

Thankfully, the Gen 2, you got pretty dialed. It worked right. The little go-no gauge worked. I'm like, all right, got that by and went and developed a load and kind of was worried about ordering bolts. I ordered some furry bolts from you, some 320 grain furies and got it all set up. But I made some posts about it. And the reason...

I've got you on as a guest is I didn't realize how many questions there are about muzzleloaders. It seems like nowadays you go to order a custom rifle, you pick a, you know, you pick a caliber that you like, you know, pick a stock that the gun builder recommends and you're on your way where muzzleloaders there's, it seems to be like there's a little more unknown. Um, I, and I had a ton of questions about my setup and I realized at that point right there, I was not the right guy to be answering those questions. And so I wanted to bring you on. Um, you know, I know there are, you know, some other, um,

builders out there, but Arrowhead, you know, by far is kind of the leading, you know, aftermarket muzzleloader component manufacturer. And that's why I wanted to have you on so you can answer all these questions that have been brought to me and, you know, hopefully answer them a lot better than I can. Yeah. I mean, there's, I think, a lot with the, like you said, a centerfire, it's kind of simplistic relative to a muzzleloader. And then there's just so many, you

variations of muzzleloaders out there. And then you've got just a load of different projectiles and powders and it can definitely get overwhelming. And when I started... So I cut my teeth muzzleloader hunting and it was...

My dad's way to extend his season, I think, is why I got... Because growing up, elk hunting was a rite of passage. You could deer hunt with a rifle when you were young, but elk hunting was for the men. They would go out... I live in an area with nothing but timber, so they would gloss clear cuts for the first 20, 30 minutes, and then they were in the timber all day, and they didn't want to deal with the

you know, a fifth or sixth grader, you know, I don't even know how old fifth graders are now, you know, so dad would let me muzzleloader hunt. It would extend his season. We get the elk hunt more. Um, but I can remember back in the old days, we had lots of opportunities, but you know, bad hang fires, guns that just wouldn't go off with three or four percussion, you know, you would try to reload and the gun just wouldn't go off. I live in the super wet Northwest. And so like my experience with muzzleloaders originally was like, this is, this sucks. Like you can't, you know, and, uh,

so as time goes on, the rules change Washington rules, I would say the lacks, whether you like them or not, they've allowed, um, you know, more, uh, you know, efficient, which I do like. We're not hang firing and shooting an elk in the, you know, the, the wrong shoulder, the back, you know, whatever it may be, we're, we're more accurate, but I will say that these more modern muzzleloaders are definitely more efficient and are probably allowing hunters to take more game. But I, you know, at least we're not wounding them or making bad hits. So, uh,

That was my original introduction to muzzleloaders was hang fires, guns that just didn't go off or guns that weren't as accurate because we were maybe getting 1,800 feet per second, 1,700 feet per second out of the barrel on these old drop two pyrodex pellets down and stuff a bullet in. So that leads us to today. The ultimate muzzleloader seemed to be like a big undertaking. And you guys have taken it way, way farther with smokeless guns.

with 45 caliber conversions even on the black powder and black powder substitutes. How fast has muzzleloader technology kind of changed from, I would say, 20 to 10 to even now? It seems to be a pretty...

you know, a pretty quick developing, I guess, niche within the hunting market. Yeah. Well, I think I started Arrowhead in 2011 and that kind of came out of, I was started bought a, I think it was 2006, 2008, somewhere in that time I'd bought a Savage 10 ML2, which was, I guess to this point, the first and only,

commercially available smokeless powder capable muzzleloader. There were some deficiencies with that and we started to re-barrel them to .45 cal with a premium aftermarket barrel. So early on, we kind of called it like the

the flying hardware store because like people are trying to figure out how to get Sabos to shoot well with the higher pressure and stuff and washers and sub bases in there and all that stuff. So I, I feel like it's plateaued a little bit in the last couple of years as far as the performance. But yeah, I'd say like from, well, what, what it's been 13 years now since I started Arrowhead, like back then 200 yards was still,

Kind of considered a longer shot. And, you know, now that's, you know, we go straight to four or 500 yards. I, I still, you know, people hear that four to 500 yards and start wringing their hands. The traditionalists do, which I, I mean, I understand that, but you, the, I, I tried to pump the brakes on people going to four or 500 yards for hunting. I mean, it's definitely doable, but guys are factoring in wind drift and stuff like that. So we still see.

A lot of guys totally with you, you know, you need to just like any firearm bow, whatever you have to get out there and put in your time at the range and, and whatnot. But yeah, that's in the last decade. It's, I mean, like I said, 200 yards, which used to be, I, I, I rebarreled that Savage 10 ML two.

to 45 Cal and I had a bunch of antlerless tags. I was living back in Iowa at the time. And I think I, I killed three or four deer in the like two to 250 yard range. And I was like,

I thought it was hot stuff. I was definitely strutting around bragging to all my buddies after that. Now, you know, 200 yards, you don't, you know, that's kind of considered average at this point. Yeah. And I remember my first, my first experience with, uh, with the, the ultimate muzzleloader, which I know they make, you know,

better aftermarket muzzles are custom built but i remember going to new mexico and my buddy loading up i think back then he was running like 103 grains by weight um you know we'd sit there with a little powder measure i'm like what are we doing all this for like we don't do that back home you just drop some pellets down um right and then i went and shot a i believe it was like a three shot group at 400 yards back when new mexico didn't have the limitations they do now and we shot like a four inch group at 400 yards i was just blown away i'm like this gun literally shoots better than most factory rifles can shoot at that time and that was

you know, back then. Right. And even, you know, like you take just a factory Remington ultimate or night, uh, you know, they've all made off and on over the years, great muzzle loaders were, you know, accuracy wasn't even necessarily the issue, uh, downrange. Uh, it was, it was energy. Like we, you know, I, I recalled tons of stories over the years where somebody would

have a buck at big old Iowa whitetail at two, 300 yards. And, you know, their gun would shoot sub MOA. So they'd line it up and shoot. And maybe they made a great shot, but you know, a lot of times they didn't find the deer till next spring. Cause the energy is, is petering off. Like they're never getting an exit at that distance. So, um,

Oh, we are pushing stuff a lot faster where it's a lot more ethical to on the, on the killing side where you're actually getting exit wounds at three, 400 yards. So you, you recover those animals. Yep. And that's where, you know, when I built my chart, I went and put it all in there and I checked like, all right, at some point you're running out of energy, you're running out of speed and like, let's limit, you know, anything to, you know, three 50 and in, um,

And my biggest limiting factor is in my state is you're trying to do all this with a one X scope and that red dots get really big, you know, out there at 300 or, you know, whatever it is. And, and that was my limiting factor because the gun and the load that we developed, we were,

We were only getting, you know, we were almost getting a little over 2,100 feet per second, I think, out of that 320. But it's a big bull. It's got a BC of 0.26. And so I would just look. I'm like, all right, you know, this is where we should cut it. And this is where my scope with, you know, one rotation of the turret, like I'm out of elevation. So we went out there. You know, I've got a really good rifle range right here in my backyard. Like confirmed I could hit a, you know, 8x, I think it's an 8x10 rectangle at 330 yards. Like consistently, every shot consistently.

It does take a little dancing, like moving the dot. Are we on the target? You know, left, right, up, down. Like you're trying to dance that little loophole. I use a loophole red dot, you know, trying to dance the size of that. And can you still see it? And, you know, the gun, as long as I had a good rest and could take my time, you know, the gun was capable of 330 yards all day long. The limiting factor was just that stinking, you know, one X. I had no magnification. And so you're just.

you know, trying to make that work. And, and that's where, like I say, everything kind of dialed in. I can shoot that far. I can dial that far. The energy is still good there, but you go much farther. I'm going to have to, you know, either find a newer load that's pushing faster, a lighter bullet. And then that's when, you know, we had talked a little bit like, well, maybe, you know, if you really want to get more, you know, go down to 45. And I think that's because you can get your speeds up and keep the energy up a lot longer or a lot farther out there.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. More, more speed and then higher ballistic coefficient bullets. So yeah, it maintains it further out. So that'd be like the next step, you know, if, if we didn't want to shoot the stock 50 Cal Remington now, or I've got to ask, are there in like, once you add your guys's breach, you know, we've got the stock Remington barrel. I've had a little bit of trigger work done just by like a local, a local gunsmith, you know, lightened it a little bit for me, cut the spring and then, you know, put it back together. Is there anything else that like,

you know, it's probably good enough for 99% of the muzzleloader hunters out there at that point, right? Once you put the breech in, can push it a little farther or there's some inherent, like, is there a bad stock? Is the stock, you know, are there some things that you would say? Yeah, I mean, well, like yours, that the Remington Ultimate, I think they have two flavors of it. One in the laminate wood stock. There's no aluminum pillars in the wood stock or anything like that. So you, I mean, they're like, if you were,

going to break it down from a inherent accuracy thing, you know, pillar bedding that stock would potentially improve things for you. I mean, as a, you know, the fundamentals of accuracy between like a rifle and a muzzle that are still there. So, um,

And whether those changes are going to, you know, in a stock gone like that, if you're even going to, you know, see an immeasurable improvement, you know, is questionable. But I mean, those are like if you were, you know, a hobbyist and just had time to, you

putts around and wanted to ring the absolute most accuracy out of it. That's something you could do. I mean, the other stock they have is Bell & Carlson M40. It's got the integral aluminum block in it. I mean, you can skim bed those as well, but I haven't really seen much benefit to doing stuff like that. Gotcha, gotcha.

Okay, well, we're going to jump into some listener questions. Those are brought to you by Pendleton Whiskey. They sponsor our question and answer segment. And so I just made a post, like I say, a lot of these, the interest. That Pendleton, my buddies bought me some of that. I think the director's reserve last couple of years from my birthday. I'll give it that as a plug.

Nice. There you go. Yeah. Yeah. No, they've been great partners with us and they sponsor this little section. So we're going to throw quite a few listener questions at you. And like I said, that was really what sparked this. I was getting a lot of questions that I wasn't really comfortable answering. And so I just kind of pulled my Facebook page. And, you know, so we're going to go through this. So Colton Stevens asks, how many grains or powder and what's your bullet weight? And so this is, I guess,

I can say what mine is. You can say what yours is or what most people should do. So I, I originally had ordered 285 grain furies from you. They used to be 280s. I believe ordered the 285s. And I, of course, once again, I go back to the internet reading and they're like, Oh, not that the 285s are inaccurate, but people,

tend to have better luck with the 320s like flying more consistent so i that's why i called you guys up hey i just put an order in i think it's wrong can you send me the 320s or can we we redo this so i'm shooting a 320 grain universal fit fury which we're going to get into that universal fit here in a little bit um i want to ask a lot of questions about like um you know bolts that are fit to the barrel how you how you accomplish that but mine was a universal fit it's got a little plastic disc

on the back of the Fury. And I'm going to speculate, Luke can correct me if I'm wrong. It's probably slightly oversized so that can fit everything from like a 502 barrel down. And it probably deformed just a little bit as you're loading it. So it makes sure to get that gas seal. Is that correct? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's correct. And then I'm shooting Blackhorn 209.

And I'm shooting 106 grains by weight. And once again, I'm going to say it again, don't put that in your muzzleloader if it's not set up or it's not recommended with your breech for your gun and your gun can handle those type of pressures. But mine is a... Definitely follow your manufacturer's recommended maximums. So that is a Remington Ultimate Muzzleloader with...

um luke and arrowheads uh upgraded breach and their ignition system which uses a um i'm using cci 250s you can use federal 215s whatever basically a large magnum rifle primer in your guys's modules and that's really all i have done to the gun

Yeah. And like you, you're seeing great accuracy out of it, out of that. I mean, what we've really found is a lot of the factory muzzleloaders out there, Remington Knight, you know, build a good, good muzzleloader. Like the barrels are generally very accurate, like where they're often deficient is, is the ignition system. So we, you know, that's, that's where if you get a hundred percent seal, you know,

You're really setting yourself up for success. And then where I see most people run into issues is actually with what the projectile they're fitting to the barrel. I think almost all the bullet makers out there at one point or another have sold an easy loading projectile.

uh bullet and that's not necessarily like it's convenient it's easy to load right but it's not necessarily going to give you your best accuracy especially as you move into the higher performance realm where pressures go up like you're not you're not going to get consistent engagement into the rifling in the barrel which is you know going to cause accuracy issues yeah um

So the next question is from Neil Rico. And you'll probably be able to answer this better than me. I do have one. I've shot this Fury 320 at an elk this year, had a complete pass through right through the lungs. And then last year I used a Federal Borlaug, one of those bullets that's very easy to load. But then once you realize that it's probably because it's way undersized and we're probably not touching a whole lot of the rifle, you know, and then your accuracy is probably going to go down. But yeah,

What have you seen just from in the field results, good bullets for elk, larger size game?

Yeah. I mean, in the, you know, going to the 50 Cal, um, you know, if, if you can get them to shoot the Thor, the Thor solid coppers are good. I mean, I think that's just a, a Barnes bullet with the, you know, the base, uh, milled out, uh, the theories are good. Fury uses a, a bonded. He's got some process where he actually anneals the copper and bonds it. So they, they still expand easy, but it's the leads bonded to the copper. So they hold together. Well, um,

I've heard really good things about the new Hornady bore drivers. I haven't actually, actually my buddy over at Preston over there at Hornady just sent me a bunch of the 50 and the 45s to play around with. That's another bullet kind of similar to the, the bore lock where it with those, you know, they are a looser fit, but that sub base kind of crushes down and then the cop like makes up for some of the space. So we've, we've actually had really positive feedback from customers using those with,

you know, black corn, you can't, they can't handle smokeless pressures. And most of the, most of the States where you're hunting with those bullets anywhere way, smokeless isn't going to be legal. Uh, but it really comes down to a lot of times with,

shot placement right with these these bullets um because you're you're slinging a big chunk of lead uh you know even if it does i mean you want it to disrupt a little bit but i mean most of the the bullets out there will do a halfway decent job if you hit the animal where you're where you're supposed to yeah yeah and one back to my my old days of of muzzleloader hunting you know we were shooting a lot of like 240 green hornady like hollow points um

And what frustrated me and why I ultimately went to a barns there towards the end of muzzleloader hunting with my old school setup was I would never, ever get an exit. And blood trailing in the Pacific Northwest, thick timber, a lot of times we're shooting these things in the timber, you got needles on the ground and you just had horrible results.

horrible blood you know trails it was just they were non-existent and so right you know even the being a solid copper but then they they opened really quick so i was almost wanting like a copper that almost didn't expand to the point where it stopped like i wanted that second hole out of it but i say the fury and i don't know i did make a longer shot on my bowl here this year with that fury 320 so maybe it didn't get the chance to expand because the bullet was slowed down but it

It punched a good hole. The entrance hole, of course, on a 50 is going to be 50. And then on the exit, we had probably a two-inch hole and it performed really well. What I would consider extended ranges.

That sounds like perfect performance to me. But it may have been because that bullet was slowed down. If I would have hit that elk at 100 yards, we may have had, you know, there may have been less chance of it coming out. You know, it's hard to tell. You know, I'm relating it back to like my burgers and stuff that I shoot on my rifles. I'm going to get a pass through at 400 more likely than I am at 100, you know, just because that bullet slowed down and it's not.

being violently like ripped apart from the jacket but uh right yeah i've got one one year testing i'm one of those guys that doesn't want to make my my judgment yet until i've got more you know different different yardages but um i did loan my gun to a buddy um that that killed an elk at 125 yards and they still got a great pass through um you know as well so

that bullet seemed to be good for elk. I don't know if that answers your question, Neil, but, um, you know, work best for elk is always subjective, but I, you know, and then what's the other, is it Pearson bullet also? Are those the other like board of fit that people, you know, the guys that get into shooting longer ranges, is it,

Well, so we have our own line of bullets for the .45 and .40 cal. And that's, you know, we're not using, there's no sub-base. It's just a copper lead core bullet. So the fit has to be much more precise where you're actually getting into a

With our customs, the barrel diameter is controlled closely enough to where we can sell pretty sized bullets. But if you have a CVA Paramount 45 cal or something, you're probably going to need to buy a sizing die and actually run the bullets through that. The sizing dies are adjustable, so you can tweak the fit of the bullet to your barrel and get that precise fit. Gotcha.

So there's, you know, with our bullets, it's an aluminum tip. It almost looks like a Hornady A-tip style bullet. We've gone thinner on the jacket. They're more going to be in that burger style where you're going to get some expansion at distance, but more likely to have a pass through at distance versus, you know, 200 or 300 yards where they're going to be more frangible.

We've all seen plenty of gadgets and fads come and go, but here's one product that stood the test of time. Seafoam Motor Treatment. Lots of hunters and anglers know that seafoam helps engines run better and last longer. It's really simple. When you pour it in your gas tank, seafoam cleans harmful fuel deposits that cause engine problems. I'm talking common stuff like hard starts, rough engine performance, or lost fuel economy.

Seafoam is an easy way to prevent or overcome these problems. Just pour a can in your gas tank and let it clean your fuel system. You probably know someone who's used a can of seafoam to get their truck or boat going again. People everywhere rely on seafoam to keep their trucks, boats, and small engines running the way that they should the entire season. Help your engine run better and last longer. Pick up a can of seafoam today at your local auto parts store or visit seafoamworks.com to learn more.

The only thing better than a successful hunt is celebrating your feet during the after-the-hunt moment. With a smooth taste made to be enjoyed on the rocks or with your favorite mixer, Pendleton Whiskey is perfect for winding down around the fire or putting your feet up after cleaning your game. If you're looking for the perfect drink to celebrate after a great day hunting,

Make it Pendleton Whiskey, the official whiskey of the after-the-hunt moment. It's not just poured, it's earned. Pendleton Distillers, Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Please drink responsibly. Pendleton is a registered trademark of Pendleton Woolen Mills. You ever get that feeling you're stuck inside staring at screens and a primal urge kicks in? You crave wide open spaces, fresh air, the chance to connect with the land?

Well, maybe it's time to find your own piece of the wild. But searching for property can be a maze. That's where Land.com comes in. They got millions of listings across the country, from mountain ranches to hidden fishing holes. Their search tools are like a seasoned guide helping you narrow down what you want. Land.com isn't just about buying and selling.

It's about finding a place to hunt, fish, explore, or simply sit by a campfire and listen to the crickets. So head over to land.com today to turn one day into today. Because trust me, there's nothing quite like the feeling of standing on your own piece of earth.

just for conversation's sake like out of your smokeless and you guys as you know 45s or even the smokeless how fast are you guys pushing those bullets typically so like 2800 uh i mean some of our our like we'll we'll build some more like land cannons for the guys in the midwest who are just going to a box blind but you know sometimes we'll be north at 3 000 feet per second with a 300 grain bullet out of those

God, I don't want to, I don't want to shoot that thing without a muzzle brake on it. I don't think. No, they're, they're, they're vicious. I occasionally get the guy that, that wants it without a break. And I'd say about 90% of the time, those end up back in the shop to get a break on after they get them. So. Yeah. And my load development, the guy that runs our range, the local gunsmith here, he was out there and,

he seen that i pulled that muzzleloader out we were going to do some load testing and he's like i was about ready to go home but he's like i couldn't not you know get the entertainment out of this um and so even that 320 grain bullet going right like i said right around 2100 feet per second like

I'm a big guy. I'm six, three to 50. Not that that makes you tough or not. But by time 15 shots was done, like I would say about shot six or seven, like it was physical discomfort. And by like shot 10 or 11, like it was starting to get painful, like physically painful, like a grown man hitting you in the shoulder as hard as he could every time. I'm like, this is not fun.

Yeah, I will say I've noticed maybe some of it is just my body's losing feeling and I just don't know this as much anymore. But the newer stocks with like a negative comb or the stock isn't smashing your face as much like I'll go and shoot.

you know, 20 or 30 shots, maybe in 40 some days, depending on how many guns we have to test fire. And I don't, I don't feel it nearly as much as I used to, you know, my face used to ache and all that stuff. So like, you know, thankfully there's been some advancements that way that help help with, uh, with that. But yeah, they do, uh, they do beat you up pretty good. Yeah. Um, is, uh,

is do this like on the rifles do the stocks do the decelerator pads like doing does any of that matter or is it just it's gonna yeah i mean i i mean i've i've i bought some fancy like almost like a lead sled back in the day and i you know it maybe helped some but it was it was kind of cumbersome especially when you had a half dozen guns to shoot so i kind of just i you know i bought the the kick easy shoulder pads and stuff and at some point like recoils just

recoil. Yeah. But yeah, I think the, you know, the muzzle brakes help a lot and the better socks. Like now, now I would say, you know, we have a lot of

you know, my buddy takes his 10 year old kid out there every year and he smokes a deer with our, with one of our full power loads. So, uh, you know, it's much more manageable. Like you were, I think you were running yours without a break. Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I, yeah, I might, we might be talking after this podcast and getting my gun sent to you and they're at least sent to you and get one put on. And then, you know, we'll talk about that a little bit, but you know, then you have to do like the pour through funnel, right? So you're not losing powdered through the break. And, um, and, and,

Yeah, that's something I definitely need to do. The only problem is, and I have the same issue with my high-powered rifles, is it seems like something happens fast.

and I don't have time to get my hearing protection in and I pulled my trigger more times than I care to admit without hearing protection in. And, um, that's something I need to get better at or have just like the, you know, I, we around here, we call them just like the loggers, you know, hearing protection, just the, the orange wrap around your neck, you know, the plastic connector, and then you can throw them in real quick. And if nothing else, take, you know, 20, 25 decibels off the high end. Um,

It looks like on muzzlers, I tried to do some research just because I'm in the process of ordering a silencer for my 7 short action ultramag because that's my main hunting gun. But there are some cans for these muzzlers, but they are huge. And I don't think anybody wants to necessarily hunt with them unless you are in a ground blind or not moving a whole lot. Yeah, well, I started doing it back when I was in Iowa. So probably eight, nine years ago, I had a silencer co-hybrid.

Um, actually I still have that suppressor. It's a, it's a great kind of all around suppressor. Um, but yeah, you can, uh,

Yeah. They do a good job. Like I, I'm not sure, you know, if you have, if you're in the Western state and running Blackhorn 209, you would definitely want one that you could fully disassemble just for, for cleaning purposes. But one of the issues I ran into back in Iowa was that it actually traps a lot of heat and condensation in the bore. So if you're not removing it every time and it's humid out, like you will soak your powder if you're shooting a bunch. Gotcha. Yeah.

So I, I, you know, if you're, you know, if you're just looking to high volume shoot at the range, it's probably not the best option, but you know, for hunting, it is nice. But for me, it's, it's probably easier just taking the earplugs, um, versus, uh, you know, dealing with the hassle loading through, loading through a suppressor on the muzzleloader. Yep. Um,

So John McCarty is asking, what is the ideal effective range? And these are all subjective for shooting an elk with a muzzleloader in our opinion. Um, and it depends on your system, right? Cause you have a gun that might be super accurate out the six or 700 and have plenty of energy where my, you know, gun set up for Washington may, you know, I might say I could probably shoot one at this distance, but you know, and it depends on how good you can shoot the gun, um, how good your load is, you know, all of that. But,

So I set and I haven't told anybody this because I'm not necessarily embarrassed of it. I just don't want people saying, oh, you can't hunt. So you had to shoot, you know, but like I had we've talked about this. Like I was consistently hitting an eight by 10, you know, three shots in a row.

8x10 target at 330 yards. Our yardage here is all set up in meters because of some competition shooting they do. So if you're at 300, you're really at 330. You're at 300 meters. Hit that little 8x10 every time. Dial my scope down, dial my scope back up. My clicks were consistent.

And so I had set on an elk 350 yards as long as I can get a rest and make a good comfortable shot. Like that was my, my limit. The energy chart showed that we were still above. I think we're,

somebody can run the numbers on me I think we were still above 2 000 foot pounds um at that 350 range maybe a little bit less we didn't go like under the speed of sound until like 450 so I was just like looking at the chart like where am I very you know comfortable above the line how how good can I shoot how you know can the bullet and the energy you know handle and and work at that so I had set mine at 350 and that was on perfect conditions because of the 1x scope

where you might be able to say 700 or 800 yards with the right build and the right wind. The other thing is comfortable conditions is being a long-range rifle shooter. If you've got 10, especially on these bolts that water, BCs of 2.2s to .3s, maybe max. Your .45s, I don't know. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. And you know, these bolts are going slow where, you know, on my 338 edge or my seven short action ultra mag, I still have to read the wind, but I can I got a lot more fudge factor in there. These muzzleloaders, you miss the wind read by two or three miles an hour, extended range, you're going to just you're going to hit something three feet off or you're just going to miss. Well, and then follow up shots as well.

are much slower, right? If you're, you know, long range with a rifle, if you're, you know, you're on the gun and you got a good buddy, that's a good spot or right. You can,

have a, you know, a round on the way of second or two after the first one gets there. Right. So it's, you know, it, it's, I think there's, there's really too many different muzzlers out there to way too subjective to, to give a number. Like there's, there's no substitute for you figuring out practicing with your gun as far as like our, our, the effective range of our customs. I, you know, we were talking about that maybe a little early in this podcast or before I can't remember, but, uh,

Energy-wise, yeah, we're good to 700, 800 yards. But wind drift calls, I mean, we're talking, I think, past 600 yards. One mile per hour wind is an MOA of drift approximately. So no one's good enough to call wind that well. So, yeah, I really feel like 400 or 500 yards is an ethical max for most people. Yeah.

Okay, so this one, and I don't know how we talked about this a little bit before too, like, you know, we hear a lot of Northwest compliant muzzies, you know, Northwest compliant muzzleloaders. We seem to be, we seem to kind of hold on to that traditional as long as we could. And now some of the laws have allowed us to kind of get through that. But when looking at Northwest, this comes from Blake Lyons, when looking at Northwest compliant muzzies,

um what should you be looking at you know are you looking at the remingtons now that they're legal the knights like who's made i guess who's making a good i mean northwest compliant i i take that to mean like oregon and idaho as well i mean that's more so i only think washington really falls into northwest compliant well not anymore yeah right so yeah i you know i i

I'm definitely not the guy. It's probably been 20 years since I've really messed with quote-unquote Northwest compliant muzzleloaders. When I get that question, I usually send guys towards night. I think they probably make the best Northwest compliant muzzleloaders. You're just not going to get... Going back 20 years ago, maybe there's some improvements out there that I'm not aware of. I feel like...

percussion cap type muzzleloader is a you know 100 125 yard type weapon yep and uh you know back back when we were i guess back when my state washington was northwest compliant type um you know we had some guys shooting um you know some ruger made a muzzleloader there for for a

yeah there were some guys shooting those around here um you had a lot of the night guys that had the double safety and so many guys had the bad stories of not like twisting that safety and missing a shot or not yeah safety backed out so we had a lot of those or i guess you had to screw it forward so the firing pin actually hit and then um like i remember i ran because traditions back in the day and all the local gun shops or you know stores would sell like a

Northwest conversion of a traditions, which was had a little longer barrel already kind of came like muzzle broke, you know, just spiral fluted muzzle break and you know, some stuff like that. But and you know, all, and I may be wrong, but I believe all of those States allow black powder, black powder substitute. So you still could run Blackhorn two and nine if you wanted something a little cleaner, maybe a little more performance and,

out of those. Yeah, I think you're going to have a really hard time getting Blackhorn 209 to ignite consistently with a percussion cap. And even we run into it pretty commonly with guys...

using Blackhorn 209 with a shotgun primer system where they go grab the muzzleloader-specific shotgun primers. And those are actually a reduced power charge. I think it helps with following with Pirate X and 777. So with Blackhorn, you really either need to be using a large rifle magnum primer system or...

uh, federal or CCI Magnum shotgun primers, not the standard ones. Gotcha. Just to get that black horn to ignite. So that's good to know. Like maybe if you're forced to use percussion caps or musket caps, maybe stay away from it. Black horn's not for you. Yeah.

Yeah. So at that case, I mean, there's lots of, you know, you got the, the IMR white hots, you've got pyrodex, you've got all these different pellets now. Like, is there one that's better than the other? Or at the point where you're not going to be able to shoot farther than 125, 150 yards, like, is there any advantage of you even messing around with,

so that's where i'm so far removed from that because i've just made the choice as a business to focus on the higher higher performance stuff like you know i think there's some really good threads on rock slide and some of the you know the other forums like if you if you're going down that rabbit hole i'd probably send you the wrong direction no i appreciate you being honest there um

This was a question I had, but Blake Lyons also kind of asks this, and it's very important to us here in the Northwest because we do usually by time mid-October rolls around, we don't have good weather. We're hunting in the rain. We're hunting in our rain gear. Tips for keeping powder or primers dry. Like, are you just a guy that put like a small water balloon over the barrel? Like, what's what? Yeah, because I like on ours. I'll electrical tape the muzzle.

you know, we're blowing enough gas out where that, that tape's coming off before the, before the bullet gets to it. And then, you know, since our ignition system, a hundred percent seal, uh,

you know, at a full pressure muzzleloader load, my assumption is like a spent primer module in the breach is going to, you know, cause we don't generally in the West, right. We're not walking around with a, with a primed loaded, right. Or, you know, a chamber ground prime muzzleloader. So yeah, I'll just drop a spent module in there to help seal the breach. And then, I mean, that, that's been very effective doing it that way. Actually the, the most effective,

Most common misfire we have is, is actually like the first round after somebody cleans where they, you clean, load it up and go hunt. Um, and with the idea with blackhorn, right. And especially definitely smokeless is non-corrosive. So you can, you can,

hunt on a on a foul bore but yeah oil is i mean it just does not take much oil or moisture to cause a misfire so we actually see you know more issues from that necessarily than than people hunting in the rain so we're always hunting on a foul bore here at least a couple of shots to burn off any any cleaning solvent

Yeah. So back when I was young, I remember my dad, like after I'd clean my muzzle or like go out and snap a couple of caps off. Like, does that get the oil or does that even do anything to the oil? I mean, it might burn off that water. Like we used to clean them in the bathtub or a bucket of water. Right. Yeah. It definitely is not enough to clear out oil residue. So if you do, if you do want to clean your gun, go back out to the range, shoot a couple more times and then keep it like semi clean. Yeah. For a little bit. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Um,

And then so when we clean these things, I'm going to add on to Blake's questions when we clean these things, like should we put gun oil down them after black horn or should we just like clean them dry and then run a bunch of dry patches through?

versus a solvent or should you put a layer of oil in them and just know that you're gonna have to shoot that out next year? - Yeah, I mean, long-term storage on a muzzleloader, I like to run a couple oil patches definitely before I put it away. I like Strike Hold. It's a solvent. Like a lubricating oil, we use a bunch of that in the shop. It kind of dries off and just leaves a film.

Um, so that's, that's, that's one I like for, for Russ preventative. Um, but yeah, I'm, I'm just not like, I don't trust patches enough in the muzzleloader to me. If I'm heading to the range, I'm not, you know, I'm, I'm not worried about it. Right. But if, if I'm on a hunt, I'm only trusting it. If I've actually fired off a couple of shots and I've burned everything off.

so back to that just just for my own um knowledge is do do does point of impact move on a muzzleloader from a clean shot to to a couple shots like on a rifle we see it on our on our customs for sure i mean every you know every load combo is going to be different but yeah we uh

With Blackhorn, we actually see a velocity spike on the clean barrel. There's less friction, I guess, and it speeds up. Generally, we're about one, one and a half MOA high on a clean bore versus a foul bore. Gotcha.

Yeah, that's where I was at because I shot my gun, had to leave on a New Mexico archery elk hunt, and then come home and just pick it up. And I was worried, should I clean it? I know Blackhorn is supposed to be non-corrosive, but just being an old school pyrotex guy, like I need to clean this thing. And we just kind of left it dirty for three or four weeks and then loaded it because I was scared to clean it because I didn't want my first shot. So I was in that battle of do I clean it and go out and shoot it again or do I just –

And the guy that runs the range, and you're always trying to take advice, he's like, oh, as long as the bullet still goes down the bore, you're good. And I'm like, all right, just keep shooting until the bullet doesn't go down. And I'm like, I don't know if that's great advice, but it worked, and the gun still hit where it needed to even four weeks later. But I've always wondered if point of impact moves tremendously. And that's something I just haven't had enough time on this. I guess next year when I go to shoot it, I'll find out on a clean barrel how close is it to still be incited in.

yeah um you know and then i'll have more time on it but yeah i elected to just keep hunting with it like 20 shots in dirty and i and that's where i don't know is there is there a number like 10 shots is extremely fouled or is it like a custom-built rifle where

And maybe you have different advice than I've been told, but I haven't cleaned my custom rifle since like the first 10 shots through them that, you know, until they start shooting bad, like don't touch your rifle barrel. Yeah, it was funny conversation, right? I was just over on the Go Hunt podcast and kind of laughing with Brady because he's like a clean my gun every range trip guy. And, you know, I don't I don't have that kind of time. So I'm I'm more in your camp where you're.

I'll usually clean my rifles like once a year is where I'm at as far as cleaning goes. With Blackhorn, really, after the first couple shots, you kind of hit a steady state with maybe just some slight increase in fouling as it goes on. So

I generally, I haven't really seen a, of accuracy drop with Blackhorn either. It's just at some point, like with, with the, the Fury universal fit or the Borlaug where it, it can accommodate some bore diameter variation. You may never run into a situation where it's too hard to load on our customs where it's,

You know, it's not as nearly forgiving. We're generally seeing like 10 to 20 shots and then it gets hard to load. So we'll do a solvent patch and a couple of dry patches just to knock the following down. Gotcha. And then you're good to go again without a complete cleaning. Yeah. Yeah. End of the year is really the only time I do a complete like stripped down clean. Yeah.

Yep. Now I'm going to roll my question right on to the end of Blake's because the way this podcast is going, we're probably going to not get, not get out of these listener questions. So on, on the cleaning, do you recommend removing the breach for a full cleaning or do you just run a patch? I do. I mean, I don't think it's super critical, but I've seen them, you know, over the years where they just get locked in. And I mean, on our, it doesn't hurt anything to pull it out and then, you know, you at least,

broke that carbon crud once a year so you know maybe in five years when you have a misfire and you need to to pull that breach plug you you know you can do it okay yeah that's i pulled my breach um ran a patch two or three patches from the

and I cleaned my muzzleloader backwards compared to my, you know, a rifle, everything's going from the action out the barrel for some reason on a muzzleloader, I clean them backwards, which maybe I shouldn't be. Um, but I figured like if I took the breach out, I would knock down like that shoulder that maybe develops in there that I couldn't get. If I didn't take it out, um, get it completely cleaned. And then,

On your guys' breach, it seemed to be very clean. I didn't know if I should soak it in solvent. I kind of looked at it, took a little pick to it, and I'm like, there's not a lot in here, and I just screwed it back in. Do I need to clean that breach? No, there's not much there, especially with black horn. Black horn burns pretty clean. So yeah, there's not much there to mess with.

Will there be some like noticeable signs coming up? Like, all right, something's going on with it. Like, will you see speeds go down? Will you see like. No, I mean, the only thing over the years, like, I mean, it's pretty much a zero maintenance system because, you know, there's no the flame channel is so short. Like there's really nowhere for carbon to build up in it. You know, the front of the plug does have that deep recess. Yeah.

And I got a gun back from, I'm not sure what he was doing because I've really never seen it in any other gun. But like that, that recess was almost completely carboned up. Like there was a, maybe an eighth of an inch hole down through all that carbon. And we, you know, we just came in with a quarter inch drill bit and drilled it out. So that's really the only thing to look out for is, and I suspect he was like doing some

some patching and some solvent started to get in there and build up or i i don't know what happened but yeah that's that's really the only part to look for on it yeah the only the only issue i've had with your system and it's 100 user error was when i went to d prime i'm like oh number number two shell holder let's use a seven mag um primer punch you know in in my old rcbs rock chuck press and i'm like huh

So I reloaded them all, went to put them in. And I noticed that the flash hole was a little bit bigger. It opened it up a little bit, but what happened is I thought I had backed it down to the point where it didn't start to flare the end of the module. Well, then it was too long or it flared too much and I couldn't get the dang bolt to close. That's why I like in a panic ordered all of those from you. I'm like, I ruined whatever, however many 15 or 16 I shot. And so then, uh,

I'm, I'm plugging Luke's business, but definitely get like the little cheap deep primer tool. Cause it works way better than ruining punch. Like I just, yeah, pain see, but yeah, yeah, it's funny. I get that. You know, we get that call periodically. Like I shot these, you know, I shot the modules and they, they swelled now and they won't go back in the plug. And I'm like, well, that's, that's physically not, not possible. Like you were, you were decapping on your press.

But yeah, I learned the hard way. I didn't even think about it. And then you use my little hand primer and got them already went back out to the range. And I'm like, God, this thing won't shut. I'm like, gosh, dang it. And I realized that I had ruined them all. Um, but no, um,

Uh, buddy Russell Porter's asking, um, he really likes your smokeless conversions. Um, what are your favorite powders in, what are your favorite powders for some smokeless loads? And then just how do they compare to a, uh, a Blackhorn 209 or a triple seven? Um, I guess performance wise.

Yeah. I mean, they're like, I mean, obviously it depends on what gun bullet way and, you know, the caveat never used smokeless in a muzzle that are that stamp Blackhorn to a nine only, but we're, we're more in that age 41 98 H three 22 benchmark burn rate. And then some of the bigger, bigger guns with, you know, longer barrels that can burn some powder we'll use like H 48 95 and,

And that, you know, that's will really ramp up the speed. But as far as black, you know, versus black and triples, I'm not, I don't even really know. I've not messed with triple seven much like black horn. Like we're, you know, we're in that 2,500 feet per second range with a 300 grain bullet with black horn. So it's, you know, anywhere from three to 600 feet per second slower than, than the smokeless. Gotcha. We actually accurate. What's that?

I was going to say, does the accuracy move? I mean, obviously they're different nodes and you're loading, but like, can you keep them more consistent for sure? I mean, we'll still, you know, we're still very sub MOA with black horn, but I mean, we're one whole group. So it's smokeless and we actually do most of our, our practicing for our black horn hunts with, with smokeless. We just download it to match the black horn speed just because black horns gotten so expensive.

So we, you know, and then it's cleaner and less expensive and all that stuff. Gotcha. I mean, it's the same reason, you know, you don't see people using Blackhorn 209 and modern centerfire cartridge rifles, right? It's not like smoke. Like it's not as good. Yeah. Yeah. It's just as good as it gets when it needs to be legal or substitute, right? That's when it shines is like, that's the best you can get when it's got to be black, you know, black powder or substitute. Exactly. Yeah.

We've all seen plenty of gadgets and fads come and go, but here's one product that stood the test of time. Seafoam Motor Treatment. Lots of hunters and anglers know that seafoam helps engines run better and last longer. It's really simple. When you pour it in your gas tank, seafoam cleans harmful fuel deposits that cause engine problems. I'm talking common stuff like hard starts, rough engine performance, or lost fuel economy.

Seafoam is an easy way to prevent or overcome these problems. Just pour a can in your gas tank and let it clean your fuel system. You probably know someone who's used a can of seafoam to get their truck or boat going again. People everywhere rely on seafoam to keep their trucks, boats, and small engines running the way that they should the entire season. Help your engine run better and last longer. Pick up a can of seafoam today at your local auto parts store or visit seafoamworks.com to learn more.

The only thing better than a successful hunt is celebrating your feet during the after-the-hunt moment. With a smooth taste made to be enjoyed on the rocks or with your favorite mixer, Pendleton Whiskey is perfect for winding down around the fire or putting your feet up after cleaning your game. If you're looking for the perfect drink to celebrate after a great day hunting,

Make it Pendleton Whiskey, the official whiskey of the after-the-hunt moment. It's not just poured, it's earned. Pendleton Distillers, Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Please drink responsibly. Pendleton is a registered trademark of Pendleton Woolen Mills. You ever get that feeling you're stuck inside staring at screens and a primal urge kicks in? You crave wide open spaces, fresh air, the chance to connect with the land?

Well, maybe it's time to find your own piece of the wild, but searching for property can be a maze. That's where land.com comes in. They got millions of listings across the country from mountain ranches to hidden fishing holes. Their search tools are like a seasoned guide, helping you narrow down what you want. Land.com isn't just about buying and selling land.

It's about finding a place to hunt, fish, explore, or simply sit by a campfire and listen to the crickets. So head over to land.com today to turn one day into today. Because trust me, there's nothing quite like the feeling of standing on your own piece of earth.

Our next question, we kind of answered it already. We'll just all touch on it again. Zellen Hessel, I guess, was asking about the Muzzy 209s versus Shotgun 209 primers. And you've kind of already touched on that. It sounds like Shotgun 209s are souped up and maybe Muzzy 209s are maybe de-performed a little bit. Right. Yeah, I guess something with the mechanics of igniting 777. If you have a full power shotgun primer, you'll get more carbon buildup.

at that crud ring. Gotcha. But you're saying if you do want to elect to run Blackhorn 209, then you need to go to that higher, the actual Magnum shotgun primer and stay away from the Muzzy 209s. Correct. And I haven't messed with these, so I'm going to ask a real ignorant question. Are they explicitly on the packaging, like these are Muzzy 209s versus these are shotgun reload? Yeah, they are. Okay.

Gotcha. Yeah, and the two part numbers you want, it's a Federal 209A or the CCI 209M are the two Magnum shotgun primers that I'd recommend. Okay. Dylan Roenisch, he's asking about 209 primers in his 12-year-old Night Disc Extreme. We've kind of already touched on that. Like at some point...

um there's no big advantage um in those guns you know unless you're going to switch to you know blackhorn 209 just for cleaning reasons and then you're running that that that better primer right um okay this is one of my question we kind of already touched on it um chad tyler lee hornery um just that cleaning frequency shooting clean versus dirty how dirty um i wanted to just kind of give him credit it's kind of a question i've already asked but um

Yeah, I do. I mean, so my cleaning, we'll go through it one more time. My cleaning is I've got a muzzleloader rod. I've got patches specifically built for 50 Cal. I've got specific Blackhorn 209 solvent. I'm like, I might as well like there. That's what they recommend to clean it. Yeah.

When I'm out at the range, if it's in between shots, I'll maybe run one solvent patch down and it comes right back up the barrel. I don't have to take out my breech. It's got a knurled end on it. Two or three swabs, two or three dry patches, and I'll continue to shoot. So that's kind of what we talked about, kind of that dirty clean, I guess, keep loading bullets. And then...

The it sounds like we both break our guns down at the end of the season. Do you have anything else to add? Like, yeah, I mean, a couple of tricks I do or learned over the years is I use a regular clinging rod and just a brush to patch with. Like, I find that is way more consistent on actually getting the patch up out of the barrel than a jag.

So like a four, I'll use it in a 45. I'll use a regular 45 Cal rifle brush and just wrap my patch around that. And like, like you, I'll go in, you know, for the quick and dirty, just right through the muzzle. Um, so that, that's that. And then, uh, you know, we, we,

Really, I mean, black horn isn't, you can use any solvent really for cleaning that, right? You'd treat it like a regular rifle at that point where you can get into some issues with some of the

black powder substitutes using regular solvents where it's more like water-based, I think. But we'll use – I'll do like a 50-50 mix with 99% isopropyl alcohol and Hoppy's No. 9 for my solvent patch just to help that solvent evaporate off a little better if I don't get it all with the dry patch. Gotcha. Yeah, because Hoppy's – if I remember right, that's a fairly corrosive –

like or it can be corrosive if you don't get it back off right so some people say it's a hot solvent is that is that right i i've not i've not heard that i actually only use it for the muzzle loaders we actually switch to uh bullet we while we retail at bullet central i think is has it branded is it's their line but they're thorough clean so we've started to use that for most of like our deep cleaning and our rifle cleaning after we we test fire them and that that stuff's like

It strips it. It looks like a new bore after you run that through there and bore scope it. Perfect. Perfect. So now we're going to get into a little... We got a little bit of time left. Sorry. Hopefully... Let me know if you've got a hard stop here, Luke. I know you're a busy guy running a busy company here. I've got however long we need to go. I'm good. All right. So...

Let's say I've just bought a Remington Ultimate or I've got an old Knight and for some reason I want to start to run Bullet to Boar.

type you know a fit bullet how do you go what is that process do you have a sample kit you send somebody is there a way to measure it with my micrometer like how does a how does the guy figure out if i've got a 501 bore or a 499 on the 50 cal like i really don't see any advantage to getting a sizing die and going straight up with the bullet to bore like the the

Bullet to born a 50, like 50 or pretty much only running them for elk hunting. Well, you know, that, that bull and the, the bliss, like the bliss, the available ballistic coefficients, um,

We're talking guns that aren't rated for smokeless, too, so you're locked in the Blackhorn. It's all about speed and ballistic coefficient and obviously accuracy, but you're not going to find a higher BC full bore .50 cal bullet to shoot than the Hornady bore driver or the Fury. They're all going to be in that range.

that same, uh, same class of BC. So, so at that point I, I wouldn't recommend buying a sizing diet for a 50 Cal to mess around with. I would, I would pick up one of those bullets and universal fits and just go with them. Yeah. Now you get into the 45 Cal, uh,

That's where you can definitely get a ballistic coefficient bump going to the copper jacket lead core bullets, like the Arrowhead XLV line.

I think we're at like a .4 G1 BC on our 300 grain bullet. So it's a pretty big jump over like a power belt or the Hornady. I think they're advertising that at .315 G1, which is still really good for a 285 grain bullet historically, but it's a whatever, a

25% hit over our 300 grain. And then you can build the pressure, get your speed up more in that full bore. But the process with that really is, I mean, really you can hope, you know, buy, we offer them in a couple of different diameters. You can buy them and hope you get lucky, but really the best way, unless you have a, you know, aftermarket, like a Brooks barrel, Bartland barrel, something that's

cut rifled and has held the the dimension super close or where our pre-sized bullets would work you're going to be needing to buy a sizing die um which the die is adjustable as you you know you start pull your breech plug and just start twisting the die down running the bullet through on your press or like a lee hand press until you get a consistent easy like firm um

One hand, like you're looking for about eight to 10 pounds, like the palm of your hand on the ramrod is the loading pressure you're looking for.

And then depending on the ignition system, you know, like a shotgun primer, you're probably going to benefit from a wad, like either a veggie wad or a wool wad between the powder and the primer just to help with the initial seal and then obturating. If you're with our ignition system, which is more efficient where you're using higher pressure like Blackhorn 209 or whatever,

or smokeless, you probably get away without the wad where that, that load's going to take off and snap seal that, that bullet into the rifling. Yeah. And so that, so the bull I'm shooting is universal fit. Is that basically that little plastic piece on the butt of the bull? Is that acting as the wad and sealing the,

showing everything up yeah yeah i would say it's similar to what i think it's the the i i really haven't got too much into the design of those you know that that more like universal fit so i i think it but it does yeah obviously it it acts as a buffer right so it is similar similar to the wad i would say maybe it's a little different in that like those bullets are designed to be

super like you're not you're not getting any friction around the bullet like it or very little right it the primary amount is is at the base there and yeah it's a it's a much tighter fit than our the wad we're using between the the bullet and the primer but yeah it's the mechanics are essentially the same

Luke, is there any, and maybe you don't know, but is there any truth behind, like you do a lot of reading and then I actually called the day I was talking to you, I called the owner of Fury and

I want to be careful of my words since so many people get to listen to this, but basically, I'm going to take the Cliff Notes version, is you have to push some of these universal fits a little harder because you get a little bit of a swell out of them or you kind of get that pressure behind them and that forces the rifling. So they'll load easy, but on the way out, they're actually going to swell a little bit at the butt and start to touch. Is that... Well, that's an operation I'm talking about. So where...

they generally speaking on a, on a universal fit bullet or like our, our ones where you're sizing them to the, to the barrel, like the harder you run them, the more accurate they're going to be. So that, that's where it is really important to follow your, you know, your manufacturer's recommendations for safe loads and stuff, because guys are, guys will start shooting and they're like it, you know,

just throw out numbers like 90 grains was good. 95 grains was better. And they're like, I, you know, it, it, it just loves it. So it must be fine. Like, no, it will generally continue to shoot better. The harder, harder, uh, you run them.

just because they do need to get that kick to bump out and swell into the rifling. Gotcha. And some of that just brought up an idea. We always talk when we're reloading or trying to find a perfect load for our big rifles, nodes, where it's like, all right, at 2,800, it sat really good, but then we can get a different node at like 2,930 that sits just as good, but in the middle, it sucked. As you're developing these loads, you're trying to figure out what the right... Because I could. I just went to...

I shouldn't even say this, but you, you know, and I'm not claiming you, but between the owner of fury and I can't even remember his name or you and everybody on the internet, they're like, just what the arrowhead breaches go to one Oh six by weight. Like probably shouldn't have did that, but that's, that's how I did it. And to be safe, you should have maybe went at one. I mean, old, uh,

Remington before they went bankrupt and all that, that was, like if you got someone on the phone, that was their recommended max for Blackhorn 209 out of Remington Ultimate.

I mean, that's, that's quite a bit more than, than the alt, you know, the recommended max you're going to see out of some of the, you know, the night muzzleloaders and traditions. Right. So that's where you, you know, that you just can't take a blanket load with Blackhorn and use it in every muzzleloader. Right. But, but yeah, that, I mean, that's, that's been a great, great load with the Fury Universal fits out of the, out of a Remington Ultimate. But I guess taking a step back and talking about load development and

in muzzleloaders where we see much more consistency across like all Remington ultimates. We don't, we don't even do load development in our customs because you're, you're getting rid of so many variables with a muzzleloader versus a rifle where you're

you know, the bullets fit to the barrel. There's no throat, there's no head space. There's no, you know, neck tension, just all those handles you have to twist on a center fire to get accuracy are, are gone. So I could see like if, if, uh, you know, I've, I've over the years, I've seen variation in lots of powder, right? Blackhorns notorious for that. So at times, you know, if, if,

if you get a, you know, if you're, if you're seeing something that doesn't make sense with a load that shoots another guns, it might just be variation in the lot, but we're, you know, we're buying eight pound jugs of powder and shooting our guns out of there. So it, and there's no, like every gun's basically the same. So if, if the load doesn't,

shoot in one gun, it's not the load. We did something wrong with the gun. There's just no value in doing ladders and stuff like that, especially a custom muzzleloader.

So what, let's say, I guess. So, and, and generally like if you, if you do see like a load, like a fury universal fit that shoots really good in a Remington ultimate, you know, in most Remington all demands and you get one where it doesn't shoot good, you may have run into a situation where it's not tweaking. The powder isn't going to solve anything. You just have a, a,

I see the biggest issue is bore diameter variation where a looser fit or a tighter fit is going to skew things. So really, you know, you may, you may be able to put a bandaid on it by tweaking the powder up or down, but really tweaking the diameter of the projectile you fit to get a better, a better fit in the barrel is, is really the easy solution. Gotcha. So back to the load development, let's just say,

You know, I buy a bullet, I buy some powder. You just mentioned like they continue to probably shoot better until you start to probably approach some pressure issues. Like how how should a guy or a gal that's developing a load like what is that balance like?

should it be recommended you know manufacturer's recommendation max like don't get close you know don't exceed that i mean that's obviously the legal advice you're going to give like how like like i'm at 106 by weight should i have tried 108 by weight because you know fury says it's okay you know your breach is okay with it remington's guns okay with it like is there should i have tried it and seen if it shoots better or that much more speed or like how does how does the guy determine like i need to stop

Yeah, I mean, obviously it's a legal answer, but it's also just the, I mean, really the common sense answer. Safe answer, yeah. Just because there really aren't the same handles on the muzzleloader to identify pressure. Yeah.

I think everyone operated under the old, I think growing up, you probably heard that too. You can't overload a muzzleloader, right? It's just going to blow the unburnt powder out the end of the barrel. And that's definitely not the case with Blackhorn 209 and obviously smokeless powder especially. But you definitely can overpressure.

uh, with Blackhorn. So yeah, follow, follow, follow the manufacturer's recommendations. I don't really see a ton of value in doing like,

a load work like starting low in the range and working up just because you're not gonna there's no pressure signs to see there's not like a tight bore like you could run into at the center of fire you know or brass case capacity all that stuff so um i think you're generally fine going to the max or whatever your manufacturer recommends and there's

So there's, you know, like on the high-powered rifles, you know, we get ejector marks. We get primers bumping out. We get some signs. Like on a muzzleloader, there's nothing on your guys' modules, nothing on the old original Remington modules, nothing on like a shot, you know, a 209 disc. Like you're pretty much just stuck with just having to run manufacturer recommendations because you're not going to see any signs leading up to high pressure. Right. And even like our modules kind of look like a case head where you can actually –

you know, create pressure signs on them. But generally that's like,

way past where, where the pressure actually is because the, the breach plug hides some of the, some of the pressure, uh, that's, it's not truly a rifle case type system. So yeah, there's, there's just not good handles to read pressure. Gotcha. Yeah. Um, yeah. And then kind of my, I guess my last question, um, you know, bullet selection, we, we, we're limited by laws a little bit, you know, lead up here, um, you know, jacketed, um,

For what we're doing, you know, relatively what I would call, you know, in your world, short-range muzzle loading, you know, 200 yards and in. Like, is there any inherent, like, issue with running some bows or versus power belts versus the bore locks versus, like, a barrel fit type bolt? Like, at some point, like...

Or do you believe like suppose we're still not as accurate as some of these other options? Talking about when I converted that Savage 10 ML2 to .45 cal back in the day, I was running a Sabo, a 200 grain SST from Hornady and a Sabo. And I shot some ridiculously small groups. You run into...

issues you have to be aware of like barrel heat is a big factor you know a lot of guys are doing their their look you know their testing and stuff in august when it's 100 degrees and you know as the perform the pressure the performance of the muzzleloader goes up but even uh you know more conventional muzzleloaders or slug guns i i think looking back when i i

was in high school trying to get a 200 yard slug gun and doing a lot of my shooting in July and August. I think I would, I can recall lots of times where I'd have to, you know, the first two shots print really close together. And then the third shot would be six inches off. And I, I believe that was probably barrel heat disrupting the, the integrity of the Sabo. Uh, but yeah,

Actually, I just talked to a customer yesterday that was having ignition issues. Remington 700 ML, their old muzzleloader, using one of our shotgun primer systems. And he was using a Harvester Black Crush Strip, which is a great sabot, but he was using a Barnes TEZ.

bullet, which that bullet, I guess I can, anyway, I'll, I'll make it a short story. It was a undersized bullet in a, in a Sabo that's designed to load easy. So I, I think my guess is it was probably taking them about one finger on the ramrod to, to seat the bullet. And he, he had ignition issues, but I, I was explaining it to him. Like, even if you were to get it to go bang, like your accuracy would probably suck because your, your fit was so loose. So that's where it's,

You can definitely obtain great accuracy with Sabos. You just have to pay attention and you might have to, you know, experiment a little bit to find the right Sabo and bullet combo that fits, fits your bore. Well, gotcha. Well, I think we went through all the listener Q and A's. We made it, it made it about an hour. Is there anything else like we didn't cover? That's important. You know, we, you know, triggers are triggers. We've talked about ignition systems. Like you say, when,

I've been amazed just because I've been away from muzzleloaders for so long and you hinted to it that

We're getting to the point where some of these muzzleloaders can be as accurate or more accurate than some of these high-powered rifles just because you are taking away case issues, all these other issues that are kind of taken care of. It's like the diesel versus the gasoline motor, right? We took a lot of this stuff apart, and it's easier to work on, easier to diagnose, and maybe easier to get to run at times. What's next for muzzleloaders? Are we there? Is there anything else you want to talk about that matters that we didn't cover here?

Yeah, no, I mean, I, you know, I, I guess just, you know, the one not even related to performance, but I always like to throw it out there is, you know, make sure you're using a witness mark on your Ram rod. You know, that's number one, I think safety issue with muzzleloaders is guys double loading a witness mark, which if you don't know what that is, that's, you know, just a mark on your rod that's flush with the muzzle, right?

uh, when it's loaded. So you can identify a double load and every, you know, everyone thinks I'll never do that, but it's, you know, you get on autopilot talking to a buddy or whatever, uh, definitely, uh, you know, something to watch out for. But, um,

Yeah. I mean, as far as where muzzleloaders go next, I mean, I think higher BC bullets that are, are less sensitive to bore diameter, uh, you know, is a big opportunity. Uh, if someone can come up with that, but it's, you know, there's, there's just a whole, you know, host of issues where overcoming that and still being able to handle higher pressures and stuff. Um,

So that's probably the biggest deficiency I see right now. If, you know, if we were even call it a deficiency, biggest opportunity for making, making them easier to shoot at distance. But, you know, it's, it's kind of, I mean, like we talked about, it's crazy over the last decade, how, you know, how fast the advancements have happened and where we're at now. You know, if we miss any questions, I like, you know, I like to do,

Sunday Q and A's once in a while on Instagram. So I'm pretty accessible that way. If somebody wants to hop on there and watch out for that. Okay. Yeah. How else can they get ahold of you, Luke? We usually close up, but how do they get ahold of you? Yeah. We're on Instagram, Facebook, all that arrowhead rifles.com. Yeah. That's yeah. We're, we're on most of the interwebs. So yeah.

I'm going to ask another question, even though we're past the part of kind of closing this up, because you brought up the witness mark. And growing up, Pirate X pellets, my dad was always like, don't crush the pellets. So there's this balance of too tight versus do you keep smashing it? Blackhorn 209, you've got loose powder that should kind of self-level as long as your gun is up.

like is there a right or wrong answer like should you is it kind of a she would be smashing the tip of the bullet in there what's the right or should it just be like you said that 10 pounds down when it tightens up you're done I just shoot for consistency I mean there are guys that have done studies you know experimenting and you can influence your velocity and stuff by how hard you see the bullet so I

I think there's almost like a torque wrench gauge out there where there's one guy that sells where it'll pop when you hit a certain pressure at the bottom. But I just go for a consistent torque.

at the end. I try to keep that consistent. Gotcha. Yeah. My sister, you're probably going to be like, just shake your head. Mine's like, you just kind of don't grab the Robbie. You just kind of like three little taps, but not very hard. Just with like, you know, one finger on each side, like a pencil and like three taps and like, I should be good. A little, a little, uh,

I'll make that joke. Yeah. You're like, here's three. And then you're kind of looking at your witness Mark and you're like, I think it's the, like put your head down. I think it's in the same spot as last time. And yeah, I mean, that's, so that's the thing with Blackhorn is volumetrically it's super inconsistent, right? So your, your witness Mark, I mean, it, it,

it's close. It's, it's going to move slightly. And that's, that's where you had definitely Blackhorn is, is better doing it by weight. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Gotcha. No, I really appreciate having you on Luke. Um, like I say, this is, I feel like I know rifles. I don't know rifles like any of you builders or anything like that. I feel like I know them, but like muzzleloaders are still kind of a mystery to me. Cause I'm just kind of getting back into taking advantage of some of our season. So I really appreciate you having, you know, having you on, um, you know, sharing your knowledge and you know, how people can get ahold of you and, uh,

Yeah, good luck with any other hunts you have this year and with the business. And really appreciate you joining us here. Appreciate it. Yeah, it's fun catching up. All right, take care, Luke. Outdoor adventure won't wait for engine problems. Things like hard starts, rough performance, and lost fuel economy are often caused by fuel gum and varnished buildup. Seafoam can help your engine run better and last longer. Simply pour a can in your gas tank. Hunters and anglers rely on seafoam to keep their engines running the way it should the entire season.

Pick up a can of Seafoam today at your local auto parts store or visit seafoamworks.com to learn more. The only thing better than a successful hunt is celebrating your feet during the after the hunt moment. With a smooth taste made to be enjoyed on the rocks or with your favorite mixer, Pendle and Whiskey is perfect for winding down around the fire or putting your feet up after cleaning your game. If you're looking for the perfect drink to celebrate after a great day hunting,

I'm sure a lot of you guys remember the old ceremonial hunting tradition of eating the heart.

out of the first animal you kill. Meat from those organs are among the most nutrient-rich foods on the planet. You can get those same benefits your ancestors craved via convenient daily capsules from Heart and Soil. Find out more at heartandsoil.co. And remember, use code MEATEATER for 10% off your purchase.