Guns Illustrated 2011. Dan ShidelerЧитать онлайн книгу.
loads, length and weight of the gun could be increased to 100 grains and 240-grain saboted bullets. For maximum performance with heavier loads, the gun needs to have some additional weight added to the buttstock and a solid steel ramrod, both of which are easy user modifi cations.
As does CVA and Traditions, Thompson/ Center also has a version of its Omega, called the NorthWest Explorer ($327-$407), which has a cut-away section of the barrel to provide an exposed ignition and a 1:48-inch twist for full-caliber bullets. These modifications make this gun legal to use in Washington, Oregon and Idaho.
TRADITIONS
Traditions continues to carry a number of side-lock fl intlock and percussion Rifles in its line. Three new additions to the Vortek line include the Ultralight and Northwest Edition rifles and a pistol.
The Vortek .50-caliber muzzleloading rifles have drop-out triggers, CeraKote finishes and Accelerator Breech Plugs. The Northwest edition has the rear of the barrel milled out to expose the primer. These guns weigh 6.25 pounds and have 28-inch barrels. Both rifles sell for between $439-$499, depending on options.
The pistol version is also a .50-caliber break-barreled gun, but with a 13-inch barrel and CeraKote finish for $369. Although I have not shot this gun, I am impressed by how it feels, by the quality of its iron sights and by its general design. I would prefer a few more inches of barrel and a steel ramrod, but this pistol has all appearances of being a winner.
PowerBelt bullets and Hodgdon WhiteHot pellets.
Powders, Bullets and Accessories
Alliant, the maker of Red Dot powder, will be launching Black Dot powder, which is advertised as a cleaner burning, virtually non-corrosive black-powder substitute. This powder may be used in muzzleloaders (including fl intlocks) and in cartridges loaded by Cowboy Action shooters.
Muzzleloading shooters going to South Africa will find this country’s home-grown Sannadex to be acceptable in both fl int-lock and percussion guns, although there are apparent problems in batch-to-batch uniformity. If you ever have occasion to use it, allow some range time to determine what charge corresponds to your gun’s black-powder load.
IMR’s White Hot pellets worked very well in the Traditions’s double that I used and in other guns. This powder has a low residue and cleans up easily with soap and water.
Both Thompson/Center Arms and Traditions now offer low-cost saboted lead bullets for use in sighting in. Thompson/Center calls its bullets Cheap Shot Sabots and Traditions has named their sighting-in bullets Plinkers ($9.99 for 20). Both are 240-gr. hollow-pointed lead bullets which are also effective close-range deer and wild hog killers.
Sannadex Powder on Giraffe skull.
Gavin Margrate is a fi ne craftsman who produces black-powder accessories sold under the Bushbuck Trading label. Besides offering hand-made brass cappers, fl ask and shot bags, he also makes powder horns using horns from African antelopes. Should you like a powder horn made from an antelope that you shot, he can produce a custom horn and/or bag to make a unique African trophy. His telephone numbers are 0444-883-1113 or 082-469-3236, or he may also be contacted by E-mail at [email protected].
New Book
X-treme Muzzleloading:Fur, Fowl and Dangerous Game with Muzzleloading Rifles, Smoothbores and Pistols is now available (about $20, AuthorHouse, Amazon.com and others). Based on a lifetime of hunting with many muzzleloading guns in North America, Europe and Africa, this book describes the author’s sometime zany, sometimes dangerous experiences with these front-loading guns.
BIG? YES! BORING? NO! BY DAN SHIDELER
The lever-action Rifle has been in continuous production longer than any other type of American firearm. The Hunt Rocket Ball and Volitional Repeater of 1848 paved the way for the Volcanic lever-actions and, in turn , the Henry; the Spencer; Winchester ‘s Models 1866, 1873, 1876, 1892, 1894, 1895, 88, etc.; the Marlins; the Savage 1898 and 1899; the Stevens 425; and, finally, the most highly-evolved lever-action of them all, the BLR (Browning Lever Rifle) Model 81.
Between the Hunt and the today’s ultra-Modern BLR Lightweight came a number of lever-actions that, well, just didn’t live up to their potential. We’re not talking pre-’64 Winchesters here. That market has matured, and the high prices that those great old guns command have discouraged many entry-level collectors who, naturally, have turned their attention elsewhere. And many of them have looked to Winchester’s Big Bore and XTR lever-actions as tomorrow’s hot collectible.
What’s a “Big Bore”? Contrary to what you might think, it’s not necessarily a .444, .450, or .45-70. As applied to collectible lever-actions, the term “Big Bore” actually refers to a trio of medium-bore cartridges chambered in the Winchester 94 that never quite got off the ground: the .307 Winchester, the .356 Winchester, and the .375 Winchester. These cartridges were “Big Bores” only in comparison to the dinky ol’ 30-30, but Winchester’s marketing department must have thought that calling them Big Bores would help them hold their heads up alongside Marlin’s .444 and .45-70.
The first of the new “Big Bore” cartridges was the .375 Winchester. Rolled out in 1978, the .375 was a slightly beefier knock-off of the old .38-55 Winchester. The “.375” designation may have struck a chord among those who confused it with the old .375 H&H stomper, but in truth the .375 Winchester was a ballistic dead-ringer for Marlin’s 336 chambered in .35 Remington. That made it a perfectly competent woods load and, besides, it gave Winchester something to put up against the Marlin that didn’t have the hated word “Remington” in its name. The .375 found its home in a redesigned version of the Winchester Model 1894, the ‘94 Big Bore.”
Two years later, Winchester really got in the game with the .307 Winchester. Introduced in 1982, the .307 was a rimmed .308 Winchester loaded with 150- and 180-gr. roundnose bullets. Cartridge capacity was actually a bit less than that of the .308 Winchester because the .307’s bullet had to be seated a skoosh deeper in the cartridge case to function in the tried-and-true Model 94 action. But even so, the .307 was a barn-burner, retaining about as much energy at 200 yards as the .30-30 did at 100 yards.
1982 also witnessed the birth of the third member of the Big Bore family, the .356 Winchester. Depending on how you look at it, the .356 Winchester was either a necked-up .307 or a rimmed version of the .358 Winchester introduced in 1955. Either way, the .356 blew a 200-gr. bullet out the spout at 400 fps faster than Marlin’s Model 336 in .35 Remington.
My editor hits me in the head with a ball-peen hammer whenever I commit an inaccuracy, so I should probably mention that the .307 and .356 weren’t literally “Big Bores” at all. That title is properly reserved only for the .375. Between 1978 and 1982, Winchester was reorganized as United States Repeating Arms Company (USRAC), and someone at USRAC decided that the “Big Bore” tag was not entirely satisfactory. Thus the new .307 and .356 were chambered in the so-called Winchester 94 XTR, “XTR” being an acronym for “Extended Range.” The XTR designation was also applied to the 94 chambered in 7-30 Waters, which is a collectible in its own right. (Most collectors, however, refer to all of the .307/.356/.375 guns as “Big Bores.”)
Call it what you will, 94 Big Bore or XTR or Angle Eject, the redesigned gun rectified a notorious weakness of the original Model 1894: an open-topped receiver that couldn’t take the pounding of anything heavier than the .30-30 and that wouldn’t accept scope mounts. The Big Bore/XTR/Angle Eject corrected this failing with a thick, brawny receiver incorporating an ejection port that hurled empties not out the top but off to the side, kinda-sorta. The design worked, and it finally gave USRAC something that would compete with Marlin’s solid-topped 336.