.577 (Minie)
Bullets
A bit of history for you. The average smooth-bore musket could,
without much training, enable the soldier to regularly hit a
man-size target at about 100 yards. The average rifle extended
that effective range to around 300 yards with a 'patch ball' -
basically a ball with a small bit of cloth around it. However,
because muzzle-loading rifles were slower to reload with this
method they continued to be reserved mostly for sharpshooters or
snipers until the advent of the Minie bullet in the 1850s.
The Minie bullet got around the problem of the patch by
dispensing with it. Although the bullet was still undersized for
the bore, it had a hollow base, the skirt of which would expand
upon firing to engage the rifling......At this point, the
muzzle-loading rifled musket, as it was called, became the
preferred infantry weapon since not only could it deliver the
same frequency of fire over greater distances, but also with
substantially more terminal effect because it was in fact a
bullet not a ball and therefore heavier - between 460 and 500
grains.
Initially the base of a Minie bullet was filled with boxwood,
iron or clay. However for the modern shooter this has not
proved, to my knowledge, to improve the accuracy, or done
anything else....apart from fowling the bore and creating more
preparation work.
The normal military powder charge in the 1880's was 70 grains of
powder, though with modern 'Swiss 2' (FFFg) this may be dropped
to 50 /55 grains depending upon the shooters choice and
distance.
Personally I
use 35 grains at 50m and 45 grains (both of FFFg) at 100m which
seems to suit my 5 groove Enfield well...Some testing with
different power (Medium, FFg, FFFg etc) may be required, as well
as testing with different 'LUBE'
to get the best accuracy and aim point.
Reference from:
www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A777990
