Garrison Joe, SASS #60708

I like PAM solution for cleaning BP residue, it's cheap and wife won't complain about the smell. PAM is equal parts of * hydrogen peroxide (drug store) * rubbing alcohol (same) * Murphy's oil soap (ditto, or a store with household cleaning products) Make small batches, store in the empty peroxide bottle with a label "PAM's magic" - that will make the wife wonder. Nothing there to harm a gun. Cleans better than soapy water, and leaves a vegetable oil residue behind prevents rust and is kind to wood stocks, too. Barrels with BP fouling need a 5 minute wetting down before running a patch through the barrel. (I keep a small spray bottle with PAM in it, even take that to the range for a mid-shoot cleanup if desired). A couple of 1/4 pieces of paper towel push any moistened fouling out the muzzle, and one wetted towel finishes the barrel cleaning. Easier than smokeless! PAM also cleans greasy stove tops and counters better than most anything else! As for load, about 40 grains of BP is plenty, and 1 or 1 1/8 ounce of shot - stretch that expensive powder as far as you can. good luck, GJ

Just put a new copper plated #4 steel shot pellet in my main match gun! Last one went to Mars. GJ

Yeah, that Redding would be great if you want to keep the seating and crimping steps separate and do a roll crimp. I use an RCBS .45 Automatic combination seater/crimp die myself, taper crimp. Have used a roll crimp at one time, but find with a fast smokeless powder in the C45Spl, I do fine with a strong taper crimp. Several pards have cut off an old .45 Colt roll crimp die - easiest with a small lathe, but with some work hand tools will "cut it". good luck, GJ

Yep, I find I need about 0.008" (8 thousandths) barrel to cylinder face gap for running 6 stages without having to hose down the cylinder face. The 3 thou that Ruger likes to have on Vaqueros, for example, is just too tight for BP loads. And, opening the gap did not have any major downsides in accuracy for smokeless loads. good luck, GJ

Your loads did not substitute enough of either filler to make much difference in the recoil. Drop down to 15 grains of Black and you will feel some difference. That then will take maybe 12 grains of filler to eliminate any air space. Good charcoal is what is ALREADY IN black powder. Unless you used some very poor quality charcoal, there is no way the use of charcoal as a filler will cause extra fouling problems. I shoot .44-40 and .45 Colt cases with about half BP and half activated charcoal, layered, and get no extra fouling. Now, if you ground up cheap BBQ briquettes, that stuff has a bunch of sand and other garbage in it. I'd betcha it's not the filler that is locking your cylinder, but the barrel/cylinder gap is too small. And also pay special attention to using a GOOD BP lube, and plenty of it. I too am a fan of Cowboy 45 Special cases. I cut old .45 Colt cases down and they last a LONG time. I'm sure you can solve this if you try some of the simple stuff. GJ

I have an Ithaca NID - it's not a cowboy match suitable double. IMO. It's well made, for a gun made in the 1930s. Doll's head projects between barrels (so a little slower to load), heavy, stiff action, and where's any spare parts? Parts will have to be made, and few smiths will want to do that. good luck, GJ

Yep, my poor experience came with a cart bought in 2008. Wire wheels, busted brakes, poor fabric design. Replaced in 2010 (IIRC) with another, and that one is still going fairly strong. My comments were directed at the original design, and that seemed to be what the OP had. I'm glad they have made improvements through the years. Glad too that they now have a field rep who gets out amongst the end users, too! good luck, GJ

Volume means how many a month or year do you plan to shoot. Once you load 500 say, you are not done. You have just begun. If you do a match a month, and practice a little once a month, that is maybe 20 rounds for match and 40 rounds for practice. Or 60 rounds a month, which is 720 rounds a year. That volume you can easily do with a single stage press. I shoot at least 700 rounds a month of cowboy and 700 rounds of Wild Bunch, more in good weather. For me, a Dillon 550 press is just about right. And extra die plates are available for that press, so to change to a different round, it can be as simple as swapping the die plate, the shell plate and maybe the primer feeder/seater. 30 minutes at the most. Getting advice from an experienced reloader is about the best way to learn this hobby. If they already know how to load for cowboy matches, it's a genuine gift if he will work with you to learn how to load 'light"! After you load for a couple of months you will start to understand what equipment will work for you. I'd not buy a LOT of stuff until you get that experience under your belt. You may get a recommendation here for every reloading machine ever made. Most will work for you, but costs can range from a few hundred to a couple-three thousand. And production rates run a wide gamut. Learn, then buy once and wisely. good luck, GJ

Not even close as to quality and usability and resale value. You sound like you are buying on names you have heard someone mention rather than considering what your real needs are. (I can not imagine what the motivation would be that someone would be "split" between a Dillon progressive and any Lee loader. Sorry, just little comparison.) The volume of your shooting will make much more difference in a press choice than the wide range of chamberings you are considering. Larger volumes of shooting and small amount of free time means you might really benefit from a Dillon progressive or a Hornady Ammo Plant. Either will be pricey and take some learning time. A simple used RCBS or Lyman single stage press is a great learning tool, though, and the dies you might buy will mostly move up to better productions rates pretty well. good luck, GJ

So get a used single-stage press for $30-50 and start on it. Will pay itself off in 2 boxes of .44-40. GJ

No, contact the factory. They have made several wheel changes during the years, and older models are just about impossible to get wheels for. Weak early designs (like the spoke wheels which did not have spoke-socket-nuts) and China-sourced product has resulted in their carts being expensive use-for-a-while-and-discard equipment. Got to be real gentle with their carts! good luck, GJ

If you REALLY DO NOT want to reload, then you should be shooting .38 special guns. All other chamberings - you need to reload to avoid PREMIUM pricing.m GJ

I use the boiled linseed oil commercial gun stock finishes on my guns. Either TruOil or Brownells Linspeed. If you have just "straight" linseed oil, it will take very long drying times between coats. If you have Boiled Linseed Oil BLO - it will be faster drying. But when I have to use the BLO, I still modify it a little with some Japan Dryer liquid, which then gets most coats to dry in a day or two. Read label on the Dryer - in other words, follow directions to get the best results. Hand apply the oils of any type and rub the finish as applied to warm it up, using the palm and heel of the hand. Friction heat helps those oils polymerize and set better. good luck, GJ

Zombies certainly do walk the earth!

Haven't switched, don't plan to since I cast and lube my own cheaper than any vendor sells. Quite satisfied with lube the way it was done back then. Good luck, GJ

If the new configuration for the software is set to Status Updates (by default) then that is the WRONG setting. Pick the one that most folks would want as the normal search- I would guess it would be All Content. I searched directly from the (simple) search box and did not use the Advanced Search screen which is where a user can see (and change) the focus and the content of the search. Since the same simple search box then worked the next day, I believe I encountered something different that what you are describing. Good luck,GJ

https://www.midsouthshooterssupply.com/dept/reloading/primers/large-pistol Something I've not seen for quite a while - standard Fed LP primers on-line and in stock (at least last 2 days). The LP Mags have been available, but not these standard load primers. Good luck, GJ

As well as power factor, there are muzzle velocity limits for rifle and handgun loads. Found in the shooter's handbook. As your question kind of implies, monthly matches usually will just use eyeballs and ears for guessing if your loads are acceptable. Sanctioned state and above matches should have a chronograph and scale available, because it is possible there will be times where loads need to be measured, not just "guesstimated" to be legal. We don't have a lot of problems with this now that several major matches got serious about measuring suspected loads several years ago - the lessons learned stuck pretty well. Good luck, GJ

Nope, the usual suspects for Casting accessories no longer list it. If I remember right, Midway was where I got the can, ten years ago, that I hardly used because I found it was a very nasty sticky messy flux that did not do a good job. I would suggest that it is no longer being sold because it was never that good in the first place. I recommend one or more of the following VERY CHEAP fluxes: 1. Wood chips and shavings. My planer makes lots of pine chips quickly from old 2x4's 2. Paraffin wax or better yet, beeswax candle shavings. 3. 2 cycle motor (fuel-mix) oil. Some of the best stuff for bringing dross and dirt up out of a melting pot. 4. 20 MuleTeam Borax. Makes a little bit of a sticky flux if the melt is too hot, and will soak up atmospheric water, so you have to stir it in carefully. Yes, all of them (except borax) will smoke. A propane torch held next to the pot will let you burn off almost all the smoke. I've used Marvelux, available from Midway and Brownells, but I find it hardly any better than Buck Beavers, and it tended to accelerate rust on my casting tools. Good luck, GJ

Yes, it is a known problem that some lots of at least Winchester 209 and Federal 209A shotshell primers have deep set primers inside the battery cup of the primer assembly. And then (mostly) double barrel shotguns have problems hitting the primer cup hard enough with the firing pins. I've had both Win 209s and Fed 209As fail to get good hits in my TTN hammered double gun (well known for not having a lot of FP protrusion) Here's a page that shows most of the parts of shotshell primers, with labels. The dark gray section around the primer is the "battery cup". It's made of steel (magnetic) even though it may be plated with copper or tin or nickel. http://claybuster100.tripod.com/claybuster100sshotshellreloadingpage/id13.html The manufacturing problem is that the primer cup gets pushed too deep into the battery cup. So the surface of the primer cup is below the rim of the battery cup by a few thousandths. I've had some Federals that have been as low as 0.013" below the rim! Firing pins sometimes don't have that much protrusion, especially on doubles. So, solutions: 1. Check that tips of firing pins are not damaged or peened and that protrusion is good - this condition causes LOTS of failures to happen from a specific gun, so it's NOT likely for your two SKB guns that both very occasionally have a FTF. That speaks more to ammo problems. So, keep reading. 2. INSPECT for deeply seated primers in the battery cups. If the dome of the primer cup is not level with the rim of the battery cup of the primer, don't load it. If you have loaded it already, don't use that ammo in doubles! 3. Switch to better made primers. I'm now exclusively using Cheddite 209 primers since the primer cup is flat, always (knock wood) made flush with the outer battery cup, and are cheaper as well. 4. Alter the gun or firing pins to give a deeper strike to the primer. With SxS doubles, this can cause the primer to swell back around the tip of the firing pin and lock the gun shut!! Or at least drag against the primer causing gun to be hard to open. So, this "solution" is not often the right thing to do, especially with SxS guns. Good luck, GJ

Most shooters DON'T do this particular modification on their own. They let one of our good gunsmiths do it. It usually involves changing the cocking points for both hammers to be a little more in the open position, so the gun hangs open after cocking instead of the cocking springs pushing the gun slightly closed. This sometimes also means the hinge has to be "retimed" to prevent the gun from tearing up the hinge and forearm hangers. It's not just a drop-in part or one single simple "grind this spot right here" operation. Send the gun off to Goatneck Clem (above) Johnny Meadows Jared at Long Hunter Supply or one of several other fellers who do good SxS work. It will be worth it. Good luck, GJ

Yep! No need to leave a credit card stuck in a primer tray, either, and not remember that until you get to the LGS! Good luck, GJ