Spencer Range Report

[PJ Hardtack]

You gotta want to shoot pretty bad to go to the range when it's -12C ....      but I did.

Because the rds were too long to cycle in the action (Rapine 350) I single loaded. Charge 30 grs FFFG.

First shot hit at 12 o'clock, holding at 6 o'clock on the 6" bull. In other words, 6" high. I fired a total of 5 rds, three of which went into a 1" group ....    
A fourth rd went 1" low and a fifth 1" high. This was off hand at 20m.

I have to say that what felt like an acceptable trigger pull at home felt atrociously heavy on the range! Especially with cold hands despite wearing light Mechanix gloves with leather palms. I tried two rds without and they may be my wild shots.

This meant that the carbine wanted to shoot so I benched it, (something I rarely do with a period firearm as it just doesn't seem right. Much to my surprise, the group shifted 3" to the left! I then fired 5 more rds off hand and they went into the same group 3" to the left.
Total group just over 2" for the 10 rds.

If anyone can 'splain this phenomenon, please - have at it! Something changed but I'm damned if I can see what.

Even with the shift in '0', the carbine would have no difficulty keeping all its rds on a 16" x 16" SASS target at 20m and beyond.

After the first 10 rds I used a Bore Snake and the fouling was quite dry, no 'lube star' on the muzzle, indicating insufficient lube on the bullet. All primer strikes were dead centre.

For the first time out under less than ideal conditions, I am quite pleased ...    I am not going to fiddle with the sights until I cast some Accurate 51-350S bullets with a large grease groove.

[Coal Creek Griff]

We do need to see some photos... 

CC Griff

[PJ Hardtack]

Yeah, I know .... "Without pics, this thread is worthless ...."

I'll have to learn how to do that. Every time I've tried on other forums in the past I've given up in frustration.

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[Will Ketchum]

you can send them to Two Flints and he will post them for you

[Drydock]

Off hand, recoil tends to turn you and the rifle to the right.  That's a lot of mass out of a carbine, along with a lot of barrel time, relatively speaking.  My Spencer, with 35 grains powder and 350 grains lead, hits me harder than my Sharps .50-70 Carbine.

[El Supremo]

Nice report; thanks:

You are well-versed, so what follows is what I share with newbee's:

So many VARYING human and mechanical forces are involved going back and forth between awfulhand and rested.

The primary physical ones are body pressures and aiming too long trying to achieve the best sight picture.

From a rest, with a moderately recoiling rifle, some light forward pressure on the butt is needed AND the left hand should pull downward a bit on forend.  Not much for either, but test and find out.  
Don't try to shoot "free recoil".
Learned this with TARHUNT rifled shotgun slug barrels that would shoot MOA if held correctly.

From a rest, get the sights where you want and see if lifting and replacing your cheek changes the picture. Hmmm.  Looking AT the sights for more than four to five seconds without gazing away and blinking can induce a burned image in the back of the eye that fools you.  Sort of like seeing the after image of the sun on the inside of your closed eyelids. Blinking maintains eye ball moisture coating uniformity.  A Olympic gold medal winner's advice.

Get shot off within three to four seconds or start over. Many try to HOLD OR SIGHT TOO LONG as sight picture fades and the wobble area opens.  If either, start completely over.  Exaggerate follow through with both rest and offhand to minimize barrel time issues.  Keep rounds WARM and load only at last minute so they don't get too cold in chamber.  Goose hunting trick. Don't lick the flag pole unless buddy ready to pee.  Haha.  Love ya.

All you want is a group.  Offhand and rested zero's are rarely the same.  
Rifles shoot away from hard rests so put your hand between the sandbag and forend.  

Keep it coming.  You are the man!

Kevin

[PJ Hardtack]

Off hand, recoil tends to turn you and the rifle to the right.  That's a lot of mass out of a carbine, along with a lot of barrel time, relatively speaking.  My Spencer, with 35 grains powder and 350 grains lead, hits me harder than my Sharps .50-70 Carbine.

I corrected my original post .... obviously I meant 6" high of the point of aim, not 3". That seems to be the norm for a lot of period arms, revolvers included.

Recoil? What recoil? Compared to 65 grs FFG and a 450 gr bullet from my 50-70 carbine, the Spencer was a kitten, not even a pussy cat!
I would describe the recoil as negligible.

It took all of my self discipline NOT to jerk the trigger and get a controlled shot due to the cold and gloves. I was resting my forearm against a sand bag when benching. The set up did not allow for a more conventional position.

With such a short barrel, I doubt that dwell time is as much of an issue as it is with longer tubes. The "Click-Clank-Clunk" of the Spencer action is not conducive to precision riflery. It's more of a "Let's git 'er done with some lead down range" proposition, "minute of horse or rider" being more it's realm.

Cleaning the carbine, I was amazed at how much hard fouling I had near the muzzle. This is shows the lack of lube on the bullets. I think I will pull the bullets on the remaining rounds and salvage the powder. I'll melt the bullets and cast some Accurate 51-350S when my mould handles arrive, possibly Friday.

When cleaning, I saw that the rear sight was hard against the left of the hinge ear so I centred it with the gentle tap of a brass drift. I think the leaf spring is the culprit as it rests in a shallow cut on the barrel. The rear of the cut is not square, but a tad to one side.

Further shooting will prove the matter. The fired brass is already in the tumbler ....

[PJ Hardtack]

It occurred to me that had I cleaned the bore after 5 rds, I would not have had the build up of hard fouling near the muzzle.

I've learned that if I want the best accuracy from my Shiloh 45-70s, I must do this and I'm shooting the Lyman 457125 with adequate grease grooves.
I have one Shiloh pal that pushes a patch through his bore after EVERY shot and he's shooting paper patched bullets with a grease cookie underneath.

That sounds like a chore, but Boy Howdy - does he ever get results downrange!

[El Supremo]

On fouling:

Deep cold up your way probably reduces lube effectiveness.

In both Spencer carbines and the longer rifles, neither I nor others report fouling issues over 25 or more shots in above freezing/40F weather.

You shouldn't have to wipe after only five shots.  This isn't sillyette at 200+.  Haha.

In freezing weather, we had to use truck radiator water w anti-freeze mix.  Crazy.

SPG and most 100% natural lubes are ok IF the lube groove is WIDE ENOUGH.  
Two or three narrow lube grooves, regardless of depth usually don't work as well.

Kevin

[PJ Hardtack]

My bore clean mix is mostly winter grade washer fluid. Using that in -12C temps held no appeal, hence the use of the Bore Snake.

My Rapine bullet has narrow grooves and does not carry adequate for cold, dry air. It has shot well in my 50-60 Sharps under less frigid conditions.

Part of my joy yesterday was tromping through knee deep snow out to 20m four times. I should have worn my snowshoes as my right knee now doesn't like me.

For the benefit of Kevin and others, snow is that white, crystalline substance (No, that's the OTHER kind! ...  ) comprised of billions of individual flakes, no two resembling each other.

I find little comfort in this knowledge when plowing our long driveway and that of neighbours, even less when shoveling.

[Oregon Bill]

PJ, you have my sympathies regarding your abundance of snow. Great fun when you are 6, but no darned fun at 66.
Think your Spencer wants to shoot!

[PJ Hardtack]

Yes, I think I have a shooter in this Spencer.

I'm going to load 35 grs FFFg in the next batch I reload. That should be a little more fun to shoot than the 30 gr loads which were a little wimpy.

Looking forwards to the coming CAS season, shooting it against slicked up, short stroked lever action rifles.

[PJ Hardtack]

Shot some Trail Boss loads today - 7.5 grs with the Accurate 51-350S bullet, SPG lube. All shooting off hand.

At 18m, printed 5 rds into 2-1/2" off hand, 6" above point of aim. Going to up this to 8 grs in future.

Again at 18m, 5 rds with 30 grs FFFg and the same bullet, 5 rds went into the same size group but only 4" above point of aim. Less dwell time in the barrel?

Then I got brave and fired 14 rds into a 4" circular group off hand at 30m. Ammo was the 30 gr FFFg load with Kevin's bullets. The last five were fired using my middle finger as my trigger finger was plum wore out!

This carbine could really shoot with a better trigger pull.

[PJ Hardtack]

I just got off the phone talking to Shiloh re: their mainspring.

I was informed that the Sharps mainspring does NOT fit the Spencer.

So much for that myth .....  

The good news is that Dixie offers ORIGINAL mainsprings at $25 and ORIGINAL barrel bands at $18.95.

Assuming that ORIGINAL parts will fit a Chiappa repro. ....

[El Supremo]

That's odd, and I have the highest respect for Lucinda and the rest of the Shiloh crew:

Did she say WHY or anything about interferences?

Well .... I have unaltered Shiloh investment cast, plum colored mainsprings working just fine in several original Spencers and also several Romano's.

Lucinda checked for me about five years ago and at that time Shiloh's answer was yes, theirs did fit.
I told her what I was up to so there was nothing hidden from them.  Since selling me mainsprings, she has also sold me flies that I have ADDED to some custom machined original/Romano Spencer tumblers to prevent half-cock damage with 4# trigger pulls.

The Sharps (Shiloh) tumbler will NOT (always) interchange on an original Spencer because the four facets on the hammer fitting section are NOT in the same index relationship for hammer end travel. This is why the original tumblers had to be altered FOR the fly instead of swapping a fly-fitted Shiloh one.  

There "could" be INSIGNIFICANT dimensional Shiloh mainspring differences, but with mine, no functional ones.
One Spencer expert believes that Christopher Spencer did use Sharps lock internals in early guns, but ever so slightly modified the shape of the mainspring fingers to prevent any copying issues. If so, the SHAPE of my Shiloh spring fingers have not made any functional difference that prevents interchangeability

Original Spencer mainsprings DO have insignificant dimensional differences (tolerances) clearly evident in the over 20 that I have.  ALSO, Sharps experts I have asked CONFIRM that there IS a difference in the temper between the original, but otherwise interchangeable Sharps/Spencer mainsprings because of the rimfire vs cap fire requirements.  This was their explanation for WHY some of mine are stronger/weaker feeling when the hammer is cocked. David Stavlo at Lodgewood Guns shared that a stronger temper was needed for the rimfire Spencer.

Guess there are no simple answers.  

Easy enough to self test with no harm.  Visually compare them.
Be gentle and watch for an easy fit with neither rubbing at the fingers end against the lock plate or cocking to one side if the mainspring screw is not perfectly straight.
Don't be tempted to fit a thin piece of shim stock between the mainspring screw and that wedge section of the spring or increase the diameter of that screw to lower the force of the sear contact leg of the mainspring.  Those alterations WILL cock the spring.

Kevin

[PJ Hardtack]

If you would care to pursue this with Shiloh, by all means, do so. Many of us would be interested in the outcome.

In the interval, I'm willing to take her at her word.

Now, will an ORIGINAL Spencer mainspring fit a repro ....