Buck Hollow Sporting Goods - click or touch to visit their website Midwest Habitat Company

Muzzleloading - Pellets to powder

MadisonB&C

MadisonB&C

Active Member
My wife and I are going to sight in guns this weekend, and I'd like to make the switch from Triple 7 pellets to BH 209. I'm shooting an older Accura V2. I know Google is my friend, but I simply don't have the time to read and research the way I would like to. Does anyone have any tips or advice to help me speed the transition along in the limited time I have?
 
Make sure you have the proper breech plug for starters. I had to order a different plug for my son's v2. He shoots 90 grains of bh and it's a tack driver. Also make sure you have the magnum primers. We are using xtp bullets and it all seems to be a great combination with his v2. Best of luck!
 
I had read that you need the proper plug...is there way to check this without just throwing shots down range?
 
100g was 6" high compared to 2 pellets at 100 yards when I switched years ago. Not sure if that helps. Good switch. Much better than pellets. Have since gone smokeless, but good stuff that BH209.
 
You either have one or not. A regular plug doesn't have a cavity for powder to sit in closer to the primer, and is solid except the flash hole to the breech face. A BH plug is like imagine someone took a 1/4" drill and drilled a hole from the powder side through the flash hole closer to the primer about 1/2 way back. Gets the loose powder closer to the primer, and shortens the flash hole length.

I'm still playing with powder charges in my new Accura PR. Max from blackhorn is 120 grains, I, along with other friends of mine that just have the accura V2's have found 110 to be a good charge, shooting 250 grain sabots.

I recommend getting the Federal or CCI primers that are recommended for the BH209 powder. Couple friends have had negative experiences with others.

I tried powerbelts to get the gun close because they are cheap, Barnes TMZ, and the new Federal Bore-Loc bullets. All were pretty accurate. I hope to make my final selection this weekend. Good Luck!
 
The Blackhorn plug says it right on it. If you haven't ever swapped it out you just have a normal one. Scheels carries the BH plug. Mine likes 90 or 110 grains. 90 grains was very close to where I was with pellets. This was with 250 and 290 grains Barnes TMZ. Quality speed loaders are handy if you never used them with pellets
 
Breach Plug: The stock breach plug in the Accura V2 is NOT meant for BH209. You can buy the correct ones online or Scheels may carry them as well. I know the Scheels in cedar falls does. The ones I've seen have a very distinct BH209 engraved on them.

Powder Charge: I'd suggest starting around 100 grains or so and go from there. Remember that BH209 has more power than the triple 7 you have been using. 120 grains (by volume) is the max charge of BH209. Don't throw 150 grains in.

Bullets: If you've had good luck with your current bullets, go with them and see how they shoot. If you're looking for recommendations, I can't recommend Barnes highly enough. I shoot the 290 grain TMZ's and they do really well. Oddly enough, my dad and I both shoot Accura V2's and he has a really tough time getting the TMZ's down the barrel, so we switched him to the TEZ's which have a slightly thinner sabot. Weird that the same gun has very slightly different bore diameters...

Primers: As stated above, make sure you use a magnum primer, NOT the muzzleloader primers. I use Winchester shotshell primers. I started with CCI and was getting a lot of blow back up through the breach on my Accura. The Winchesters are just ever so slightly longer and it was enough to close that tiny gap that was allowing the blowback through.

Cleaning: BH209 is oil based. Triple 7 is water based. Don't try cleaning BH209 with water and soap, it'll make a mess. I've been using Hoppe's No. 9 and it does a great job.

So my experience has been that my consistency isn't the greatest when I shoot and reload with no cleaning in between. It's not bad, but could be better. WAY better than back in the day using pyrodex. Some people have great luck with shooting many rounds through a dirty barrel with BH209. In my case, with my specific gun, I run a dry bore snake through after each shot (literally takes 30 seconds) and it shoots really good.
 
I will add that when stating I was talking about the V2 I was using also. And oddly enough to oppose Lyon my gun shoots the best on shots 2-4 without cleaning. Through a clean barrel is about 2 inches off what shots 2-4 are so I always hunt with a dirty barrel with 1 shot down it so my follow up shots will hit where in aiming. I measure my powder by volume, but agree that weight would be more consistent
 
If you are going to weigh your BH charge, and that will be more consistent, you need to remember that the 120 gr max charge is a VOLUME EQUIVALENT to black powder, not an actual weight!!! To get the actual weight you need to use 0.7 times the volume equivalent. This means that the actual weight of the max charge is 84 grains NOT 120!
 
I am currently shooting a T/C pro hunter fx. I've played with 90 and 100 grains by volume of bh. I shot a few rounds today with xtp bullets as well as the last 4 of my 250gr shockwaves. To say the least (which very well could be the nut behind the handle) I was not impressed with my shooting. The best I was getting was maybe a 4 inch group at 100 yds.
I went out to scheels today to buy
some of the Barnes TMZ bullets most of you use only to find out they didn't have any.
I'm using a Bushnell DOA scope. Both gun and scope were new last yr. My question is, what kind of accuracy should I expect out of that gun Scope combo?
Out of my son's 45 call accura v2 with the same Bushnell scope I shoot 1.5 inch groups.
Any advise would be appreciated and thanks in advance.
 
I can tell you make the switch. I have an original Knight disc with the orange discs. With no alterations I switched to Blackhorn 209 and used a Barnes Spitfire 290 grain sabot and just killed large shed buck. He stepped out at about 100 yards broadside and I hit him just behind the shoulder and he ran about 40 yards and went down in sight. The load was 75 grains weighed with a Winchester 209 regular primer in the orange disc and the Barnes bullet. It broke a rib going in and out and filled the chest cavity with blood. The only real problem was that these bullets were very hard to load in my Knight but it really shoots well! So make the switch!
 
I recently just switched to bh 209 from 777 in my cva optima and have been having problems off and on with it misfiring. I’m using Winchester 209 primers and have the blackhorn breech plug. Shooting 100 grains of powder with powerbelt bullets. Leaning towards trying some different primers. Thoughts? Still learning with muzzleloaders
 
Get ahold of some magnum primers for Blackhorn CCI 209M or Federal 209A. Also make sure your breech plug is clean! Run a small drill bit through it to remove any fouling. That should make a difference.
 
Definitely try the magnum primers. Guy at scheels in C.F. told me that you didn't need the magnum primers for blackhorn but everything else you read says you do. Good luck.
 
4DABUCKS said:
Definitely try the magnum primers. Guy at scheels in C.F. told me that you didn't need the magnum primers for blackhorn but everything else you read says you do. Good luck.
Click to expand...
They told me the same thing when I asked for them to open the case for some. Some guys there know their stuff and some don't. Same guy tried selling me SSTs cuz they perform so well...
 
Using Winchester primers, every now and then you will have a miss fire, Federals and CCI, and CCI mag primers, less miss fires. If you are getting blow back from around the primers, they sell a metric O ring that goes into the primer pocket, that will seal it up from doing it, they are good for 20 to 30 shots.
Now, after a good range session, or when cleaning your gun, you will need to clean out the carbon build up in the fire channel on your BH 209 Breech Plug with an 1/8 th inch drill bit, do this by hand, not with a drill.
I had 2 CVA MR muzzy's, bought about a month apart, 1 barrel was so tight I had to use Harvester Crush rib sabots with 74 gr of BH 209, shooting a 250 TEZ Barnes for best accuracy. The other barrel To get the best accuracy out of it I had to use the Harvester short smooth black sabot, with the 250 TEZ bullet with 78.5 gr of powder.
Your gun will tell you what powder weight it shoots the best with.
 
I’ll try and get ahold of some mangnum primers and clean out the plug good and see if that does the trick. Thanks guys!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom