100 or 150 grains?

[CParsons]

I have a TC encore. I started out shooting 150 grains of powder but found i was getting inconsistent groups, i was told by an old timer that use to own his own gun shop to switch to 100 grains of powder, and boom that did the trick. I now shoot much better groups. A buddy of mine swears up and down that 150 grains is much better ( he also shoots an encore). what is everyone elses thoughts?

The old timer said that a 50 calibur muzzeloader is only capable of burning 120 grains, so if shooting 150 then 30 grains just gets built up in the barrel/ "falls" out of the end of the barrel. any one else ever heard this?

[peddler]

I shoot 90 gr. BH 209 out of my TC G2 and it works great.

Peddler 

[stka]

With any type of gun each one has it's own best load for each bullet. Best way to get the tightest group is to shoot 5 shot groups with increasing charges in 10gr increments. Shoot each group at a fresh target and label it with the load and bullet. You should see the group shrink and then grow again at some point, that will tell you what load the gun wants for that bullet. For my ML I'm not going to bother this year. I'm going to shoot two mag 777 pellets and determine how accurate it is. If it's only good for 100yds I can live with that. One of these days I'll end up getting loose powder and fine tuning, but shooting a deer at 200yds just isn't that appealing to me.

[jlaclair]

they make 60gr charges too

[peddler]

they make 60gr charges too

That's what stka was talking about 777 mag pellets are 60 gr

Peddler 

[upstatehunter]

Have seen this a lot with M/L...same gun, same barrel....shoot same load, and one shoots fine...the other doesn't....had a person who builds custom rifles for people tell me that in most of these factories that are turning out the guns....they do tolerance testing on the barrels...if it fits in the tolerance...it gets put on a gun....so you may have a barrel that the steel is a little softer or harder...(porous or not) and it took the grooves differently...or they used an inferior cutter....or it was button rifled...and the barrel is not true....as a lot of them aren't , but are in tolerance....so your bullet with 150 gr of powder is tumbling and the other is spinning.....being your barrel was in the lowest percentile of the tolerance and his was in the top....I've seen it with a bunch of the cheaper rifles....they got popular because of price and to meet demands...corners were cut to make them faster.....I'm sure that bigger companies like TC have done the same.....
Here's a link to how barrels are or should be made....guy who was telling about all this makes his own in his machine shop....he does rifling by hand....
http://bettincustomguns.com/Technical%20Information/Barrel%20rifling%20techniques.htm

[Hollywood]

100 grains... 348 gr Powerbelt... absolutely POUNDS them out of my Encore 

[TallywackahME]

way too many variables here. allpowders are not created equal.  bullet weight plays a HUUUUUUUUUUGGEE part in a powder charge and accuracy. example, i can steam 1 250gr shock wave w/ 120gr of bh209 @2290fps and cant get it to group better then 2 1/2". same bullet but now w/ 95gr by volume of bh209 and the rifle will p[unch dimes all day. now take the same 120gr of bh209 and step up to a 300gr thor and back to shooting ragged hole groups. there isnt just one thing, its a combonation of variables that all have to work together. if you want a generic load that will shoot well out of about any 1/28 barrel you want a mild charge and a medium to medium heavy bullet.

-Brandon

[Stuck-on-Seven]

I use 100gr. Call me a wimp but 150gr rocks my shoulder after shooting a few times trying to sight in, and I'm use to hammering away 3 inch mags at geese up to 20 shells a morning!!! 

[stka]

I use 100gr. Call me a wimp but 150gr rocks my shoulder after shooting a few times trying to sight in, and I'm use to hammering away 3 inch mags at geese up to 20 shells a morning!!! 

But that's steel, big difference. Try shooting turkey loads at geese all morning (I may have watched someone do this before...once). I don't think you would like any of my guns .

[CParsons]

Thanks for all the replies. As far as bullet weight goes we both shoot 250 gr shockwaves... oh well whatever works for him works for him to each their own!

Lots of good info here though thanks again.