Pennsylvania Game News - October 2011 - 60

CLEAN that modern in-line’s breech plug thoroughly in the off-season, try some newer replica powders and the hot 209 primers, and you should be looking for venison recipes.

believe that the bear tolerated all of the commotion, Matt actually attempted another shot. But this time the pop of the primer resulted in a hang fire that sent the 300-grain Barnes into the dirt, not the bear. Thinking that the culprit was the breech plug, he attempted to rotate it out of the bore, but the only thing rotating was his fingers. Apparently, all of the previous shooting at the range to make sure the sights were on had left a deposit of carbon and Triple Seven sugar-based fouling on the threads of the breech plug. The plug was tightly cemented to the barrel breech and was not about to turn. The hunt was over. Muzzleloaders have a huge selection of rifles, replica powders and bullets to choose from when they head afield for the October hunt. Accuracy and power are almost a given with these new scoped inlines. And yet, just like any hard working piece of machinery, proper attention to maintenance is paramount in making sure that the rifle will perform, hunt after hunt. You just can’t shoot an in-line and then ignore it for the rest of the year without the performance becoming less than flawless on the next hunt. One of the key components of an in-line
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rifle is the breech plug. Back in the 1990s, in-line rifles used #11 percussion caps to ignite their loads of black powder. Then, Hodgdon started producing Pyrodex pellets, and for a brief interlude of time rifle builders responded by building and replacing the #11 rifle primers with #2 U.S. Musket Caps. But poor performance with these solid cylinders of propellant led manufacturers to adopt the 209 shotgun primer as the industry standard for in-line ignition. Breech plug designs evolved with those changes. Unfortunately, there was no standardization within the industry. Breech plug lengths, removable features, thread sizes and even flash channel designs prevent changing breech plugs from one company to the others’ products. Replica powders are more finicky to ignite than black powder, and pelletized powders require higher temperatures and greater volumes of hot gases to ignite, but some of the standard 209 primers are so energetic that they actually push the load of powder and projectile forward of the flash channel and prevent complete and timely ignition (a.k.a. hang fires.) By their very nature, muzzleloaders are loaded from the muzzle, or top, of the gun. Regardless of whether you know your bolt as the Quick Release, Speed Breech, Accelerator Breech Plug, or some other catchy moniker, breech plugs by their very nature are bolts that seal explosions in the barrel, keeping them from reaching your face. Because this bolt is an obstruction that prevents ignition of the powder, manufacturers, beginning with Tony Knight’s humble
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Pennsylvania Game News - October 2011

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