.44-77 bullets for a 19-twist barrel?

[Distant Thunder]

That's interesting, paper patching a gas checked bullet. I assume you did this without a gas check on the bullet? I would be pretty happy with that group and iron sights. For whatever reason (age?) my 200 yard groups with iron sights have just sucked bad the past few years. The .38-50 is another one of those cartridges that is very interesting to me, but I don't see that I'll have time to play with all the many fine cartridges of the black powder days.

When I started the 2-D PP development with my .40-65 I had to go to a scope because with irons I could not shoot anything smaller than 4 to 5 inches at 200! I put the scope on and things got immediately better. I have not put the tang sight back on that rifle since!

I am a bit surprised that I'm still shooting fairly well at Creedmoor matches with the iron sights on my Hepburn. I feel as though I can see the target as well as I ever have. I'm sure it won't be that way forever and that is one reason I'll put a scope on this .44-77 right out of the gate. With a little luck when the time comes to use a scope for Creedmoor the 30" barrel will make that much easier than a 34" barrel does and the .44-77 with a 17-twist barrel will have no trouble reaching to 1000 yards. I'm not sure how the recoil will be in a 12 pound rifle, but I could add some weight to bring it up to 14 pounds if need be. If I keep the bullet to something around 500 grains it shouldn't be too bad.

There's lots of ground to cover once I have my rifle back from Shiloh and right now I'm just waiting on that. I shouldn't get too far out in front of this project right now, there's only so much I can do without the rifle in hand. I do have other projects I can move forward while I'm waiting on my .44-77.

Good luck with your .38-50 and keep us posted.