Interesting Confederate Gun

In reply to neon4891:

So what is your desire with the guns, do you want to just clean them up or shoot them?

Civil war guns are .577 and .58 caliber. A 20 guage bore brass bore brush is .600, so they will go down the bore pretty easy to help clean it up. You only need two things to disassemble a gun of that era, a flat head screwdriver and a wrench that will fit the nipple.

To shoot them, you'll need some #11 musket caps and some black FFFg black powder. The FF is a bit too course for my liking and the FFFF is too fine. You'll need some sort of a powder measure, dixie gun works will have one. For musket caps, I'd stay away from the cci ones and purchase the rws german ones.

Dissassemble the gun throughly... clean the nipple well, make sure that when you have the hammer on half cock, you cannot move it forward with pressure on the hammer(finger off trigger).

after shooting, a hot water cleaning(it's weird, I know) is the best.

For bullets use .575 diameter minie balls for the enfield and .577 diameter for the springfield. Use 60-70 grains of powder plus a mini ball coated in Thompson Center bore butter. You can use a wad if you want, but they are not neccessary, unless you want 100% highest pressure mostest accuracy. I really wouldn't shoot the springfield much, it'll only go up in value.

Just found this site. They have good stuff. http://www.lodgewood.com/

Also this: http://www.2ndflorida.com/Library_files/Enfield%20BIG%20Clean.pdf

I truly miss these silly old things. I had a lot of fun shooting with my dad.

DO checks constantly by dropping the rammer down the barrel. Let it free fall, if you hear a ping on the breech plug, she is unloaded. If not, use the puller(worm or screw) to go down the barrel to screw on and pull out whatever is in there.