Black Powder Sights: An Exercise in Patience and Detail

    As I dive deeper into the rabbit hole of black powder, I realize among everything else I've experienced this has the most facets so far. Now that I have "mastered" the construction of paper cartridges, the many steps of cleaning a black powder firearm, and become more familiar with powder charges. I have shifted my focus to becoming more accurate. At 20 yards, I have become relatively proficient. Looking through the sights, using "Kentucky windage" to adjust from side to side, and adjusting for height. I felt quite proud of myself, at the time, but, since moving to 50 yards that progress seems to have reversed. My groups are erratic, and gaining a solid sight picture is much more elusive. After 3 or 4 trips to the range I decided that changing the sights might be in order. My quest to find better sights for the 5 rifles I currently have has been a exercise in patience, and a lesson in paying attention to detail. What I have learned about iron sights, which don't use any type of vision enhancements, is they may look similar but are not created equal.

    I put Google Gemini to work, AI prompt engineering to narrow down what kind of sights can be used with my type of rifles. That list is smaller than I realized. Muzzleloading on it's face seems to be a dying sport, and the lack of choices when it comes to upgrades reinforces that notion. Williams Sights, looks to be one of only a few choices, as well as Skinner Sights. I decided to move to Ebay, and see what I could find on the used market. To my surprise this proved to be a wise choice. I searched through the lists of just front globe sights, the Williams brand came up quite a few times, as well as Lyman, along with some unbranded ones, in varying conditions. When looking for parts or upgrades I tend to look for the cheapest price first, this doesn't always bode well, but it is an effective strategy. You can imagine how the list looks when sorted from low to high in price. At the top of the list, the sights in the worst condition, or have been altered in some way. The next are reasonably priced, new old stock, and this is the section I choose to examine. Very few sights are label to be used with a muzzleloading rifle, what I have found are sights geared towards modern and lever action rifles. I purchased, a Lyman 17AHE front globe sight, and an unbranded globe sight said to be used for a 1863 Zouave rifle or reproduction and the 45-100 Pedersoli Rolling Block rifle came with a front globe sight. At first glance these sights look very similar, and in basis they are, but there are subtitle differences.

    The Zouave globe sight attaches to the barrel by sliding on and using a tightening screw to secure it. This sight has a fine crosshair that is fixed. My use for this sight was on the Thompson Center .50 New Englander. I chose to use this rifle because the rib that holds the ramrod can be removed which allows me to slide the sight on and reattach the rib. I took this set-up to the range using a Williams peep sight for the rear sight. The results were not the best, my shots were very high, not hitting the target on the first 5 shots. Even adjusting the rear sight to its lowest level didn't help. At the end of the day, going on the advice of more experience shooters, I determined this sight is meant for a barrel that averages 33 inches, the New Englander has a 26 inch barrel. In the end this sight was not the best fit for this rifle. 

      The Lyman 17AHE is a front globe sight with replaceable inserts. This sight is solid steel construction and very durable with a height of .404 inches. I use this on my .54 caliber New Englander with the factory rear open sight. This combination was very effective once i got the hang of it. I used the tall post insert and can easily acquire my target. For a novice shooter like myself this seems to be the best combination, but adjusting windage is slightly difficult because of the dovetail mounting so the rear sight windage was used. Movement of the rear sight to the first line on the left adjusted my shots. The picture above shows the adjustments on the target. My first two shots were high, the next two hit in the black. With a bit more practice i believe this sight setup will help me to become a better shooter.

       The Pedersoli reproduction of the Remington Rolling Block, has a factory globe front sight with a long post in the center. This sight has a screw for windage adjustment. Though I have yet to fire this rifle i wanted to include it in this post. It is uniquely suited for the rifle because of its versatility, since the rear sight is a Vernier sight. I have to admit, this was a fan purchase. Having seen the movie Quigley Down Under, purchasing a rifle in this caliber for a relatively low price was something I couldn't pass up. This will be the first rifle i shoot at 100 yards and I'm told this rifle is set up for distances up to a mile. In coming blog posts I'll showcase this rifle more thoroughly.