RANGE REPORT: 14 OCTOBER 2020

Location:  Lytle Creek Shooting Range.
Weather:  65 degrees, wind variable, light to moderate from 3:00 to 5:00.
Range:  15 yards.  Shooting position:  One-handed offhand.
Weapon:  Pietta Remington New Model Army Revolver.

1.  Eras Gone Kerr bullets in paper cartridges with 25 grains of Pyrodex
String Test:  45 in./12 rounds = 3.8 in./round

2.  .45 Colt hand loads with 200 grain RNFP bullets over  5.9 grains of Hogdon 38
String Test:  43.25 in./10 rounds = 4.3 in./round

3.  Loose Hornady .454 round balls with lubed felt wads and 30 grains of Pyrodex
String Test:  40.25 in./12 rounds = 3.4 in./round

Kerr Paper Cartridge Results

Note that this is at odds with the previous test in which I shot 4.7 inches/round for paper cartridges and 5.6 inches/round for loose round balls at 25 yards using a two-handed offhand grip.  Although the sample sets are too small to be definitive, this may suggest that conical bullets perform better as the range increases, while at closer ranges the difference is less.  This is not what I would expect, however, since the Kerr conicals are both heavier and have less powder, meaning that the round balls have a higher velocity.

Alternatively, note that in the picture above, one of the rounds was a flyer (at the bottom of the group) in the Kerr group.  This may well be simple shooter error, and had that shot not gone off, the score would have been significantly better, making the conicals outperform the round balls.

NB:  Using different loads of powder for the conicals and round balls may seem odd, but during the Nineteenth Century loose round balls were generally loaded onto more powder than was used in military paper cartridges in period, so I chose to follow this practice in order to compare the ammunition as it was actually used.