I have always used Goex in my 54 TC Hawken. Have used .535's and .530's without having any issues with starting the balls. Now I'm playing with Scheutzen powder, and I can start the first ball with a short starter without any problem. But cannot start anymore balls in the barrel. Could the change in powders be causing this? Will be going to the range to experiment some more. I had to drop back to a .010" patch to get them to start. Always used .015" with Goex. Has anybody experienced this annoying situation?

I guess I should just order a sear spring from VTI but man 21+ shipping seems crazy for a part that is 7-8 bucks for most locks.  Any recommendations on a substitute or how hard would it be to make one? Or anybody have a parts lock like this lying around?..This is a gun I had got from Marty's estate (Ohio Joe). He had made a spring but it's weak at best.. I did take the side plate off and found the star stamp, which I'm told is indication of a Curly built north star gun..and the LOTT locks were on his early guns.. so that was neat to find out.. Thanks

A lot of folks won't eat javelina because they say the meat smells/tastes like the musk gland on their back. That has not been my experience and I was very careful around that gland when I was skinning mine out. The meat smelled to me like...raw meat.

I decided that the first dish I would make from the meat would be birria tacos. My wife and I love those things and I thought it would be appropriate to cook an animal from that region using a recipe from the same.

I used around 5 pounds of meat from the hindquarters and browned it first. I figured if the meat would have an unpleasant smell then this would be the time I would find out. It smelled just like frying meat.



I then put the meat, three different kinds of dried peppers, vinegar, and spices in a pressure cooker and cooked it for a little over an hour. The result was a flavorful meat that shredded easily in my hands. I think its taste and texture leaned more towards pork than beef.



Now it was time for tacos! I made some tortillas, chopped up some cilantro, and put my assembly line together. The key to birria tacos is the juice the meat is cooked in. I saved back a generous portion of that to soak my tortillas in and to dip the tacos in after they were done.



Here is the end result.



My wife was initially reluctant to eat the javelina because she doesn't like trying new things. However, she thought the meat in these tacos were delicious! My bloodhound, Jake, concurred.



Darren

In that second photo, it's kind of hard to tell if that is you taking a break from threading that rope through the sideboards or if that is a corpse laid out waiting for the funeral.