[archangel2003]

Originally Posted by illbfrank

Bearwallow Creek, and the County of Transylvania (Through the Woods)

LOL!
After reading "Transylvania" I thought you were kidding me

Sounds like a nice area even though the furriners are muddying things up.

[Josey Wales '94]

Couldn't agree more with you frank, about the era statement. But you know what gets me? A felon can own and shoot and handle and tote a BP firearm. This is BS. Of course I forgot that a BP gun cant kill anyone cause the shield that deflects only BP projectiles. And that a BP cant hold enough rounds to kill many people, and that you cant carry multiple guns. Dont get me wrong, I like the fact I can go buy a BP w/out all the BS. But the gun rules are messed up somewhere...

[TXnorton]

Originally Posted by Josey Wales '94

Couldn't agree more with you frank, about the era statement. But you know what gets me? A felon can own and shoot and handle and tote a BP firearm. This is BS. Of course I forgot that a BP gun cant kill anyone cause the shield that deflects only BP projectiles. And that a BP cant hold enough rounds to kill many people, and that you cant carry multiple guns. Dont get me wrong, I like the fact I can go buy a BP w/out all the BS. But the gun rules are messed up somewhere...

Actually, a felon who is prevented by law from owning a firearm CANNOT own a BP firearm either.

BP firearms are exempted from the requirements for the federal paperwork and criminal background check required for purchase of "modern" firearms, and you can order a BP firearm on-line with delivery straight to your house by UPS.

BUT.....a firearm is a firearm, and just because a felon could purchase one, does NOT mean that he would not be arrested and convicted if he was found in possession of one.

[John sukey]

How long? They have dug up shells from the Revolutionary war, and the powder was STILL Good
The Navy had to come out with a handbook years ago on defusing Civil war shells. Apparently a Navy base that had been there since before the civil war still had ordnance laying about in the surrounding area and some souvenier hunters found out the HARD WAY that it was still live. Black powder is a mechanical mixture, NOT a chemical one like smokeless powder.

[quigleysharps4570]

I've a couple here at the house that stay loaded all the time. Never have had any problems.

[Scratchammo]

I have an 1858 pietta that I shoot every now & then. I keep a cylinder loaded with a silica pellet under each bullet. I've left one cylinder loaded for over a year & all six chambers fired without any noticeable lack of power.

[cauterizer]

Standard black powder, kept dry, has an amazingly long shelf life. Guns found loaded after a hundred years have proved, sometimes to the shooter’s chagrin, capable of firing. This is not true of some black powder substitutes.

In 2008, Sam White's hobby cost him his life: A cannonball he was restoring exploded, killing him in his driveway.

More than 140 years after Lee surrendered to Grant, the cannonball was still powerful enough to send a chunk of shrapnel through the front porch of a house a quarter-mile from White's home in the leafy Richmond suburb of Chester, Virginia.

[thdrduck]

Bummer Sam!

[fisher79]

My grandma left an old revolver loaded for over 25 years. Four out of six rounds where duds but really no damage to the cylinder.

[Dphar]

Decades for sure, probably several lifetimes if kept dry and good caps and good blackpowder are used.