What do you like. My son has one that is rarely used because of the cleanup required after shooting. For us it is simply too much trouble for a one shot rifle. I am open to suggestions, but we have come to prefer crossbows.
A friend just gave me a Winchester Apex. (he bought himself a new rifle and gave me his old one)
I’ve taken a couple shots at the range and can drive a nail with it.
It is a bear to clean though
I have the TC Encore Pro Hunter (at least I did before the accident) and it is the best gun ever. I love it. Also, you can interchange to about 15 different rifle and shotgun barrels for it also.
I kinda like my Hawkins .54 cal I built from a kit.
I’m primarily a bowhunter who occasionally takes a rifle for a walk in gun season, but, with respect to muzzleloaders, I’m more interested in the bullets than the rifles themselves.
Nine years ago, a friend who was an outfitter in Illinois offered me four December muzzleloader hunts at half price if I could round up three other guys who wanted to go, which wasn’t much of a problem. Seems four of his booked hunters had a late cancellation due to a conflict and had to forfeit their deposits. I told him I’d never hunted with a muzzleloader, but I had enough time to buy one and get it tuned for the December hunt.
I bought a .50 caliber TC Omega, put a Leupold VX-III scope on it, started developing some fairly hot loads and shot it frequently. I had that rifle shooting 3 to 4-inch groups consistently at 200 yards. To make a long story short, I hit the second largest whitetail buck I’ve ever seen at 150 yards. He was quartering slightly towards me, I had a good rest and my crosshairs were centered on the point of his near shoulder when the trigger broke - precisely where I would’ve shot that deer with a centerfire rifle. After searching until almost midnight that night and until noon the next day, we never found that deer. The outfitter had multiple pictures of him and we all agreed that he’d gross 190-195 B&C.
The outfitter asked me what kind of bullets I was shooting and when I told him 250-grain T/C Shockwaves, he said, “That’s your problem. That bullet won’t completely penetrate a 300-lb. whitetail at that range - especially if you hit a large bone.” He was right, of course. It was clear from the sign that I did not get an exit hole. There was little blood, most of which had run down his right front leg. Unfortunately, I’m sure I killed that buck - just not quickly enough to recover him. I sold that rifle a couple months later and haven’t hunted with a muzzleloader since.
There are a lot of good muzzleloaders capable of decent accuracy at 200-plus yards. However, in reading reviews of modern muzzleloaders, I think writers and manufacturers, as a rule, place far too much emphasis on accuracy at extended range (for a muzzleloader) and far too little on bullet construction, which, in terms of terminal effectiveness, is just as important as accuracy. In other words, I can hit a whitetail at 300 yards with most of my .22 rifles, but I’m not likely to kill one quickly and humanely.
Ka-Pow!!!