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That 8 to 10" apart - were they shooting 8" to 10" apart or were they crossing by 8" to 10"? (IE; they were already crossing by 5 1/2" - did this increase to 8" - 10" at 115gr. which is what I think you are saying.

The individual barrel accuracy you've noted is not very good, Tom.

Your 12 bore should easily make a 1" (on centres) groups with each barrel for 3 or 4 shots. Work needs to be done on the load combination before progressing, in my opinion.

This is what I'd do. Try different patch materials. I think you have a .715" mould bought or .715" balls. I understand from others here, that the 12 bore Kodiaks have bore diameters of .724". That is perfect for a .715" PURE LEAD ball and .020" or thicker patch in the relatively shallow Pedersoli rifling. With neetsfoot oil or mink oil, you should recover perfect patches that would allow you to re-lube and re-use them with identical accuracy - 1" or so at 50yards off a rest. Once you get the tubes shooting more accurately or as accurately as possible, then adjusting the powder charge is in order.

As long as you aren't needing to wipe the bore often (loading remains easy), you could proceed when you are happy with the individual accuracy.

Have you reduced the charge to see what happens - I would try it to see a trend. I wouldn't be happy if I had to reduce charges to get it to shoot in the end, but would do it just to find out what is happening with that rifle - what it does when the load changes.

Cut it back to 80gr. then 70gr. - shooting at a right hand target with the right barrel, then left hand target with the left barrel.

I would superpose the targets onto a white blank paper sheet and mark the hole centres - all the holes. Draw circles for bullet holes around the dots, with an L or R inside the circle so you can easily see the 'groups' and measure them. Different colour pens might also help, ie: red = right, blue = left. Mark this page for ball diameter and alloy, along with patch thickness, lube and powder charge.

Changing ball size can change regulation as the balls lose or gain weight depending on smaller or larger. Too - in smaller balls switching to WW alloys can effect weight even more.

What I would be looking for, for myself for elk, moose, bear and deer, would be a load that regulates with about 140 to 160gr. of 2F powder GOEX or Swiss.

If all you want to shoot is 115gr. or less, that's OK, but your velocity will be correspondingly low with a very high trajectory. It will certainly kill anything over here, but with trajectory, hitting well becomes a problem.

In order to get a good point blank range, you'll need to develope loads that shoot well with the powder charges I noted ie: for a 125yard point blank range where the ball is within 3" of point of aim, you'll probably need 165gr. of 2F (roughly 6 drams). Of course, that will kick a bit - probably about 70 fpe or so. I wear a shoulder pad when developing loads and shooting off a rest with my .69.

If all fails, you'll have to sight for the most accurate barrel and learn to hold for the 'bad' barrel.

Please do your shooting at 50 yards or even further, althogh it can be frustrating, the range makes a big difference to the trustability of what you are seeing on paper. 25 yards will not prove anything. Even my smoothbore shoots into 1" at 25 yards and it has no rifling and only a flattened bead for a front sight. At 50yards, you would be hard pressed to shoot a 6" group - so 50yards is the 'lie' detector in regards accuracy with these guns. the grouping is rarely linear. Shooting 1" at 25 yards does not mean 2" at 50 and 4" at 100, even with a rifle. I wish it did. Some will, some will shoot even better - most won't or don't.

You are well on your way - just more work to do, is all.

You can try 3F, but the pressure rise is pretty fast with that stuff. I wouldn't go over about 90gr. with 3F. It might be what you need to get the barrels uncrossed, only shooting will tell.

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Daryl

"a gun without hammers is like a Spaniel without ears" King George V