Single Shot Muzzleloading Rifles Blog

with Mark Hendricks

Editor’s Note: Mark Hendricks, vice president of Technical Development for CVA, helps with product design, manufacturing, production, quality control and bringing new products to the market for CVA. This week, Hendricks will tell us what to expect from CVA’s new 2010 products.

Question: Mark, what CVA muzzleloading rifles have been redesigned this year, and what has CVA done to improve them?
Hendricks: The CVA Optima has been the most-exciting gun we’ve ever introduced. We’ve learned that our hunters want simple guns that are easy to operate and clean, and they want to buy them at a reasonable price. We’ve listened to our customers and implemented the changes throughout the line that our customers want. For instance, the original Optima had a deep-cut pistol grip, but the new 2010 Optima has a more-traditional stock. The stock and the receiver have been redesigned, so there are no pins and screws showing, making it a much-more attractive gun. The old Optima was available in a blued-steel or a nickel-plate finish. The 2010 Optima will be available only in stainless steel and only in .50 caliber.

Question: Why did CVA decide to change to stainless steel?
Hendricks: Historically, black powder has been very corrosive, and our customers wanted a gun that was easier to clean and maintain. Although stainless steel will rust if it’s neglected, it stands up better to corrosion and stains than the nickel or the blued guns do. Our customers also wanted a quick-release breech plug . In the past, breech plugs have always required a special tool to remove them from the barrel. When you were hunting or in a hunting camp, you could rarely find the special tool. For this reason, many of our hunters didn’t remove the breech plugs of their guns, so they weren’t able to maintain the breech plug like they should have. As a result, breech plugs often rusted or seized into the barrel. When this happened, the hunter had to send his gun in for repair, which took the gun out of his possession for a couple of weeks and was costly.

With the new CVA Quick Release Breech Plug (QRBP), you don’t need a special tool to remove your breech plug. You can remove it with your fingers. The QRBP is a gnarled ring at the back of the barrel that you quickly and easily can twist. We weren’t the first to introduce the quick-release breech plug. We watched as other companies developed and released quick-release breech plugs, and at training shoots, our competition demonstrated the breech plugs and bragged about how simple and easy they were to remove. However, after firing 20 shots or more through the gun, a tool was needed to release the other companies’ quick-release breech plugs, which negated the purpose of the quick-release plugs.

The Research & Development (R&D) Department at CVA began to work on a quick-release breech plug that could be unscrewed with only finger pressure and didn’t require a tool to remove it, even after firing numbers of shots. CVA developed a specialized sealing system in the nose of the breech plug that actually kept the fouling out of the threads of the breech plug, the problem that caused the quick-release breech plugs produced by other manufacturers to not operate properly after shooting multiple rounds through their rifles. The CVA Quick Release Breech Plug, however, can be removed from the barrel after one shot, 20 shots or 100 shots, 5 minutes or 2 weeks after shooting.

Question: What else has CVA done to the Optima?
Hendricks: The unlocking system, or the breech and the lever, is at the end of the trigger guard, making it much-more convenient and attractive than the old Optima. All of our stocks come with a CrushZone Recoil Pad, which is extremely effective in reducing the amount of recoil you feel when you shoot. Too, we put in new ramrod thimbles lined with Delrin, a nylon material that serves two purposes. Delrin holds the ramrod in place better than the old ramrod thimble did without scratching or damaging the ramrod. Too, it keeps the ramrod more silent than a metal thimble by quieting the buzz you often hear if the ramrod hits or taps the barrel.

The new Optima is available in the standard and the thumbhole stock. The thumbhole stock comes with the DuraSight integral scope mount and is really a scope-shooter’s gun. It has a higher comb, allowing your eye to lineup with the riflescope much easier. The higher comb elevates your head a little more than a standard stock does, so you don’t have to readjust your cheek on the stock to get proper eye alignment when looking through the riflescope. The standard stock is more of a compromise between the open-sight shooter and the hunter who prefers to aim with a riflescope.

Question: How have all these improvements affected the cost of the new Optima?
Hendricks: No, they haven’t greatly affected the cost. Suggested retail for the Optima with a stainless-steel barrel and a black FiberGrip stock is $281.95. If you chose the Realtree HD camo stock, the suggested retail is $331.95. The version with the black FiberGrip thumbhole stock sells for $313.95, and the camo version is $376.95.

Question: How do these prices compare with the older version of the CVA Optima?
Hendricks: The old base price for an Optima nickel gun with a black thumbhole stock was $273. The stainless-steel version with a thumbhole stock sold for $313.

by Mark Hendricks

Editor’s Note: Oftentimes progress is one step back and two steps forward, as is the case with the .35 Whelen and the CVA Apex. There has been a revival of this old caliber, and it’s found a new home in the State of Mississippi during primitive weapons season where the .35 Whelen is writing a new chapter in the story of the return of old calibers. To learn why CVA has begun building barrels for the .35-caliber Whelen cartridge, we’ve talked with Mark Hendricks, vice president of technical development for CVA.

The .35 Whelen is an interesting caliber. It recently has become popular in the State of Mississippi because of its well-known history. In 1922, James Virgil Howe of Griffin & Howe fame designed this caliber cartridge and developed a rifle specifically for Colonel Townsend Whelen, considered by many sportsmen in the early 1900s as the foremost authority on al types of rifles. The cartridge and the rifle were named the .35 Whelen in the Colonel’s honor. Howe designed the cartridge to be the best all-around big-game cartridge of its day. He specifically wanted a cartridge that efficiently would take down moose, bear, elk and other big game. In its heyday, the .35 Whelen was almost as powerful as the .375 H&H Magnum. It was the Big Daddy of calibers at that time, but Howe used a standard action instead of a big magnum action. He had a standard bolt face, rather than the big belted case, so the caliber would fit in a model .70 Hauser or a Springfield. This caliber cartridge delivered 3,400- to 3,500-foot pounds of energy to those big animals.

The State of Mississippi decided to allow hunters during its primitive weapons season to use the .45-70 caliber after Louisiana decided to allow its hunters to use that caliber. The hunters who had the .38-55 type of rifles probably were upset that they might not be able to use their guns that shot older calibers. The Mississippi law was written to include .35 caliber or bigger for the State’s primitive weapons season. The .35 Whelen was the biggest caliber cartridge available in that range, and the hunters embraced this caliber because it was very-well balanced for big game. In this bullet, you shoot a 200- to a 250-grain .35-caliber bullet at the mid to upper 2,000-feet-per-second (fps) range. We see speeds of 2,500 to 2,600 fps. The 200-grain bullets Remington makes will come out of the barrel at about 2,700- to 2,750-foot pounds per second. So, it’s a big bullet with a big diameter traveling really fast, which produces good range and delivers really-strong knock-down power.

In terms of energy, the .35 Whelen ranks with today’s modern magnum models like the 7mm magnum. It compares very favorably with those calibers, without nearly as much recoil. Modern calibers often deliver a sharp, shocking-type recoil, whereas the .35 Whelen has more of a push-type recoil. Connecticut Valley Arms is producing the .35 Whelen barrels for its Optima and Optima Elite rifles. To order one of these calibers from CVA, make sure to tell us the type of rifle you own. Mississippi is unique in that so far, it’s the only state that allows hunters to use the .35 Whelen during its designated primitive weapons season for deer. In other states, the .35 Whelen is just another caliber that can be used during rifle season. In recent years, the .35 Whelen was a dead caliber. It was a wildcat round until about 1986 or 1987, when Remington came out with this caliber in their 700 Classic Series. Remington helped legitimize the caliber, and the .35 Whelen became really popular at that time. However, since then, this caliber of cartridge has been on the decline, until recently when Mississippi began allowing the use of this caliber during its primitive weapons season.