The 45-110 is one hell of a round. Easy to load.
You can use "F" or "FF" in those cases. You can use Pyrodex CTG. You might even find some smokeless loadings for good old Hercules Reloader 7. Personally, I would use the black or use the Pyrodex, with old fashioned leaden bullets with no jackets.
You dont want air space in the cases, nor do you want a "compressed" powder charge when you load black powder rounds.
In the grocery store, you can find a boxed hot serial called "cream of wheat" that works well in reloading black powder cartridges, as a non-explosive air-space filler. You may also use cornmeal. Many people seem to prefer the C of W. I have used both. I dont know why C of W is preferred many shooters. Maybe because it is in a box as opposed to a sack and it sits on a shelf next to your powders just fine.
You dont need a press, but certainly may use a press. You can get yourswelf a compact boxed LEE handloader kit in 45-110. Comes in a little red plastic box and some come in a black and red cardboard box. The kit comes with a charge table, measured powder dipper, decapper, sizer and seating jig. You load on a piece of scrap 2x4 wood block on your kitchen table top, using a cheap, small wooden or acrylic mallet to tap cases and primers. The kits are great for loading ten or twenty cartridges at a time, and the cost is usally under 30.00. They last a lifetime. You might find some smokeless powder loads for this cartridge, and that is fine to do. But dont use the C of W or cornmeal in the smokeless loadings. And, I would not use copper jacket bullets with black powder or pyrodex loads. Use only lead bullets, properly sized at .457 or .458 for the black powder or pyrodex loads. Save your jacketed bullets for the smokeless loadings.
You can buy lead bullets, sometimes with a brass gas-check on the bottom, and sometimes without. You can also put round-ball of .454 to .458 in dia in those cases if you want to. The gas-check lead bullets are OK for smokeless loadings if you want to do that. Traditionally, the cartridge was designed for black powder.
You might also get yourself a scale or a Lee Dipper Set. The dipper set is yellow or red plastic powder dippers of various sizes and it comes with a cardboard slide-rule / sliding-table to assist you in measuring out charges.
If you are using black powder substitute, like Pyrodex CTG (THE SINGLE "f" substitute) use the same BULK RATE as the black powder, but DO NOT USE THE SAME ACTUAL WEIGHT !!!! If you are using a dipper set, then you are measuring a bulk-rate charge. If you are using a gravity scale, then you are using actual weight. 70 GRAINS OF BLACK POWDER IN ACTUAL WEIGHT IS NOT THE SAME AMOUNT OF POWDER AS IN 70 GRAINS IN ACTUAL WEIGHT OF SUBSTITUTE BLACK POWDER ! ONLY BULK RATE IS THE SAME IN THAT WORLD.
Your rifle will fire very well with 60 grains of FF black powder and pinch of some C of W or corn meal on top of the powder o take up the air space, loaded underneath a 400 grain cast lead bullet. It will easily drop a deer or black bear. It will fire comfortably on the range. If you are going to shoot long-range competition, you have that wonderfully long 45-110 case to increase your loadings of powder to get more power and distance.
Load a 400 to 500 grain lead bullet over 110 grains of "F" or "FF" if you want to. That works very well. Recoil bites a little, and there is a nice big BOOM and a cloud of smoke. That bullet will really reach out there for a black powder round. There are also some 550 grain lead bullets out there you could use as well. Watch that you are not compressing your powder charge when you do this. Watch that you are not leaving an air-space between your powder and your bullet. Dont stuff oversized bullets into those cases. .457 or .458 is probably going to be the max diameter you would need to use.
If you use an airspace filler like cornmeal or cream of wheat, dont put it inside of the casing on top of the primer touch-hole. Your primer may not get your powder ignited or it may cause some delay or hang-fires. Your filler goes in on top of your powder, and just before your bullet goes in.
Dont crimp those cases if you are just firing on the range. Your brass will last longer. If you are making hunting loads that will get moved around and kicked around in your possible bag or pocket, then crimp those so the bullet doesnt get pushed in compressing the powder or so it doesnt fall out of the casing.
You have a very decent rifle. If I had one, I personally would never sell or trade it. That is definitely a KEEPER ! Probably one of the best rifles to own.
