Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders Muzzleloader Safety Inspection finds a flaw

I just wanted to share a very scary situation I found on a friends sons muzzleloader pistol. His son bought it at a show, unfired condition the seller told him. They felt that the lock was heavy and the set trigger was to stiff. After inspecting the lock and trigger, they checked out in perfect working order.

The pistol brand is known for using a very heavy duty main spring which does make the lock feel heavy when you cock it. Even heavier when theres no lube on the rubbing surfaces! A little lube and oil and the lock felt perfect.

Same with the triggers! A little lube and oil worked into the rubbing surfaces of the trigger spring and engagement areas left a nice grit free, creep free trigger.

Getting to the bore I got my light out and was shocked to see that barrels breech plug and drum was packed full of fouling! I mean SOLID fouling! I used a small drill bit to break it up as much as I could, then used the hot soapy bath method to remove the rest. Unfired condition? It was more like, fired until it would no longer fire!

I suspect the previous owner had been using a centerfire cleaner and just swabbed the bore from the muzzle end, rather than using the hot soapy water/suction method. All the previous owner did was push fouling into the breech plug and in the end, plugged it up and sold it off.


Luckily neither my friend or his son attempted to shoot it!

After the barrel was clean, I grabbed the nipple I had pulled out, went to clean it and my gut just sunk!

The nipple on one side had most of the threads broken off from poor cleaning and lack of up keep! Most likely, the owner had installed the nipple dry and over the time of shooting, all the blow by that gets into the threads, locked the nipple into the drum and he broke some threads during removal.

The threads inside of the drum looked perfect and a new 6-1mm nipple was threaded into place and everything was in safe working condition.


Naturally when I saw that mess broken off the nipple, I thought, HA! Clean out screw is pushed against the nipple and broke the threads! Nope, that clean out screw was perfectly flush and no where close to hitting the nipple.

Never buy something and assume the previous owner actually cared for it! Strip it down completely, inspect for cracks in wood,metal and especially the threads of the bolster/drum!

I took the pistol outside after I was finished cleaning and inspecting it, shot it 6 times and now, I will be ordering the same pistol because it was deadly accurate out to 25 yards!

After shooting it half a dozen times, I completely stripped it down, cleaned the wood, cleaned out the trigger mech, lock, nipple, threads, and did a good cleaning job before relubing all the parts. A nice wipe down with a RIG rag and she was back to the owner the next day.

It feels good knowing that you most likely saved someones eye due to the previous owner being a skunk and selling something to an un-expecting stranger.