Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Cap and Ball revolvers ?

Chain firing is not urban legend. Absent some preventative measure (Wonder Wads or greasing the chambers) it is highly likely to occur.

A brace of Pietta reproduction Colt .36 Cal Police Pocket 5.5 inch

These are no longer manufactured by Pietta. Real nice guns. Always like the fluted cylinders.

we were down at crossfire ops place one day doing a little shooting. Gregg had a ruger old army.
he filled it full of powder then used a lead slug originally made for a 45.70 to fill it up. must of weighted 400grains.
didn't move to fast but it went "thunk" when it hit something.
My experience, what little there is, it would fire a ball rather fast, and i know it was accurate on pop cans out to 20-25 yards.

Sounds like the fit of the ball is very Important.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrfBOJnw06U&t=4s

I've heard of cases where the ball is tightly fit, even producing the ring of lead upon loading, and getting chain fires.

Yes and in this video he addresses this issue.

In addition even if one were to get the shaved ring it would not necessarily mean much as if there were a burr on the end of the cylinder the burr could shave the ball but still be a loose fit behind in the cylinder.
Possibly fooling the shooter into the belief that Because it was showing a ring of lead that the ball was a tight fit to the cylinder chamber when in fact it was only being shave by the burr around the edge.

I think that a slight chamfer would alleviate that issue.
I will see if I can research that issue and when I find Something I will post it.

I found where I read about the chamfering of the Cylinder.
It is on Page 2
I find all the Pages very interesting.But read them all,will really make a man put his thinking cap on !
A Long but very enlightening series of helpful information.

http://www.geojohn.org/BlackPowder/bps2.html

I just use Crisco, no wads. Melt it and pour it into an empty Elmer's glue squeeze bottle. Neat & easy!
Crisco washes off in hot tap water too.

Good idea.

All this stuff makes me want to keep my two Colts unfired...
Bob

Well, it seems you are absolutely correct on that. I guess the BP guys I've shot with, who like me have never seen a chain fire, must be doing it right to not have seen one happen.

There's a bunch of videos on Youtube of just such events happening. I have edited my post from last night in which I made the "urban legend" comment. Please excuse the brain fart.

You look at all the old pics of Civil War folk, 49er's, etc. and they never have any grease in the chambers. You just see round balls in the cylinders with the barrels usually pointed obliquely at the cameraman.

I've wondered the same thing..."urban legend" probably being as good a term as any, since it sure seems the bullet or ball makes a pretty good seal, having to shave it with the loading lever. However, I always use grease or a wonder wad. I don't bother with greasing the wonder wads though-that being the whole point of them. Much cleaner, IOW.

When i was a lad i went to the colorado history museum ( the old one that really displayed things( the civil war didplay had a clearly loaded revolver, there was no grease visible. I was old enough to notice but young enough to not realize the whole import. Later the balls were gon on that one. no idea about caps .
I had 2 holes go off once. Second went down the side. I have read they can get a spark through the caps too with powder on the cylinder. I still grease mine, lubriplate in a tube

EE, yes, I just use the regular Wonder Wads too, for the most part. I used to make my own from felt with beeswax-Crisco lube, but WW's are cheap and easy to get... and yes, MUCH cleaner. If you use "loose" lube in front of your balls, you end up with black grease everywhere.

I like the pic you posted. IIRC, that's George Maddox, of Quantrill's Raiders. I have that pic framed and hanging in my game room.

Maybe your pic shows the balls in the cylinders better than the one I posted. IIRC I've seen several of the balls and they don't appear greased in any way. Nor do I ever remember reading about the boys greasing their cylinders in the olden days of yore. I, like you and TRH, think it's still a good idea though as there is just too much modern evidence of chain fires.

It is George Maddox, Col. Quantrill's Chief of Scouts. He and his brother served under Quantrill and I believe he is buried in Joplin, Missouri. I've been to Quantrill's "grave" as well as Bloody Bill's, George Todd's and some others. General Jo Shelby is buried right in Kansas City, Missouri.



My beautiful wife looked Maddox up and I was mistaken. He is instead, buried in Missouri's capitol, Jefferson City. He was captured near the end of the war and then kidnapped to stand trial in Lawrence for his participation in the battle there. Surprisingly, he was acquitted and then lived about forty miles from my location in Nevada, Missouri (home of THE Bushwhacker Museum) and worked for the railroad before moving to Jeff City and being a Guard at the Missouri State Pen. Evidently, he died in 1906.

The Ruger Old Army will hold about 40 gr of BP and that's about it. As I recall, in John Taffin's book "Sixguns", he described getting his cylinders bored deeper so as to hold more powder, but I think if I was going to do that I'd just buy one of these cylinders:
http://www.classicballistx.com/our_cylinder.html

The old Colt Walker would hold 60+ gr of BP, though I doubt the repro guns from Uberti or others will hold that much powder.

EE... Well, dang, that's a better outcome to ol' George's story than I had heard! The book I have the pic from stated he did not survive the War. I always thought a fella that looked that good ought to have lived longer. Glad to know he did.

There is a guy in Texas (GB Enterprises) who will convert about anything (legally) to cartridges. He will convert your Walker to a semi-historically accurate 45 Colt or to a proprietary cartridge holding 60 grains of Black Powder, called the "45-60-250 Brimstone".

Well, who knows for sure, but there is a pic of his grave on Find-a-Grave. I don't know what happened to his brother Dick. A surprising number of Confederate Partisan Rangers did survive and as you may know, held reunions in and around Kansas City for many years. Some turned against Frank James when he went Republican. I don't remember for certain, in support of which Republican President, but I think Grover Cleveland. It was New Jersey's Grover Cleveland who finally ended Reconstruction in the South, IIRC.

Quantrill murdered women and children in Lawrence Kansas.

Says LaBoeuf. LOL.