Making Blackpowder Revolvers More User-Friendly

Preparing a blackpowder capand-ball revolver for easy cleanup and optimal shooting is a thoroughly satisfying task, with long-term rewards that far outweigh the cost of the work. Once the gun is set up, the owner can shoot to his heart’s content, without the need for constant swabbing or for major disassembly following every shooting session. I’ve used the procedure outlined here on all my cap-and-ball revolvers, and to blackpowder rifles as well, and it works.

I use only real blackpowder, with which my guns work their best, and cannot vouch for the long-term results with Pyrodex or Triple-Seven’although my methods of preparation seem to work well with those as well. Cap-and-ball revolvers can also benefit from a touch of tinkering along the way, as you’ll see. For this example, I’m using a revolver of mine that has seen little use in the dozen or so years I’ve owned it, for the simple reason that I couldn’t get percussion caps for it.

It’s a 2nd Generation Colt 2nd Dragoon, one made back in 1981 or 82 and marketed by Colt as a continuation of the same serial numbers used on the originals. Fortunately, I also had on hand two recently made 2nd Dragoons, both from Uberti and imported by EMF and Cimarron. The EMF had a distressed "antique" finish, and the Cimarron was in the normal bluing with case coloring. Both importers offer both types.

According to Elmer Keith, original Dragoons were set up for #12 percussion caps, as was my 2nd Generation Colt. Twenty or 30 years ago, when my Dragoon was made, you could buy #12 caps, but not today. To the best of my knowledge, all you can get now are #10 and 11, and they come from several sources including CCI and Remington. Because of the lack of #12 caps, I tried to replace the nipples with stainless ones, but could not find any. The thread size was 1/4-28.

As I later found out, the threads on the recent Uberti-made Dragoons are also 1/4-28, and those nipples take number 10 caps, so I could have tried to get a set of those. Instead, I turned the existing nipples down to accept #11 caps. I did this with a simple jig made by drilling and tapping the end of a brass rod to Ox-Yoke’s Competition Bore Cleaner is shown, but is no longer available. Eastern Maine Shooting Supplies’ Concentrated Bore Cleaner works equally well. take the 1/4-28 thread of the nipple.

I screwed each cap in turn firmly into this jig, and with the lathe compound set at 5 degrees, it was a simple matter to carefully cut along the existing taper on the old nipples until they just accepted #11 caps. I used a carbide bit, because the nipples were pretty hard. Perhaps I should have mentioned this right at the beginning, but the first step in the process of preparing the gun for easy cleanup is to equip yourself with the proper grease. In the

past, this was Ox-Yoke Originals Wonder Lube 1000 Plus, but Ox-Yoke is out of business. Fear not, some of the former employees created anew company, Eastern Maine Shooting Supplies, Inc. (www.emshooting supplies.com), and they are producing a nearly identical product called Premium Lube. Eastern Maine Shooting Supplies (EMSS) has a replacement for the Wonder Wads that I previously used over the powder charge, now called Premium Lube 100% "Wool" Wads.

One more product you’ll find necessary for clean-up is Concentrated Bore Cleaner which, with the grease, is all you really need to make the gun right for blackpowder shooting. The former Ox-Yoke product was Liquid Wonder Competition Bore Cleaner. These water-consistency cleaners cut blackpowder residue like nothing you’ve ever seen, and they’re easy on the hands. With the grease, wads (for shooting). and bore cleaner on hand, disassemble the revolver down to its last component and degrease everything thoroughly.

Then, heat the cleaned and dried parts gently. An easy way to heat the parts is in the kitchen oven, set to about 200 degrees. When the parts are nearly too hot to touch, take them out of the oven and, while they are warm, anoint them all with Premium Lube. The heat lets the grease permeate the metal, and this will provide long-term protection from corrosion even if you don’t see or feel any lube on the surface. Let the greased parts cool and you’re ready to put the gun back together again.

However, before you fully reassemble the revolver, be sure to check several areas. First, the latch setup on old 2nd Generation Colt Dragoons is faulty, and the same condition exists on new Uberti Dragoons. The engaging surfaces are slanted, which will allow the latch to fly open every shot, which I find very annoying. The solution was twofold. First, make the engaging surfaces parallel to the barrel. I used files and a graver to accomplish this.

That will stop most problems with the newer guns, which have a strong latch spring, but I found it was not enough on the older gun with its weaker spring. I drove out the latchretaining pin and removed the spring. Because I didn’t have a stronger one on hand, I just stretched the existing one and then installed a brass filler plug in the bottom of the hole in the lever. The hole diameter was 0.180 inch.

A touch with the lathe on the outside of a 3/16-inch brass rod gave the right diameter, and then I cut a plug about 3/16 inch long and put it under the spring. However, the latch’s These are most of the Colt’s parts. They need to be degreased (except for the wood), heated, and anointed with Premium Lube from Eastern Maine Shooting Supplies, or with the old Ox-Yoke Wonder Lube 1000. This makes cleanup a snap. integral extension pin, which goes into and centers the spring, bottomed on the new plug.

The latch was thus unable to move far enough to release. The simple fix was to grind off the extension pin, which was plenty long anyway. This ensured the latch could move enough to work properly. This finally solved the problem of the latch flying open on recoil. I like guns that shoot well, and my old Colt 2nd Dragoon didn’t. I had two other 2nd Generation Colts on hand, an 1851 Navy and an 1860 Army, and they both give very good accuracy.

I decided to measure them carefully to find out something about the dynamics of cap-and-ball revolvers. The chamber has to be small enough that the ball fits tightly over the compressed powder charge and wad, and stays in place under recoil. Chamber diameter is dictated by the size of balls you can conveniently buy in swaged, pure-lead form over the counter, commonly offered by Speer and Hornady. In ".44 caliber", both companies offer 0.457-inch balls. The next jump up is to 0.490-inch diameter. Mark that well.

I found that a chamber of 7 to 10 thousanths smaller than the swaged ball would give the required tight fit. I generally chamfer the chamber mouths so the ball is more swaged than clipped during loading. Chamber measurements of my Colt 2nd Dragoon indicated an oval condition, varying from 0.445 to 0.449 inch, or about 0.447 inch on average. This ten-thousandths of wedging gave the necessary tight fit with 0.457-inch balls. But to my consternation, this Colt Dragoon had a groove diameter

some 0.016 inch larger, or 0.463 inch. How could I expect it to shoot? The cause of the Dragoon’s accuracy problem seemed obvious, once I knew its dimensions. I measured the dimensions on my 2nd Generation Colt 1860 Army, which, as noted, is very accurate. Its chamber mouths were extremely oval, from 0.440 to 0.460 inch, and the flattening was from the outside in, as though the cylinder markings had been rolled onto the surface after the chambers had been cut.

The groove diameter of the 1860 was identical to the Dragoon. Hmmm. I suspected the oval shape was the key, because part of the bullet was mighty close to the groove diameter. My first thought was that the bore and chamber dimensions of blackpowder revolvers were contrary to good modern-revolver practice. But I was wrong. I found the Cimarron 2nd Dragoon on hand shot like a house afire, so I measured its dimensions.

Then, with a carbide tool and the compound set to 5 degrees, he made the old #12 nipples accept #11 caps. In this photo, a nipple is in the jig and the cutter has just dressed it down. New Ubertis use #10 caps but have the same thread, so they’re an alternative to this. The author found #11 Magnum caps would ignite Pyrodex Pvery well, but the #10s gave hangfires. Groove diameter is 0.463 inch, though originals (and modern Ubertis) are 0.454 inch.

This means the barrel is too big for the chamber outlets, and accuracy suffers. The solution is to open the chambers to match the groove diameter and use a custom bullet of the correct diameter (in this case, about 0.472 inch). Aha! I found very close correlation to modern-revolver practice. The chamber outlets were a very close match to the gun’s 0.454-inch groove diameter. To further confound me, the modern Uberti-made Dragoons have a twist rate about five times as fast as my old 2nd Generation Colt.

Original Dragoons had gain-twist rifling and 0.454inch groove diameter. This information comes from a collector who measured the bore of his original First- Model Dragoon. He told me his original 1860 Army had the same dimensions. My 2nd Generation Colt turned about 30 degrees in the full 7.5-inch barrel length, but the new ones turned the ball about 160 degrees in that length. My old gun had a twist rate of about one turn in 7.5 feet.

However, with much testing of all guns on hand, it turned out the twist rate didn’t seem to matter a whole lot, so we can move right on past it. To review a few basics, I had determined that, for best accuracy, a capand-ball revolver must be tightly assembled with the barrel key driven in firmly, and with minimal fore-and-aft movement to the cylinder. The grip screws must all be tight, too, and a rattling loading lever doesn’t help things either.

With all these items in place, my Dragoon produced groups larger than 3 inches at 15 yards with my normal load of 50 grains of GOEX or KIK FFg, a lubed wad over that, and a Speer swaged-lead 0.457-inch ball on top, with no over-ball grease. That, I thought, was lousy accuracy. The 1860 cut one hole at that range. So how could I fix my Colt? Before I did any modifications that would change the gun forever, I decided to try something else first, and then see if I still wanted a reamer. I fire-lapped my 2nd Dragoon.

The bore looked great before I began, but there was a tight spot, felt during slugging. I used Neco’s 220-grit and 400-grit pastes, rubbed into enough balls to get the bore truly slick. This helped very little, though the actual fire-lap rounds cut one ragged hole. I thought that FFFg might give enough added blast to cause the bullets to jump up and fill the grooves and thus give better accuracy. It didn’t work, even when I tried Triple-Seven, which gave over 1200 fps out of the old boomer.

I was faced with a choice of either making the gun entirely right, or leaving it alone. Because I don’t like unfinished situations, I decided to fix the problem once and for all. At this writing, I have a 0.462-inch

Clearly, the recoiling barrel will pull the lever out of engagement with this setup. The barrel lug just cams the latch back and the lever flops open, which is very annoying. This is a modern Uberti, but the 2nd Generation Colt was identical, with an even weaker spring. The mating surfaces are parallel to the barrel. He also put a plug under the latch spring within the lever to help keep it shut.

This gun’s loading lever stays put after every shot. reamer onsand Machinery to enlarge the alls of about 0.470 to 0.472-inch diameter would give the required tight fit. Swaged balls of that size are not available (Corbin swaging tools are too costly for my needs), and neither Lyman nor Lee make ball molds in that size. I found a custom maker in England, JT Bullet Moulds (www.jt-bullet-moulds.co.uk) who will make me a custom mold of whatever size I want.

At this writing, I have one on order because that is clearly the easiest and longest-term way to a proper solution. The mold will stay with the Dragoon for all time, so the gun will shoot as well as can be expected for its entire life. However, I don’t like casting bullets, so I’m still looking for a better solution. It’s good to know the Binder Ad (p/u from page 18, AGM-August 06) recent Uberti-made Dragoons don’t have this problem.

By the way, they take #10 caps, not #11, and these smaller caps don’t work so well with Pyrodex P. All the Dragoons I’ve tested print about 7 inches high at 15 yards, which was common for cap-and-ball revolvers made during the 1850s. The rear sight is simply a notch in the hammer nose. Rough calculations told me I’d have to grind off about 0.2 inch from the hammer to get the gun to print where it looks. Or I could raise the front sight to center my shots. I chose to leave it alone.

However, I raised the front sights on other cap-and-ball revolvers and can report it’s mighty satisfying to have them shoot where they look. Concerning twist rates, my old gun makes a turn of about 30 degrees in its 7.5-inch barrel length (about one turn in 7.5 feet), while the new Ubertis turn a bullet about 160 degrees in the same length (one turn in about 1.4 feet). The new guns’ grooves are nowhere near as deep as those in the older Colt. Both old and new versions have seven grooves in a left-hand twist.

As mentioned, I had two Ubertimade guns on hand. One was from EMF with an acid-dipped "distressed" finish. The other, from Cimarron, had a normal blued and case-colored finish and a perfect bore. The distressed gun had had its bore acid-dipped along with the rest of the gun, a foolish move if I ever saw one. Why they didn’t plug the bore is beyond me. That would have given a great-look-