I've got a pair each of Uberti 1858 Remington clones and 1860 Colt clones along with an 1851 clone. The 1860's and 1851 being made at different times and with different North American distributor names. One is Euroarms and another is Navy Arms and one is under the Uberti name. But they all came from the Uberti factory.
They all load and shoot to a better accuracy than what I can hold. In other words however well you can shoot with a modern cartridge semi auto or revolver you will be able to match with any of the Italian clones of the C&B guns. I will add that for some reason ALL of the Colt open top revolvers come with overly short front sights. I've replaced all of mine so I can use them at more or less normal hand gun distances of up to around 25 yards. The Remingtons are much better in this regard. I also treat the vague notch in the hammer on the Colt open top guns as a starting point for opening up a nicer "U" shaped notch so the old eyes have something that I can actually see and use for aiming. This all applies to genuine antiques as well. The difference here being that no one will wring their hands and wail to the heavens over my modifications like they would on an authentic antique.
I shoot my C&B guns at the range just like a regular handgun and at cowboy action matches. And that's why I have a pair of each style as I need to shoot 10 shots for the handguns. At the matches I go off to any unused but designated loading area and load the powder and ball. Capping the nipples is done at the regular loading area when it's my turn to load the rest of my guns in prep for shooting the stage.
At a regular range day I lay out the loading supplies on an old heavy towel. I load powder and ram the balls with the muzzle up. For capping in preparation for shooting the gun is pointed downrange in case of an accidental cap firing and a chamber firing off. For this reason my hands are kept well back from the front of the cylinder as well. You do NOT want your support hand wrapped around the gun while capping. I can't stress this enough. Yeah, it's awkward to hold the gun and put enough pressure on the cap to seat it firmly on the nipple while holding the gun that way. But it's a lot better than not having any fingers to hold the gun at all. The odds of an inadvertent cap ignition are very slim of course. Almost to the point of iron clad. But it's still a good rule to live by.
The reason I use a big old bath towel is so I can flip half of it over the loading area. That way any sparks from the gun won't reach any spilled powder that might be on the loading area or reach the caps or powder flask. And sparks there are aplenty with a black powder revolver. Not only out the front of the muzzle but also out to the sides from the cylinder gap. So you want to be sure that when shooting and loading right on the bench at the firing line that your supplies are well covered.
Black powder guns are fine on any outdoor range. But generally due to the smoke and sparks I don't know of any indoor ranges that allow them.
For cowboy events I only load five chambers since I have to lower the hammer on an empty nipple. For range days where I cap and shoot right away I load all six and don't lower the hammer. Instead once capped I raise the gun, finish cocking from the half #### used for loading to full #### and then aim and shoot. This is perfectly safe since once you start capping and until you're finished the last shot the gun is always pointed directly downrange. But for anywhere you might load and cap where you're not pointed downrange and then would need to move even a few feet to the firing line it is a wise idea to always only load 5 then lower the hammer safely onto the empty position. The point is that if you were to trip and the gun then flew through the air and landed hard on the hammer that it could be enough to fire off the cap and discharge a chamber.
Having said this some models do have safety notches where you can lower the hammer onto such a notch between the nipples. But the cowboy shooting rules don't allow this and not all guns have it so it's better to simply load 5 only if you really much cap away from the shooting table.
Since you're new and don't have a PAL yet I can't stress enough that loading and capping then walking around is not something that ANY range allows. I've yet to see a "hot" range where this is possible. All the ranges are operated "cold". Hot referring to a loaded gun ready to shoot and cold to carrying guns in holsters but unloaded. There are some occasional special cases where a shooter will be requested to holster a loaded gun and move from one stage to another. But when this is done the shooter is under the command and control of a range or safety officer. Same with cowboy shooting. Once loaded and holstered the shooter cannot leave the loading area until requested by the safety officer running the stage.
I've gone into this a little more because you don't have your RPAL yet and likely you haven't even been to any handgun ranges to see how they operate. Hopefully this will fill you in a little. And you'll learn more about it all once you take your course and begin visiting some ranges.
In the meantime if you're truly interested in black powder revolvers and not just looking for a way to "cheat a little" and begin shooting sooner I urge you to find and attend one of the local cowboy action matches. Visitors are always enthusiastically welcomed at these meets and there's a good chance that if the weather is nice that you may find at least one person shooting BP with C&B guns. And often as not at lunch or the end of the day if you can stick around that someone will make you put on a rig and load up their guns and run you through one of the stages before they get torn down. Cowboy shooters are much like drug dealers in this way and know how easily folks can get hooked on the whole scene....
"Sure buddy, the first time is free!.... "
