In reading on the Snider system, one of the trial experiments was to fire loose powder behind a seated bullet to ascertain the gas leakage in the event of a case rupture with the paper wrapped foil cartridges of the day.
This was accomplished by replacing the firing pin with a nipple, effectively re-converting it back to an Enfield muzzle loader.
It was deemed not unsafe to do so, as the gas leakage was acceptable (by era standards) and safer than that from the 1855 slant breech Sharps which the committee rejected for excessive gas leakage. The cuffs of too many expensive Dragoon and Cavalry uniforms were being singed!
Modern Snider shooters tell me they have done something similar with success by chambering a solid brass case with a slightly enlarged flash hole. This way they were able to shoot their Sniders in re-enactment events where properly, they should have been carrying Enfield muzzle loaders.
My idea is to fire form a 50-90 case in the chamber of my .54 '63 Shiloh Sporter (2 1/8" chamber), tap it out and slightly enlarge the flash hole.
Then I could ML both patched round ball and the .54 Lee Minies I load in paper cartridge tubes.
Comments?
This was accomplished by replacing the firing pin with a nipple, effectively re-converting it back to an Enfield muzzle loader.
It was deemed not unsafe to do so, as the gas leakage was acceptable (by era standards) and safer than that from the 1855 slant breech Sharps which the committee rejected for excessive gas leakage. The cuffs of too many expensive Dragoon and Cavalry uniforms were being singed!
Modern Snider shooters tell me they have done something similar with success by chambering a solid brass case with a slightly enlarged flash hole. This way they were able to shoot their Sniders in re-enactment events where properly, they should have been carrying Enfield muzzle loaders.
My idea is to fire form a 50-90 case in the chamber of my .54 '63 Shiloh Sporter (2 1/8" chamber), tap it out and slightly enlarge the flash hole.
Then I could ML both patched round ball and the .54 Lee Minies I load in paper cartridge tubes.
Comments?
