Tried my 1858 Remington .44 yesterday for the first time.

[hunter64]

After acquiring all the paraphernalia that one needs for a BP revolver I finally made it to the range yesterday to try it out for the first time. Loaded with 20 grn.'s to start, wonder wads then bullet, capped her up and let loose. Oh my goodness this was fun. I pulled the cylinder and to see how dirty the barrel was and it wasn't to bad, pulled a brush thru and a couple of patches and continued on. Loaded 25 and 30 grains and I could keep all the shots on the 8 1/2 by 11 piece of paper. Tried to see how long I could go without it binding up and I got 3 cylinders full and then it quit. I made some paper cartridges of just measured amounts of powder and they worked great. Just dropped them in each cylinder and put a wad over top seated it down and then the ball and caps, really sped the reloading time up. Next time I would like to run it off some sandbags and get some accuracy work going. Cleaned it up at the range with some moosemilk and set it aside to play with other stuff. I cleaned it when I got home and since I hadn't taken it apart since I bought it used I totally stripped it down, nothing to it. The insides didn't have any black powder residue on them. Cleaned everything with hot water/soap and put it in the oven on a cookie sheet for 10 min at 150F. After I pulled them out and oiled everything with olive oil and put it in the safe. I just pulled it out and checked it and no rust and everything is good. It was alot of fun and very addictive. I tried finding number 10 caps in Edmonton and could only find 11's so I had to pinch them to keep on the nipples ok.

Do you guys break it down totally every time or just every other time or what is normal for the innards to be cleaned? I was thinking of taking a big plastic jar/barrel of some kind filled with soapy water to the range and after I was done, take off the grips and put the whole revolver in the jar. Any thoughts?

 

[DEZ]

I don't clean the whole action every time a few times a season some blow by gets on the hammer then down into action I clean the barrel cylinders nipples I definitely suggest pulling the nipples every time (makes the barrel hard Just kidding) and lube the threads then I keep the action well lubed in oil so any fouling soakes it up instead of moisture out the air .

 

[Sharps '63]

Remmies

Hunter 64

I own every cap & ball revolver from the diminutive .31 Baby Dragoon to the mighty .44 '47 Walker and everything in between.
The Colts have 'catchet' (a French term for cool) but for trouble free shooting, no jams from cap fragments, no loose wedges, etc., I'll take my '58Remingtons (New Army Model '63 is the correct term) any day of the week.

My most accurate Remington was built from a kit by someone who knew what he was doing. The timing is perfect and the front sight is high enough to make it shoot on POA.
My prettiest is a Uberti, but my favourite is a recently acquired stainless model as it shows you where it is dirty. I use a small hand held steam cleaner and it blasts away all the crud leaving the metal hot to air dry. A quick pass with a brush in the bore and chambers and it's done.
I remove the nipples every time after the steaming blasting and put a pipe cleaner through them. I've never stripped them down to the innards and will only do so if I drop one in a river; not likely ....

To reduce hammer fall and make it easier to ####, I've rounded the top of the mainspring (a trick learned from a 'smith), giving it a curved surface rather than the flat, stock shape. By doing it in stages, you avoid lightening it to the point of getting misfires.

That cartridge conversion kit which chambers .45 Colt rounds is a winner from the reports. You can switch back and forth to percussion by switching cylinders. Oddly, it angles the rounds slightly to accomodate the .45 case rims, but accuracy is said to be phenomenal, better than from Colt cartridge SAAs.

Todd