1858 Rem Pietta- More Questions

[GolfGuy]

Thanks to all who helped answer my questions in my other post. All VERY helpful info.

Well, my new toy arrived today and overall I'm pleased, the quality is a little less than I expected but not much.

Question #1 Are Uberti's visibily better quality than Pietta's or are they comparable?

Question #2 When in the half-cock position is the plunger supposed to line up with a chamber? Because on mine it is off by just a hair. The cylinder locks into position a little bit past where it needs to to let the plunger enter the chamber. (see Photo)

if I rotate the cylinder until it clicks, it's too far and won't back up, I have to go all the way around and turn it really slowly to a point just before it clicks, once it clicks it's too far, and this promises to be an area of frustration when loading because its right on the cusp of the click.

My question is this, would filing down the 'ratchet thing' (I don't know the proper name) that turns the cylinder and also prevents it from turning backwards in half cock, if I file that down a hair it seems the cylinder would line up with the plunger. (See Photo)

Would this have an adverse affect on the rotation of the cylinder when fully cocking?

Or is this a normal condition for this gun? It seems to be kind of an awkward design if it is a normal function.

Question #3
I think I'll order a conversion cylinder in the near future and I know that you are not supposed to load these guns with smokeless powder and I have seen .45 LC 'Cowboy ammo' in black powder and smokless. I have read that the smokless cowboy ammo is okay to fire in these guns as it is a lighter load than standard .45 LC therefore doesn't produce the higher pressures and is within the tolerances of the gun.

Is this correct? Is smokeless cowboy ammo okay to use in the conversion cylinder?

Question #4
This one I'm sure is a no brainer but I can't seem to find any clear instruction on this and the manual that came with the gun is pretty useless...'treat every gun as if it's loaded...yada yada...'never use smokless powder...yada yada, it is pretty lacking when it comes to specific info. Anyway, the balls that came in the starter kit have a small 'nub' on them. Now that nub must need to face certain way, i.e facing down (toward the powder) or up (facing out the barrel) but for the life of me I can't find any specifc info on this.

Which way does the nub go? (I'm sure there's a more technical term other than nub, but I don't know what it is). I appreciate your patience in giving this green horn some help.

I have owned guns my whole life but this is a new realm for me, I know now how a person who has never owned or fired a gun before feels around modern centerfire weapons..."uh, what's this do?"


Anyone with experience with any of these issuses please feel free to share your knowledge with a 'greenhorn' BP shooter.

Thanks again!

Steve

 

[gmatov]

If you are using cast balls, the only raeson to put the SPRUE cut, the flat, on top, is that you can see that it IS there, not alongside the chamber wall. If you put it down, into the chamber, you don't KNOW that it is down, you can't see the "flat". It could be along the chanber wall, could be a path for a "chain fire".

No, on "half-cock", the cylinder rotates freely clockwise. You will turn it a little past the hand to line up with the rammer. Consider. At full cock, the topmost chamber is in line with the barrell. Why, at half cock, should the rammer, opposite the chamber nearest the barrel, be in line. You have to place a ball, rotate under the rammer, seat the ball.

If you want to know if you are in "time", cock the pistol, unloaded, of course, then unlatch the rammer and see if it is true to the bottom chamber. If the top chamber is lined up with the barrel, the bottom chamber should be perfectly lined up with the rammer.

Of course, the bolt is in the cylinder notch, the pistol is locked into battery, it won't turn any further.

Cheers,

George

 

[Low Key]

I have read that the smokless cowboy ammo is okay to fire in these guns as it is a lighter load than standard .45 LC therefore doesn't produce the higher pressures and is within the tolerances of the gun.

That's right, shoot the cowboy ammo and you'll be fine. You may find that you like the bp cylinder better though, there are several people on here that have tried both and still prefer the bp just because it's loads of fun!

 

[sundance44s]

sundance44s

shoot the cowboy loads .. save the brass ..load`em latter with the holy black stuff and have even more fun ..

 

[GolfGuy]

If you are using cast balls, the only raeson to put the SPRUE cut, the flat, on top, is that you can see that it IS there, not alongside the chamber wall. If you put it down, into the chamber, you don't KNOW that it is down, you can't see the "flat". It could be along the chanber wall, could be a path for a "chain fire".

Okay that makes sense. I assume that since you said "if" I'm using cast balls, that must mean that not all balls have the sprue. It seems to me that balls wihout it may fly truer? I mean it seems that if the sprue is not perfectly centered on top that the ball may 'wobble' in flight. I could be way off on this that's just what it seems like to me. Any logic to this or am I off base?

If you want to know if you are in "time", cock the pistol, unloaded, of course, then unlatch the rammer and see if it is true to the bottom chamber. If the top chamber is lined up with the barrel, the bottom chamber should be perfectly lined up with the rammer.

And yes, the bottom chamber is perfectly lined up with the rammer at full cock, so I guess everything is fine. It still seems a little awkward to me, maybe after I actually load the gun it'll make more sense why it's not lined up at half-cock too.

Thanks for the info!

 

[Steve499]

GolfGuy, I am reluctant to advise you to remove metal from the hand (ratchet thingy in your picture) without actually having the revolver in hand to examine. With that said, my Pietta at half cock has the bottom chamber aligned perfectly with the rammer when the hand engages on the back of the cylinder. The hands I have replaced have all been long and required a little shortening and reshaping on the tip before they were right so a hand that's too long would certainly not be unusual. If the hand is way too long, the cylinder can lock before the hammer is rearward enough for the trigger to catch. If it's too short, the cylinder won't be rotated enough to lock up.

On my revolver, cocking means pulling the hammer fully to the rear. The cylinder locks and the trigger catches the hammer at some point, but when the hammer is released, the hammer nose rests at full cock approximately 3/16 inch forward of it's maximum rearward travel. That forward movement before the trigger actually engages is allowing the tip of the hand to retract downward from it's maximum upward travel when the hammer was against it's stop on the frame. If yours is just a little too long, the hand itself may be bottoming out on the cylinder and stopping the rearward movement of the hammer before the actual limit of rearward space is reached. If that is the case, the hand can be shortened carefully to a length which will still allow it to carry the cylinder up to lock but will retract downward when the hammer rests at full cock enough to allow the chamber to align with the rammer at half cock. Did all that make sense?

Yes, there are swaged balls available which have no sprue. Speer and Hornady come to mind but there may be others. It would seem the swaged balls would be truer and therefore more accurate than cast balls but my own totally counterintuitive experience has been that my cast balls shoot a little more accurately than the swaged ones. I know it don't make sense but I have noticed it enough that I no longer use swaged balls. It may be that I now expect my cast balls to shoot better so I just shoot better with them. Practically, there's probably no real difference except the swaged balls are easier to load since you don't have to align the sprue.

Steve

 

[GolfGuy]

Steve,

Excellent description! And your name will be easy to remember, that is my name too.

Okay, so on yours the bottom chamber IS perfectly aligned at half cock. Ah ha! That is how I thought it should be aligned, it didn't make much sense to have it like mine by design.

So after carefully reading your post (a few times) I have examined my gun a little closer. I think my hand (I knew there was a proper name for that thing) is a hair too long. At full cock the hammer doesn't quite contact the frame at its furthest most rearward travel. Its about 1/16th away from the frame and only travels about 1/16th (or less) forward when released. I can see the cylinder try to turn more when I pull it back to the full back position so it does appear that hand is bottoming out on cylinder. With the cylinder out of the frame the hammer does go all the way back and touch the frame.

So what should the next step be? The logical thing would be to file the tip of the hand a little bit to see if thta helps. But as I know from other experiences the logical thing is not always the right thing. But is that what you would recommend?

You mentioned filing and 'shaping', its the shaping that I'm not sure about, given the angle of the top of the hand, just filing it square off a bit( by that I mean like having the file flat against the inside of the back of the frame, that doesn't look to me like that will accomplish what I want. It might but geometry was never a favorite subject of mine. It looks like I should file it with a slight downward angle.

What is your experience in filing your own hands down?

Also, the hammer draw seems unusually hard to me. It actually kind of hurts my thumb to pull it back a few times. Is that normal? or am I just a wimp? Or will this loosen up with use?

Also, the trigger pull is very hard too, I mean really hard, like my hand shakes I'm squeezing so hard, I thought it was broken at first and was not actually going to release the hammer. Yes, I dry fired it a couple of times, I know thats a big no no but I just wanted to see how the trigger pull was and it turns out it is really hard. And I'm not necessarily a weakling, I'm 6'1" and about 195lbs.

Maybe this is related to the long hand? (the hard trigger pull that is, not the hard hammer draw) And the gun is just not cocking correctly?

I can see that I'm going to get a crash course in gunsmithing on this unit before I take it to the range.

The hard trigger pull should be something that could be corrected by filing something or other right? It's just a matter of knowing what to file eh?

The hard hammer draw is something that I can live with but it just doesn't seem like it should be or needs to be that hard.

Also, good to know on the swaged versue cast balls, I guess I'll have fun experimenting.

Thanks again!

Steve

 

[gmatov]

Golf,

As to the hard hammer draw, there is a screw in the fromt of the handgrip that puts more tension on the hammer spring. Back it out till it either becomes tolerable, or you decide it is still too much.

As far as the rough and tough trigger pull, try pushing on the hammer spur while you squeeze the trigger. twill often burnish the roughness from the mating parts, ease the trigger pull.

If you should decide, with this pistol, or any other you buy, to take a file to the trigger-hammer-sear, group, please reconsider. A sharply cutting hard Arkansas stone is the least you should use. Just dress the parts, clean up any burrs and roughness. Do NOT change any engagement angles.

Be extremely careful. I do not mean don't try for a 4 ounce pull, just don't try for a 4 ounce pull that that doesn't secuirely engage . If the sumbitch shoots when you pick it up, it ain't safe.

Cheers,

George

 

[Steve499]

Steve, you will need to take the whole thing apart to work on the hand. These revolvers are not terribly complicated and you need to become familiar with total disassembly because they need internal cleaning from time to time.

If you don't have a good set of gunsmith screwdrivers, take care of that the first chance you get. I didn't and wound up buying not only a screwdriver set but also a few replacement screws.

As far as the shape of the hand goes, there should be a bevel on the left side which removes the left corner from the top of the hand. Yours probably is already shaped correctly but just needs the tip itself shortened. I hope the detail can be seen in the picture. The hand on the top is already fitted to my Remington. The bottom one is a replacement in the condition I received it.

I would imagine the hard trigger pull is due to burrs on either the trigger tip where it engages the hammer notch or on the hammer notch itself. If there are burrs there, you will be able to see them when you get the gun apart and, like George said, a little judicious work with a stone will smooth things up.

If backing the hammer spring tensioning screw out some doesn't help with the hard cocking, the spring itself can be ground narrower and made weaker like that. Again, I'm just guessing that the cause for the hard cocking could be from binding/burrs on the hammer or on some of the internal bearing surfaces. When you get it dismantled, look for any obvious deformations.

You mentioned dry firing. If you want to do that, you can put a piece of leather down in the hammer cut of sufficient thickness to prevent the nipples from being struck. The inside curve of the hammer strikes the leather before the hammer nose hits the nipple. I dry fire mine a lot.

These replica revolvers vary considerably in quality, and I have become resigned to the necessity of having to tinker with them. In fact, I sorta enjoy it. The Pietta I have did have a few issues but it just absolutely shoots like a dream. Perfect finish is a modest virtue if the gun isn't accurate. I would say you should mess around with yours, shoot it, get the sights regulated and go from there. All this stuff is what makes it FUN.

Steve

 

[GolfGuy]

Yes, I agree the tinkering is part of the fun. Thanks to George and Steve, your advice is very helpful.

Ah ha! A hammer spring tension screw! That sounds like that should help with the hard hammer draw.

Those are the kind of things that are elementary to you guys I'm sure. Does anyone know a good book on the 58 Rem or a good C&B revolver book in general that covers the 58 Rem in pretty good detail?

I looked briefly on line but didn't really find one. I am looking for one that discusses all of those things, tweaking, disassembly/reassembly etc...

Steve, great picture that is what I needed and mine is not beveled but is shaped like the one on the bottom from what I can tell without taking the gun apart.

I am dying to tear this gun down and see whats inside, but as you mentioned, I don't have a good set of screwdrivers, the ones I have will surely booger the screws and it is taking every ounce of self-control I have not to use them

I don't plan to make any adjustments to this gun until I have a better understanding of the workings, (or at least get some decent screw drivers), I have a true talent for taking things apart and not being able to get them back together so a good book is a must have! Also I'm considering returning it for an Uberti with target sights so best to leave well enough alone for now.

But keep the advice coming, its all helpful! Thanks guys!

 

[Steve499]

Percussion Pistols and Revolvers, written by our own mec, is a must have. It's available from Barnes and Noble as well as an on-line version of some sort. Maybe mec will give you better leads on how to get it. Pages 133 and 134 cover disassembly of the 1858 Remington.

Steve

 

[GolfGuy]

Ah great, thanks. I started a new thread for the book/screwdriver topic, just wanted you to know that you don't need to post this again there. I'll get the book by mec, thanks!