percussion revolver chainfires

Very interesting/well-written article.
A lot of work done there.

He also makes an excellent point about chamfering the cylinders mouths as
a potentially key factor in fully sealing the ball against the cylinder walls.

Truth-in-Telling: I've chamfered all my N-SSA revolvers/shooting since the early 80s
1:1 Crisco/beeswax over the balls sealing the mouth. Never had a chainfire.
 
Those old Italian caps were so tough they didn't split much, and often had to be pried off.
I don't remember having cap jam issues in the '60s and early '70s.
 
Sharp chamber mouths

I sent my first Pietta back due to inconsistent chambers, the gun they returned is still excellent and has a nice sharp edge that shaves a ring, never had a chainfire. I'm shooting it more lately. I've always used greased felt wads and shave a ring every time using good consistent swaged balls.
While I need a small dowel or #2 pencil to seat them #10 Remington caps are perfect. I've learned to roll my wrist back as I cock the hammer and the split cap pieces fall out pretty as you please. At least something in the process is automatic.:)
 
bamaranger said:
I suspect part of the issue with the reliability of C&B revolvers is modern caps versus the caps of the era.
Click to expand...

I had some original caps but I have no idea how old they were. They were in a wooden matchbox that a man had that died in his 90's and this was in the 70's. They were thicker than todays caps and were made of copper. I have never had a chain fire from the nipple end. I have had them from the front.
 
A wad covers a multitude of sins.
There was one C&B that used bullets cast with a prong on the base to spear a wad. Probably in a combustible cartridge.
 
Its a good item to deal with if you shoot C&B (Or C&Conical).

The bussniess about proving a negative plays in, grease or wax or ..... over the mouth and never a chain fire. But the same number of shots were not fired with none of that.

Its a bit like throwing the Maiden in the Volcano and it quit, ok, we threw in a man before and it did not so the answer is the Maiden.

I have only shot maybe 500 rounds of C&B (and a few C&C) - I was turned off in the 70s on C&B (no C&C then ) because of the so called Crisco requirement. Mawg, what a mess.

I have related my wife gave me her ASP 58 NMA some years back and last year I could not stand it and rigged up to shoot it. I reviewed the chain fire thing and concluded it was a myth.

1. They did not grease chambers back in the C&C/C&B days.
2. I saw the testing and they could reliably induce a chain fire under .451 (they would not say what but the .451 was the do not go over this line and it may be iffy even there)

I have not had any chain fires. Shot 5 different BP revolvers now. Mostly .454 or .457. If I do .451 I put a lubed felt wad behind the bullet (and have done it in front of bullets).
Its clear if you do one in front of a bullet the blast pattern does not penetrate more than the front surface, it looks to be a dandy flame arrester (ergo stop or assist in stop of chain fire)

Concur that you want a slightly oversized ball that will leave a shaved ring on the cylinder mouth. That (in theory) should seal the cylinder mouth (if the ball was solid and had no cavities and assuming the chamber is smooth and without gaps).
Click to expand...

I would amend that to you want a chamber that squeezes the ball and creates a band such that it seals. My ASP has tapered chambers, no lead ring but it squeezes a good band at .454.

Oval chamber or one with a flaw can of course leave a gap and grease over the top or a lubed felt wad may well do the seal.

As for rear chain fire. I don't discount it but I do believe is truly odd circumstances that might cause it. As was noted, fire wise you would have to change directions no less than twice at 90 deg (so each time less and less fire) and then down a small hole, into an even smaller hole and set off enough grains of powder to start igniting. Sometimes getting ignition is hard enough with a cap on a Cone firing right. I have had to loosen up a few loads to get them to go off.

As you can't put grease over the Cone, yet to see what can be done about it.

The situation with Caps and the questions abut them are good ones. Sometimes we only can get 11s, RSW1175 seem to fit a lot better and then what was the variance of caps originally and were they better than what we have now?

No one has an answer to that I have seen.

You can check your chamber seal by seating a ball of conical and then pushing it out with a punch with the Cone removed and see how each chamber does.

While I play with .451 a bit just to see about accuracy I do it with treated wads.
 
...rear chain fire...you would have to change directions no less than twice at 90 deg
(so each time less and less fire) and then down a small hole
Click to expand...
Again, take a look at the slow-motion video in Post #21.
The rear of cylinder flame hell that accompanies cap ignition is not well appreciated.
 
mehavey said:
What characteristics/forensics do you use to determine where it starts?
Click to expand...

I have an old 58 Remington that will chain every time if I don't use wads or over ball lube. I can leave the caps off or use pinched caps and it won't chain. That tells me they come from the front
 
Nah, note the dwell time between the sparks and then the gases erupting from the cylinder; indicating the main charge is beginning to ignite.

Camera rental is $499 for a week. There should be two cameras or one on each side. I'm going to start looking for an educational grant.

ETA: NRA has grants and I'm asking the College to apply for one; for science of course.

ETA#2: The Foundation lady sent me a 70 page guide and after perusing it, I asked the Vice President for a grant application. The grant will be requested in the College's name and a panel must approve it before submission.
 
mehavey said:
Interesting...

- Even with the clasic "shaved lead ring" ?
- First cylinder loading, or subsequent loadings ?
Click to expand...

It shaves a ring and it does it on every single loading. I haven't measured it but I'm pretty sure the chambers are out of round even tho it shaves a ring.
 
Admitted

My fancy shiney 58 NMA was originally a problem child. 1 cylinder would shave a ring it's been years but recall finding 1-3 thou of variance in the cylinder. After a fairly sharp exchange of words with the distributor they agreed to take the 58 back, if I paid the freight. They only agreed to "evaluate" my complaint, mind you I gave them detailed dimensions of all 6 cylinders.
I was pleased to receive a new revolver, and they paid the freight back to me. The replacement was (and is) perfect. I have been shooting it more lately. My opinion is chain fires come from the cylinder end, I relieved around the nipples to allow use of my snail capper, no issues and easier to cap it up.
 
"I have no idea how good the machinists /machinery was in the mid 1800's compared to what is done by the shops in Italy modern day. I suspect part of the issue with the reliability of C&B revolvers is modern caps versus the caps of the era."

Don't kid yourself. The accuracy of machinists and machinery in the mid 1800s was excellent. Today, most folks think that Computer Numerical Control (CNC) is the end all and be all of accuracy in machining. I have some experience with CNC and can tell you without a doubt, that a skilled machinist could produce highly accurate parts with the old hand cranked equipment that was being used before the advent of CNC.
 
I bought my first Cap & Ball revolver back in 1968.


10HmLR.jpg





As you can see by the trade mark under the cylinder, it was made by Uberti. It was advertised way back then in the Service Armament Company catalog as the 'Army 60' or something like that. Yes, it is a brass framed replica of a Colt 1851 Navy, and the Navy was never chambered for 44 caliber balls, but I did not know that as a kid in 1968. Service Armament was the fore runner of Navy Arms. The shop was in Ridgefield NJ, about 1/2 hour from where I grew up. I borrowed my Dad's car and drove to Ridgefield to pick it up.


Back in those days, standard procedure was to cover the ball with Crisco. Wonder Wads had not been invented yet. One day I was out in a field and drew a bead on a woodchuck. When I pulled the trigger, the revolver almost jumped out of my hand. The cylinder under the hammer had fired as well as the chamber next to it. One ball went down the barrel, the other glanced off the square section of the barrel and who knows where it wound up. The woodchuck escaped without harm.

You guys can talk about flash from poorly sealed nipples until you are blue in the face, but I am sure the flame arched over from the front of the chamber. Crisco was never really good as a spark arrestor. It usually melted from the heat of a round being fired. Of course, I knew that a thin ring of lead should be shaved off the ball when seating the ball in the chamber. But think about it for a moment. That thin ring is probably less than 1/16" in length. In addition, if the ball was not perfectly formed, if it had a dent, or some other imperfection, the ring would not be perfect, leaving a small void between the cylinder wall and the ball. A perfect path for an errant spark to make its way past the runny layer of Crisco, past the ball, and into the powder charge.

As I say, Wonder Wads had not been invented yet. I have not shot Cap & Ball in years, but when I used to, I always seated a Wonder Wad between the powder and the ball. 1/4" or so of wad is a much better spark arrestor than a thin slice of lead.
 
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