New Colt and a lube question

Took my new-to-me 2nd gen. Dragoon out today for the first time, had a ball. I was using 40 grain loads with round ball, thought there might be some serious recoil but the weight of the gun pretty well soaked it up.

Shooting at only 15 yds or so, found it was hitting about 6" high, as I expected from this forum and other reading. A previous owner has done some work on the front sight but I think I'll take it to a gunsmith to have it replaced with a taller sight. I also need to put in considerable range time to improve my shooting.

By the time I'd put 18 rounds through the barrel, the action had stiffened right up and I also had some trouble getting the hammer to catch at full **** so took her home for cleaning.

Thanks to everyone who replied to my earlier questions about what I'd need for the care and feeding of the Dragoon. I found it all very helpful, I also followed Mike Belliveau's (aka Duellist1954's) Youtube video to strip the gun right down - what a great resource that is! After cleaning off the crud, and getting a flattened cap out of the works, everything went back together with no trouble.

Overall very pleased, but I'm wondering if better lubrication might keep it shooting longer. The arbor was very lightly lubed and the action seemed to stiffen up pretty quickly. Any suggestions anyone can make in that line would be appreciated. Right now I'm tending towards Ballistol with maybe a heavier choice on the arbor.

Jamie

I have found out no matter what you do, after 12 or 18 shots the percussion revolvers will cake up with fouling. All I do is take them apart and give them a good brushing down with a damp tooth brush, put a few drops of oil on the arbor and shoot a couple more cylinder's , and repeat. No big deal and takes only a few minute's.

I believe juice jaws has the correct approach. It doesn't take a lot of time out of the reloading cycle to pull the cylinder, wipe and oil the arbor, reassemble and reload. Clean the face of the hammer, remove cap fragments and wipe the nipples. Your shooting experience will be better and in a range session you will fire more shots.

Thanks guys, if what I'm getting is normal then I am okay with it. I'd read or heard of range sessions of 30 shots and thought I must be doing it wrong.

No problem with a quick cleaning, I took the cylinder out to reload anyway. I found it hard to do anything with the gun together, guess it'll get easier with practice.

I've been shooting my couple of BP revolvers since the mid-80s and paid attention to the label on the inside of the Colt box that advised the shooter to apply grease to the arbor, rather than any kind of oil. I regularly shoot upwards of a hundred shots with the ROA at a guest day without doing anything more than wiping it between cylinder-loads. Unless I get a jam - VERY rare - it stays in one piece.

The Walker is a mite more finicky, but it's still uncommon to shoot less than 48 - 60 shots before doing a clean-up.

I'm obviously doing something wrong here, but I can't be bothered to figure out what it is.

tac

Never heard of anyone getting that many shots in a row with a cap and ball, my old hat is off to you. Good shooting

I have been using wheel bearing grease on the arbors of my black powder revolvers since the 1970’s. No problems with fouling the arbor at all. I use FFFG powder, and fouling is kept to a minimum. I pay attention to the spent caps to make reasonably sure they don’t drop into the works. Sometimes a spent cap does, but not often. Very few problems.

DoubleDeuce1, maybe I should add that I was using FFg, that might have contributed to the fouling.

DoubleDeuce1 and tac, you both seem to be getting great results. I did not put any grease over the balls, but used Wonderwads which I've seen recommended. If you've been shooting cap and ball since the 70s and 80s, does that mean you put grease on top of the ball? (Not sure when Wonderwads appeared on the market.)

In any case, I'll start using a grease on the arbor rather than Ballistol - it looked a bit thin to me but I'd seen in it recommended.

Jamie

I've been using lubriplate (white grease) on the arbors and on the cylinder pin of my Remington (and the slide rails of my 1911) forever....never have the cylinder bind up, and the lubriplate comes right off with hot water, cap frags, however are quite another matter. I have 2 .36 Colt style that do NOT have a safety pin slot in the hammer, and they do not drop caps into the works.

Hmmm... It’s the Remingtons that people often bring up about binding within the third cylinder, which mine would do also. That was until I used Ballistol on the base pin. Don’t know if it was necessary or not but I’d reapply some every 3rd or 4th cylinder and I’d shoot no less than 6-8 cylinders. I also wiped the cylinder as well. Again not sure if it was necessary but just did it.

I'm sure you noticed, the cylinder arbor has a bunch of grooves cut into it.

Colt did that so they would hold grease to not only lube the cylinder but also to keep the fouling from gumming up the works.

As the others noted, gummed up cylinder arbors are a common source of problems with not only the Colt and Remington but with the other cap & ball pistols of the time.

It wasn't until just about the end of the Civil War that the Rogers & Spencer revolver was made.

The Rogers & Spencer was a new design that deflected the fouling from the powder blast away from the arbor joint at the front of the cylinder.

It was produced too late in the CW to be used in action and the guns sit in a warehouse for years.
They were eventually bought by Bannerman's for penny's on the dollar.

This is why, if you see an original, they are often in very good to excellent condition.

I put a very thin film of grease over the balls in the cylinder. Very thin. It doesn’t take much. Crisco works, but melts off on warm days. They both wipe off easily when things get a little gooey.

I’ve used the lubed wads a couple of times. They’re ok. As for the grease, it comes right off with liquid dish washing soap and warm/ hot water.

I use Black MZ powder in my revolvers. Just keep on shooting....very little fowling. Easy clean up.

hadden west said:

I use Black MZ powder in my revolvers. Just keep on shooting....very little fowling. Easy clean up.

Click to expand...

How does it shoot, and how do you accomplish the compression with a lower volume load?

It shoots as good as I can shoot. I have shot a lot of hand guns, in my life and I have high expectations for accuracy. I can not, honestly, compare it to real black powder, because I only shoot Black MZ in my cap lock pistols and small caliber cap lock rifles.

I use real black in my flintlock pistols and flintlock rifles and my large bore, cap lock rifles. It's been years, since I used real black in a cap lock pistol.

You can add cream-of-wheat or felt wad, on top of powder, to get compression that you need.

I have an 1860 Colt Army. I lube the arbor with bore butter, use wads and no grease over the chambers. I usually run 4 cylinders, 24 shots, in a session and never have any binding. Also have the 1858 Remington, don't shoot it as often but IIRC I haven't had any binding problem, not cap related that is

Yeah, I see a lot of recommendations for bore butter on the interweb, think I'll try it. Thanks everyone.

Jamie

What Mr. Troll said: Lubriplate white lithium grease on the cylinder pin / arbour. Also, use some lube like Gatofeo Nne Lube (home made) under the ball or conical. That same stuff over the ball is the next best. People go 80-100 shots using this foweling mitigation technique. So do I.

Nothing to do with good shooting, Sir, I assure you. It's just the way it happens. Sure, I wipe the gun over after every cylinder-load - it's stainless and a breeze to do it. The only time I've needed to tear it down during a guest day shoot is after a piece of cap jammed it up. I demonstrate to every new shooter how to just flick the wrist after each shot to 'eject' the bits. Works more often than not.

As I've noted many times before, I grease the arbour with Shakespeare spinning real grease after I lucked in to a ten-pound tub at a fishing store fire sale about twenty years back. Best $5 I ever spent. The ROA doesn't have grooves on the arbor pin, just a reduced diameter that does the same job. After applying a generous measure - a dollop if you want to be picky - I just put it back together and wipe away the excess around the front of the frame.

As for ball bube, I usually shoot off the last cylinder with a dollop of E45 [emoluent skin preparation] over each ball, flush with the face of the cylinder. It not only softens most all the crud, but being an emulsion, takes 95% of it all away in the wash-up. No wads, though.

tac