Hey gang! 
Got my new 2020 Pietta London Navy out to the desert again early this morning before the ruthless heat of the day kicked in:
This is my 4th outing with this pistol and it shot great again! I fired 54 rounds through the gun, bringing my total of shots fired through this Navy up to approx. 160. I again had 0 issues. No cap jams, light cap strikes, or any other issue. This gun just keeps shooting! Today I worked on a little load development. I modified my charged spout on my flask to throw 22 grains of 3Fg, I was using O.E. today and .380” cast balls which cut a handsome ring of lead. This put the balls nearer to the top of the chamber mouths. I also added olive’s oil to my factory Ox-Yoke wonder wads.
A quick note about those wads, I personally am not at all impressed with the factory wads. They are pretty thin and flimsy, and not well lubed. I have had poor results with them and fouling accumulates very quickly. Adding olive oil today helped dramatically, and I certainly noticed an easier time during clean up. I plan to make my own wads, as I’ve done years ago. I use hard 1/8” pure cotton felt generously lubed with a lamb’s tallow and a bee’s wax. I had great results years ago with this combo.
The gun is shooting pretty well. At 12 yards, it put these dozen shots into a 2” group with one flyer:
I was shooting off the back of my car and due to the field of fire at my impromptu desert shooting area, the sun glare wasn’t helping much. Looks like eventually once I do more load development I’ll need to file my rear sight to correct for windage. Elevation is about right though I might carefully file a few strokes off the front cone to bring point of impact up an inch or so.
The Pietta London Navy continues to impress. I’ll have to say this is the best cap and ball revolver I’ve yet purchased, and as much as I enjoy my .44 Remington, I think this little Navy Colt’s just knocked it down to 2nd place. The balance and amazing beauty are really great.
Also, a .36 round ball is NOT to be underestimated. Noted author Elmer Keith described in his classic book “Sixguns” his interviews with actual Confederate veterans of the American Civil War. They claimed they had a decided preference for the round ball vs the conical bullet paper cartridges in their .36 revolvers. Claiming “it took all the fight out of them”, these men who actually fought with these guns were entirely satisfied with its effectiveness. Add to that long time users and famous gunfighters just as “Wild Bill” Hickok, who continued to use their percussion 1851 .36 Navy revolvers until well into the metallic cartridge era, and it’s no wonder why the gun had such an amazing reputation. If one were restricted to black powder weapons only, as many countries are, you would NOT be unarmed with a .36 Navy!
Take care gang and stay tuned!
-Smokey
Got my new 2020 Pietta London Navy out to the desert again early this morning before the ruthless heat of the day kicked in:
This is my 4th outing with this pistol and it shot great again! I fired 54 rounds through the gun, bringing my total of shots fired through this Navy up to approx. 160. I again had 0 issues. No cap jams, light cap strikes, or any other issue. This gun just keeps shooting! Today I worked on a little load development. I modified my charged spout on my flask to throw 22 grains of 3Fg, I was using O.E. today and .380” cast balls which cut a handsome ring of lead. This put the balls nearer to the top of the chamber mouths. I also added olive’s oil to my factory Ox-Yoke wonder wads.
A quick note about those wads, I personally am not at all impressed with the factory wads. They are pretty thin and flimsy, and not well lubed. I have had poor results with them and fouling accumulates very quickly. Adding olive oil today helped dramatically, and I certainly noticed an easier time during clean up. I plan to make my own wads, as I’ve done years ago. I use hard 1/8” pure cotton felt generously lubed with a lamb’s tallow and a bee’s wax. I had great results years ago with this combo.
The gun is shooting pretty well. At 12 yards, it put these dozen shots into a 2” group with one flyer:
I was shooting off the back of my car and due to the field of fire at my impromptu desert shooting area, the sun glare wasn’t helping much. Looks like eventually once I do more load development I’ll need to file my rear sight to correct for windage. Elevation is about right though I might carefully file a few strokes off the front cone to bring point of impact up an inch or so.
The Pietta London Navy continues to impress. I’ll have to say this is the best cap and ball revolver I’ve yet purchased, and as much as I enjoy my .44 Remington, I think this little Navy Colt’s just knocked it down to 2nd place. The balance and amazing beauty are really great.
Also, a .36 round ball is NOT to be underestimated. Noted author Elmer Keith described in his classic book “Sixguns” his interviews with actual Confederate veterans of the American Civil War. They claimed they had a decided preference for the round ball vs the conical bullet paper cartridges in their .36 revolvers. Claiming “it took all the fight out of them”, these men who actually fought with these guns were entirely satisfied with its effectiveness. Add to that long time users and famous gunfighters just as “Wild Bill” Hickok, who continued to use their percussion 1851 .36 Navy revolvers until well into the metallic cartridge era, and it’s no wonder why the gun had such an amazing reputation. If one were restricted to black powder weapons only, as many countries are, you would NOT be unarmed with a .36 Navy!
Take care gang and stay tuned!
-Smokey
Last edited:
