Caps for Bobcat

[mashaffer]

For you Bobcat owners. Which caps does your kitty prefer? Also, should I use anything special to clean the barrel before the first use?

mike

 

[Lone Carabiner]

Definitely swab the barrel out with a dry patch and blow through the drum screw to check for blockage, any cleaner will do (windex or windsheild washer fluid) before shooting

 

[arcticap]

I would prefer to use a gun solvent followed by dry patches. The solvent may help to remove any oil or grease residue from the factory.
I try not to introduce water or water containing products into my barrels if I can avoid it. Many people do use hot water when cleaning though, it's just a matter of personal preference.
I can't say that there is much of a difference between caps, but then I haven't tried the magnum #11 caps from CCI for example. Some folks do prefer them because they are supposed to be hotter, but they may not promote better accuracy.
There have been reports that aftermarket nipples can be helpful to promote better ignition in some Bobcats, but that may also depend on which powder you're going to use.

 

[marwat06]

Using Black powder I had good result with Remington (new 40% hotter brands) and regular CCI caps. For Pyrodex Remington’s worked better. I used warm water and dish detergent to clean out the barrel and ran some dry patches to dry out the barrel. Used Bore Butter to lube the barrel. At the range used spit patch to clean out the barrel. I also take the nipple off and use a pipe cleaner with spit to clean out the drum channel. If you find a good price on Caps from a local source buy in bulk. Caps seem to be harder to get now days.

 

[DMURPHY317]

It sounds like your question about cleaning the barrel was in refrence to a new gun. If that is the case, you do need to get the preservative lube out of it before you shoot it. In the Lyman manual it suggests using WD-40 or similar to clean the stuff out for the first time. Then you will need to clean that out with windex or alcohol or whatever to get down to bare metal before using Bore butter or whaterver you prefer for storage lube. You can then swab the bore dry before loading the first round.

I use the CVA perfect nipple on my Bobcats and I still have a tin or two of the old CVA #11 caps that seem about the same strength as the #11 mag caps out there. My gun prefers 3F powders, 2F seems to have trouble getting down into the fire channel and would cause misfires often. I don't have that problem with 3F powders. If I'm shooting PRB in the guns, I don't bother swabbing between shots, the patch around the ball seems to take care of it for me and I can shoot all day without noticeable changes in accuracy.

I hope this helps.

 

[mashaffer]

Thanks for the tips. Much appreciated.

mike

 

[hangfiretx]

If you're basically looking for a hotter ignition, I stumbled on some musket nipples designed to work with cva sidelocks and snatched them up. I don't remember where I got them, but I put one on one of my bobcats, figured theres more volume of flame with the musket nipple and therefore better ignition reliability. Anyway, they were a mail order item from one of the mail order muzzleloading outfits out there. Maybe Dixie has some?

 

[paulvallandigham]

WADR, the caps sold today are already too hot. There is no need to use a musket cap to ignite your Black Powder. If you are using substitutes, you deserve the problems they create! You might as well buy an adaptor to fire modern pistol primers, as you are trying to ignite smokeless powder, by any other name!

If you can fire both musket caps, and regular percussion caps out of the same gun, do so at night, or have someone fire off a couple of caps for you in the dark, so you can see the length of the flame coming out of the barrel. I have not found a gun that had a long enough barrel that I didn't get fire coming out the muzzle at least 10 inches. The musket caps will do that and only a little more. Musket caps are used in the larger bored guns, and rifles, because they put out a larger spray of fire, which helps ignite more of the main charge. But even percussion caps put out enough heat to light anything.

If you are having ignition problems, its because either the nipple or flashchannel is blocked. The length of the flash channel is of little concern. That primer explosion will send out a flame that is more than capable of traveling a few more millimeters to reach your charge, even going around corners. But it can't do that if the flashchannel or nipple is blocked.

When I am reloading a percussion gun, I use a damp patch down the barrel to move the crud, but I am also watching the nipple to see that some smoke comes out of it. That proves to me that the flash channel and nipple are clear for the next shot. I then run a dry patch down to dry the barrel, before loading my next powder charge. This process requires me to pull the hammer back to half cock, after firing, and clear the expired cap from the nipple, before cleaning the barrel. I found that when using the #10 caps, I had to use pliers to remove them from the nipples. #11 worked just fine, split, and were easy to remove. After loading the gun, the last thing I do before capping is to use a cleaning patch to wipe the nipple clean, and clean the smoke and crud from around the nipple, and hammer. That gives me an excuse to check the face of the hammer, and skirt for damage, or stuck caps, so I can eliminate those possible problems before re-capping my gun to fire the next round. It also cleans the sides of the nipple so that spent caps don't stick to it.

 

[hangfiretx]

Hmm,

Always interesting to get a new perspective on things. I agree that bp is much preferred over the substitutes. Unfortunately its getting harder to get BP. I do have plenty for me though.

Anyway, when the chips are down, I still like to use musket caps and not worry about if there might be a tiny bit of moisture in the barrel

 

[cayugad]

In my CVA Mountain Stalker which is a Bass Pro Bobcat.. I swab the barrel with pure isopropyl alcohol. I swab the barrel, then run a dry patch down the barrel. I then pop (my favorite brands) a CCI Magnum or RWS 1075 cap through the nipple. Pull the patch and see if there are burn marks. If not, put another patch down there and repeat the cap on the nipple fire. This will blow clean the nipple of oils and crud. When you finally see a good burn mark on the dry patch, then load the rifle as normal.

Also when I hunt with the rifle I like to remove the nipple and put some powder under the nipple, then replace it. Just that little bit of assurance that the rifle will fire when I need it.

I also shoot substitute powder out of this rifle. I shoot Triple Se7en 2f in an 80 grain amount with a .530 ball. It is a deadly load.

 

[Tim Clark]

As for caps, the only ones available locally anymore are the new "40% hotter" Remington #11, they have a better fit than most I've ever tried (CCI, CVA, Remington in the past) and they work well.

As for first cleaning, I sprayed some brake cleaner into the barrel (not on the outside of the barrel) and had a patch all ready to go chasing it before it evaporated. Another short spray in the bolster to make sure there were no metal shavings or other accumulated crud. Then I ran Ballistol-soaked patches (came out clean as a whistle), then used bore brushes. The odd thing is, I got black patches after running the brushes. I get them on my older guns after running brushes, and thought it was just old residue, etc. But on a brand new, never fired gun? Oh well.... I just ran a few dry patches and after the first blackened one the rest came out clean.

As for the nipple -- I took the stock nipple on the Bobcat, inserted a drill bit into the flash hole (NOT where the cap rests, the other end that is screwed into the bolster) to find the size that's just snug and run it at low speed to make certain that it's uniform, then chucked a bit two sizes larger and just coned the flash end of the nipple. Then I switched ends, inserted the bit from the cap end and repeated. I know from reloading centerfire cartridges how important it is to have uniform flash holes. Yeah, maybe it's overkill and probably unnecessary but it takes one of the nagging variables out of the equation when shooting. I think it helps. But that's just me. After "coning," I polish up the bolster end with a dremel until it's a mirror finish. Some would say that it won't matter after the first shot, but I'd disagree. It seems to never foul-up this way.

Have fun shooting that kitty!