Crockett hammer sucks caps

[GrandLakeHunter]

Try dusting some graphite or even better, moly powder on the inside of the hammer cup and burnish it in with a squared off toothpick or bamboo skewer. Have the cup face up to not lose the loose powder while burnishing and make sure to get all surfaces covered well.

 

[user 51067]

Too much gas escaping through the nipple perhaps? I would switch the nipple to be sure.

 

[sportster73hp]

Had a similar problem with an Invest arms. Funny thing was the second cap would go off sometimes even with two caps in the hammer the third would. After a while i started checking the cup after every shot and cleaning carbon after every day of shooting.
Not sure how i fixed it. Changed caps due to supply issues and replaced the nipple due to wear.

 

[1861colt]

Hey, forget buying a fancy nipple . Do like Blackie Thomas does on YouTube and file just a small file cut on one of the flat top surfaces of the nipple. Not all the way across both sides, just one side. Cut just enough to feel it with your fingernail, no more. So, when the ignition starts to blast back on the cap, that cut will be the first path of least resistance and the cap will be blown clean open. Works great on my uh...6-shot percussion pistol (can't say revolv-- here)

 

[doubleset]

Right now the caps I have handy are CCI standard caps (not mag) and Remington caps. The hammer on the Crockett seems to like to suck up both of these indiscriminately. In fact, the hammer face is so deep that for the first few shots you can't see any obvious sign that it's retained the cap, and it keeps on sucking them up. At one point I cleared out four stacked up caps from the hammer. I've seen this effect reported in other forums/threads as well. Surely, this can't be what's intended by the hammer designers.

Re moving to Hot Shot or Red Hot nipples: I don't at the moment see any likely advantage of this since these seem designed primarily for users of black powder substitutes and to ensure ignition with those. Also to "prevent caps from sticking" -- but I think that may mean "sticking to the nipple". In any event, since I use Swiss 3Fg in this rifle, I never have any ignition problems, nor do I have any sticking cap problems with the same (brand/style) nipple on my Lyman GPR (in which I use Swiss 2Fg).

I'm going to do some more comparisons and experiments today see if I can get more confidence in what the cause of the problem is.

 

[doubleset]

Right now the caps I have handy are CCI standard caps (not mag) and Remington caps.

Oops. MEA CULPA. This turns out to be a lie.

Looking at what I have, it appears that at some point I bought four 100-cap tins of CCI magnum caps. I just did a side-by-side test of those with the Remington caps I have left (only about a dozen), and the Remington caps do NOT get sucked up by the hammer, but the CCI mag caps get FIRMLY blasted deep into the hammer face and stuck there. And this is just firing caps on an empty barrel.

So ... sorry about my carelessness in that. Unfortunately, I now have about 300 CCI magnum caps that I'll have to relegate to using on the GPR since they never proved to be a problem there. And now I need to get some other caps for the Crockett. But that's a simple solution.

 

[doubleset]

Continuing the saga:


The plan to get non-magnum caps lasted about five minutes -- which is what it took me to discover that apparently no one has any available . So I went back to work and

1. Filed back the face on the Crockett hammer so that the hammer cup was about the same depth as on my GPR. This left about 1 mm of an unfired cap exposed when placed in the hammer cup.
2. Carefully (using a 1/4" dowel and a .22 cleaning patch with a bit of oil and some Timesaver "very fine" 333 lapping powder) polished the interior of the hammer cup to as close to mirror bright as I could.
3. Smoothed all the edges.

Put the original Traditions nipple in the barrel and fired some caps. The Remington (non-magnum) ones worked fine. Not sucked off and kept by the hammer. The result with the CCI magnum caps was an improvement, but only to the degree that a few didn't get sucked by the hammer, but a lot still did. They were easier to get out of the shortened hammer cup, but not what I'd hoped for.

Switching back to my stainless nipple (which it turns out I got from RMC Oxyoke), I discovered that the CCI magnum caps work like a charm! No sucking of the cap at all.

Now a visible difference between the Traditions nipple and the Oxyoke nipple is that the Oxyoke has a smaller (top) hole. Resorting to my Meyer wire gauge set (don't ask me why I even have this -- it's a long story), I discover that the hole in the top of the Traditions nipple will just take a 103 (0.103") Meyer gauge. And the Oxyoke stainless nipple will just take a 65 (0.65") Meyer gauge. I didn't measure the flash holes (my gauge set doesn't go that small), but they look to be at least very close to each other in size -- although the one in the Traditions nipple begins wider and then tapers down as it goes up into the nipple. I'm not going to try to get into the comparative physics of the interiors of these two nipples, but pretty clearly the Traditions nipple is passing more and/or faster gas back at the spent percussion cap and blowing it with some force into the hammer cup.

At this point I can't attribute my success to one specific change I made, and it appears that both modifying the hammer face AND using the Oxyoke stainless nipple contributed to the result. Not altogether surprising since that now pretty closely duplicates the hammer/nipple configuration on my GPR. And at least now I can use the several hundred CCI magnum caps I have with the Crockett rifle -- and without having to pull each one out of the hammer with a pick.

 

[APG]

I have the same issue with a Traditions Hawken rifle. I let one of the caps get stuck and then keep shooting. Goes off everytime. At the end of the day I pry out the stuck cap.

 

[Grenadier1758]

...

Re moving to Hot Shot or Red Hot nipples: I don't at the moment see any likely advantage of this since these seem designed primarily for users of black powder substitutes and to ensure ignition with those. Also to "prevent caps from sticking" -- but I think that may mean "sticking to the nipple". In any event, since I use Swiss 3Fg in this rifle, I never have any ignition problems, nor do I have any sticking cap problems with the same (brand/style) nipple on my Lyman GPR (in which I use Swiss 2Fg).

...

The Hot Shot or the Red Hot nipples were designed for improved reliability when used with black powder substitutes. But they also work just fine when used with real black powder especially when the rifle has a long flash channel or a lot of turns in a drum and nipple.

 

[The Crisco Kid]

Try filing or grinding with a Dremel a v in the top of the hammer nose down to the flat at the bottom of the recess. This lets the gas from firing go up and out. It may help loosen the cap and for sure keeps crud from blowing back toward your face.

 

[doubleset]

I have the same issue with a Traditions Hawken rifle. I let one of the caps get stuck and then keep shooting. Goes off everytime. At the end of the day I pry out the stuck cap.

At the end of the day for me is usually after I've fired 50 or more shots. As I got it, this hammer was collecting 4 or 5 spent caps before I'd stop to pick them all out. That's just a situation I don't want to tolerate. And the hammer came with a deep V in it.

 

[necchi]

, and it appears that both modifying the hammer face AND using the Oxyoke stainless nipple ,,

Did you actually modify the "hammer face" or did you do just the end of the "hammer cup"?
The hammer "face" should strike the full surface/circumference of the nipple.
It's a modification that can be made with the same dremel stone your already using.
Several CVA/Traditions models have a "V" cut into the forward facing section of the hammer cup.
I have modified/enlarged that V in many and opened the front of T/C and Investarm models that were stubborn about letting go of a spent cap, with great results.
The hammer isn't "sucking up" the cap,, it's just not letting go of the spent cap.
Something in or near the hammer face is holding that thin layer of copper,, the hammer face itself and perimeter, needs to be dressed.
Good luck,,

 

[pilot]

All these years I thought sticking primers was a normal part of shooting a percussion rifle. I never considered it to be a problem. A bit annoying at times, but nothing that gets in my way. Obviously, everyone is a little different. I'm glad you are getting it sorted out.

 

[Jim]

The Hot Shot or the Red Hot nipples were designed for improved reliability when used with black powder substitutes. But they also work just fine when used with real black powder especially when the rifle has a long flash channel or a lot of turns in a drum and nipple.

I don’t get it!. . . .

I used a “hot shot” only ONCE! . . . .Didn’t work! . . .

Why would one want to vent some of the cap flash to vent out the side of the nipple . . . .instead of THROUGH the nipple, into the main charge?

Seems counter-productive to me!

 

[doubleset]

Did you actually modify the "hammer face" or did you do just the end of the "hammer cup"?

Sorry to be confusing with my sloppy use of terminology. I modified only the end of the cup.

The hammer "face" should strike the full surface/circumference of the nipple.

Absolutely. Important to keep it as square as possible to the tip of the nipple.

Several CVA/Traditions models have a "V" cut into the forward facing section of the hammer cup.
I have modified/enlarged that V in many and opened the front of T/C and Investarm models that were stubborn about letting go of a spent cap, with great results.

This hammer came with just such a "V". I enlarged it to the point where I thought any more would be excessive. It didn't help.

The hammer isn't "sucking up" the cap,, it's just not letting go of the spent cap.

Metaphor -- heavily used in the cap & ball revolver world. I don't think anyone actually believes that there is a mysterious sucking force in play here.

Something in or near the hammer face is holding that thin layer of copper,, the hammer face itself and perimeter, needs to be dressed.

Yes. Results suggest the primary cause in this case is the force with which the magnum primers (particularly with certain nipples) are driving the spent cap back into the hammer cup -- essentially peening them into the cup.

 

[doubleset]

All these years I thought sticking primers was a normal part of shooting a percussion rifle. I never considered it to be a problem. A bit annoying at times, but nothing that gets in my way. Obviously, everyone is a little different. I'm glad you are getting it sorted out.

I guess it depends on the sort of shooting you do. If I were just hunting with it, I think it wouldn't bother me (although in this case the magnum primers drove the spent cap so far into the hammer cup that it was actually quite a chore to pry them out with a knife or a pick -- even with the "V" cut in place). But if you're shooting session requires putting 25 or 50 balls down range, and especially if there is some time constraint, what's just annoying in a hunting situation can become severely irritating.

 

[doubleset]

Why would one want to vent some of the cap flash to vent out the side of the nipple . . . .instead of THROUGH the nipple, into the main charge?

Often, physics can be pretty counter-intuitive. I haven't researched how these nipples actually work, but based on the pictures of them I can imagine that the basic phenomenon involved isn't the VENTING of the cap flash OUT of the nipple AFTER the cap has fired, but the "venting" (suction) of air INTO the nipple as the cap ignites. This will provide more oxygen to that ignition and result in a hotter and more forceful cap ignition. So it is actually "venting" more oxygen into the main charge. But that's just a guess.

I would be motivated to use a hot shot nipple if it solved a specific problem I had. Again, in general these are intended to address ignition problems, and that's a problem I don't have.

 

[necchi]

I would be motivated to use a hot shot nipple if it solved a specific problem I had. Again, in general these are intended to address ignition problems, and that's a problem I don't have.

You've mentioned that several times, and I understand that. Your logic is sound, considering you don't have ignition problems.
It seem's you have addressed every issue with hammer cup and face including polishing. At this point about the only thing you haven't tried is switching to a different style nipple beyond the two you have.
I've been using the non-vented Knight Red Hot for well over a decade in all my rifles with BP and several different sub's all with reliable ignition and darn few stuck caps. I have re-worked the hammers with particular care for hammer face/nipple contact using a transfer agent like inletting black or simple lip-stick. I keep working the face until I have a full circle of transfer to the face. Any stuck cap usually comes out with a brush of a finger.
What harm will it cause at least trying a different nipple?
I get it, you can't improve successful ignition,, but changing the gas jetting variable may be the answer.
For what it's worth, The Knight Red Hot has a 0.032 orifice,, I use .032 music wire for nipple picks.

p.s. I used CCI Magnum caps for a long time, then switched to RWS 1075

 

[doubleset]

What harm will it cause at least trying a different nipple?

Patting my head while whistling "Farewell to Slavianka" won't cause me any harm either, and is a bit less costly than ordering a single nipple and paying tax and shipping on it -- which actually might be thought of as "harm" if one were to be picky. In fact, there's no limit to the things that likely won't cause me harm. But I just don't have the time for all of them, and doing one to solve a problem I don't seem to have any longer just can't be very high on my priority list. That's just how I roll. However, if the problem reappears or for some reason (like "supply chain", or I have to switch to Pyrodex), then it will get bumped to the top of my priority list.
[/quote]

p.s. I used CCI Magnum caps for a long time, then switched to RWS 1075

I just checked with the "supplier" at the club where I shoot and he is happy to provide me with RWS caps.

 

[necchi]

Patting my head while whistling "Farewell to Slavianka" won't cause me any harm either,

True enough, but if doing that helps ya think about the info others have offered about their experience, you may find resolve for your non-problem/problem you've shared with us in the topic you started.
No offense intended, but spent caps stuck in the hammer can send tiny pieces of thin copper shards of shrapnel flying in any of 360 degrees. I've seen it happen.

I just checked with the "supplier" at the club where I shoot and he is happy to provide me with RWS caps.

Imagine that folks, after 39 posts to the topic,, he might actually try something different,

I'm certainly not trying to tell you what to do friend, I was just sharing my learned experience from 15yrs ago or more about the same issue and how I resolved it.
You like funny analogies huh? Well at this point I'm thinking;
"You can lead a horse to water,,,,"