embarrased yesterday!

[east texas]

howdy folks :redface: we had a little party in the deep woods yesterday with all the neighbors in the area {10 folks} big party out here! and the hens went inside and the guys started talkin huntin and guns! sound familiar? talked turned to my huntin with the frontstuffers and here came the usual manure, one shot , accuracy, blah blah imade a trip back to the cabin and grabbed three poles and the fixins and headed back. iwas thinking on the way how these guys would love this! anywhoo i got back and we set up and i went thru the basics and popped a couple caps on each one and then started loading. the fifty kentucky didnt fire, a couple of snickers in the peanut gallery while i waited. re capped and nothing! iwaited a minute and laid it aside , picked up the traditions deerhunter ,capped it and pop! nothing! re capped agin and no luck! the ribbing was getting a little heavier by then ! i laid it aside and grabbed the jukar 45 kentucky and capped it and handed it to a neighbor and BOOM! ihad their attention again! i pulled the nipples on the two fifties and put a little powder in the drums{is that what they r called?} and put he nipples back on and boom boom! for the next45 mins i couldnt load and pass them out fast enough! when the smoke cleared i had three neighbors standing there makin plans on when where and what they were gonna get! a proud moment for the old guy up the hill!(me) as luck would have it my new 44 remmie 5 1/2 bbl showed up yesterday with the starter kit so plans were made to get together today and have a taste!{still waiting on the 60 army its supposed to be on the way!!!} so after being embarrased it went good ,maybe even made a couple bp shooters in the process! these guys couldnt hit squat! two of them said they had NEVER shot anything without a scope we had a coffee can filled with sand set at fifty yds and the only damage was a couple of nicks and some deflated egos ! before we quit i finally took my first shot and sprayed sand for them and now they have to get one cause the old blind guy can hit lol and they cant yet now i know this was a long story and tiresome but i had to share it ! now comes the second part! got home last night and went to cleaning and was surprised at a couple of things! cleaned the barrel of the kentucky fifty and when finished the patch came out clean . pulled the nipple and had so much crud in the drum i couldnt believe it . the drum is round and it took a small pipe wrench to remove it snd holy manure at the fouling in the bottom of the bbl. i ran a patch back down and noticed the loop that holds the patch hit bottom but the rag was pulled further up the bbl so it wasnt hitting anything within 3/4 inch of the bottom.i was looking into a nearly half inch hole and could see exactly what was and wasnt happening! suggestions on this? also the drum is round on both 50s but the jukar 45 has flats which makes it capable of putting a wrench on to remove. does anyone know of someone who makes the drums to fit the two traditions that has flats or should i modify these ? they are not looking that good with pipe wrench marks on them! lol! they are not damaged just dont want to add a pipe wrench to my shootin bag!! also the 50 kentucky was a kit and after the first heavy shootin session the blue on the bbl around the nipple was gone! i blued it with birchwood casey super blue when i built it but that stuff dosent seem all that good now! what can i do to prevent this from happening? also the nipples got pretty cruddy and one is so stoppered up it must have concrete in it! the stainless one on the old jukar fared way better! there are so many differnt thread and mm sizes on nipples as to be confusing to someone of my rather large yet hollow head size is there a chart somewhere tht would list brands,sizes threads? one more thing before i finish this novel. the traditions 50 deerhunter ,when the drum was removed icouldnt see the cleaning rod it seems to have a very small hole from the drum hole to the bbl how the heck do you clean out the sideways hole inside the bbl? ok im thru and any help youguys can offer is greatly appreciated i hate being embarrased like that but its obvious its my own ignorance and poor cleaning that was the cause :redface:

 

[majg1234]

wow lots of questions here!!!! I'll try to answer a few for ya,the tradition guns will likely use 6mmx1 nipples,the Jukar will likely do the same or 6mmx.75 just take a look at the two side by side,as far as the damaged drums go DIXIE gun works sell them along the with replacement nipples or you may be able to file and polish the damage out.Now for the cleaning the drums don't need to come out for cleaning,liberal soap and water (warm or hot) with the nipples plugged is described by many folks here.even with the breaches as you descibed them it'll work,I'm sure other more knowledgeable folks will give some other pointers to you good luck

 

[CoyoteJoe]

Glad you impressed the neighbors. My own house warming party also turned into a shootin' party.
As to your cleaning procedures, I see a few issues which most likey account for your initial misfire problems.
It sounds like you have been cleaning the bore with a patch loop on the rod. That may work OK for breechloaders open at both ends but is not the thing for a muzzleloader. You need a jag which fits the bore of each gun. The cleaning patch wraps over the end of said jag so that it is pushed right down to the breechplug face. Check this link for the general idea. http://www.trackofthewolf.com/Categories/TableList.aspx?catID=6&subID=49&styleID=152

Nipple drums should not need to be removed for routine cleaning and should not be removed except for serious repair or replacement. They are fitted up so that the nipple aligns with the hammer and are meant to be left there. Removing and replacing it will very quickly loosen the threads so that the nipple no longer aligns properly.
The Traditions breechplug is set up something like this photo of a Pedersoli plug.

As you see there is a small diameter powder chamber between the nipple and the bore. That needs to be cleaned or you will have nothing but misfires. A bore brush of around .22-.30 caliber screwed onto your rod will reach into that chamber to clean it out and dry after cleaning. That is esential if you are to have reliable ignition. You can get a new drum from the same link posted above but I can't help you with the metric thread size. It is very important that you do get the right size. Some metric and SAE threads are similar enough that they sort of seem to fit but will not fit well enough to withstand the 15,000 psi you may develope with a heavy blackpowder load.
You really need to get better aquainted with basic cleaning procedures since what you have been doing is obviously not working for you.

 

[necchi]

Please DO NOT remove the remaining BREECH PLUG! Because of the way the plug and drum is drilled and installed the threads take a real beating. They where made to be left in place.

That kind of crud is usually caused by oil left in the barrel when it's loaded and fired.
Their all 6mm x 1mm nipples.
Good Luck.

p.s. some form of caps and and paragraph structure would make reading your posts alot easier for some of us older guys, :wink:

 

[BrownBear]

...how the heck do you clean out the sideways hole inside the bbl?

If there's a cleanout screw, I remove it and use a pipe cleaner. If there's no cleanout screw, I remove the nipple, but a little bend in the tip of the pipe cleaner to get it started, then push that through the nipple hole to scrub. Never a wrinkle in my brow.

 

[east texas]

thanx for the inf and i already told you guys i got this puter to look at nekkid women so im SURE my typing has a little left to be desired i use the tried and true hunt and peck method it sure takes a long time to make a post like that one! :rotf:

 

[David W.]

thanx for the inf and i already told you guys i got this puter to look at nekkid women....:rotf:

Now who would do a thing like that? :redface: :nono: :rotf:

 

[William O.]

I'm going to add one thing to the already good advice. Every now and then I remove the nipple and place in an empty pill container, add one drop of liquid soap and top off with water. Screw the lid on and give it a shake to stir up the soap. I just let it sit that way while I'm cleaning the rest of my rifle, then I just rinse the nipple in water, dry and replace. Another trick is to wrap a pipe cleaner around anything with threads and turn it, instantly cleans the threads and it goes back in easily.

 

[east texas]

good info bull! :hatsoff:

 

[majg1234]

good info from all.I'll add that I use bore mops the caliber needed along with the cleaning jags as someone else posted,I use a sectioned SS rod with appropriate boreguide/muzzle protector for all my rifles made by PROSHOT,when I needed an extra section for my long rifles a simple phone call and a 2 day wait was all it took,these are hardened SS and micropolished (made in the USA too),with correct adapters I can load,clean and protect all my ML's I also use another of the same rods for all my CF firearms
good luck and enjoy "making smoke"

 

[tg]

"thanx for the inf and i already told you guys i got this puter to look at nekkid women"

I hear the next breakthru will be scratch and sniff software :haha: :grin:

 

[east texas]

thanx for all the info guys the only thing not addressed was the blueing being burnt off around the cap area any fix for that? thanx mike

 

[majg1234]

naw it just happens,just clean and lube well it'll develop what fancy folk call a "patina" :thumbsup:

 

[Greg Hardy]

Most of the factory bluing is gone from the drum on my old CVA Frontier rifle, so ya kinda gotta live with it. And nekkid women and muzzleloaders, shoot what else do ya need in life? :rotf:

 

[east texas]

just some beans and cornbread and i can sit out the hard times ! :v

 

[Greg Hardy]

There ya go!

 

[east texas]

well i orderd a coupla drumsto replace the ones i chewed up a little with the pipe wrench, and some spitfire nipples fri from cains also a nipple wrench and nipple pick{couldnt find where my wife sewing kit was!} i orderd the spitfire nipples and a couple of flash cups ive read on an older post that the spitfire nipples do just that spit fire so i got the flash cups to help protect my purty purty face! my question about all this is if i were to put a spot of anti-seize on the drums would it do damage to remove them regularly for cleaning?

 

[Zonie]

If we are speaking of a percussion gun with a side drum, no one that I know removes the drum from the barrel unless there is a reason to replace it.

Each time the drum is removed and retightened it will need to be turned slightly further into the barrels tapped hole to become "tight". This will move the nipple upwards slightly.

Removing and reinstalling a drum is one of the best ways I can think of to mess up its "timing".
Timing in this case means that when the drum is tight, the nipple is pointing in the correct direction to align with the hammer.

Because it is a bad idea to remove a drum I would not put any anti-sieze on the threads. In fact, if I were going to put anything on the threads it would be a thread locking compound to prevent the drum from turning easily.