Help with an 1851 Navy, alignment?

[Schutzer]

I'd say take it apart, clean everything really well. Pop 6 caps on the nipples to make sure the nipples fit your caps , then test fire

Great advice, will do exactly that. Have found with my steel guns that half the time, cleaning and reassembly solves the problem.

The ball leaves the chamber at like 200fps, into the forcing cone where the burning powder and barrel give it the velocity. A little bit of an off Center entry won't matter. We're not talking a .454 Casull . Half my cap and ballers probably have visibly off-center chamber and bore alignment

That’s good to know, so this is not an uncommon problem. I think an interesting test might be to put the same amount of powder through this gun and my steel one, and through the chronograph, and see if there is an appreciable difference in FPS between them.

There's a reason why Freedom Arms prides themselves on laser alignment of the chambers and bore , because most production revolvers don't have perfect alignment or the "lockup slop" centers the chamber upon firing

I had never heard of Freedom Arms before, just looked them up. They look like beautiful revolvers. If only they made BP models too (it doesn‘t look like they do?). I think if a company, any company, started making new Ruger Old Army type modern revolvers, there’d be a market for them, and they’d give the Italians a run for their money. What do you think?

.44 percussion revolvers did the job 150+ years ago and they'll do the job now. If that's what you have to legally carry, make sure it works, carefully load it and carry it with 5 rounds in it

Well, I don’t mean to give the impression it’s all I can carry, I’m not a prohibited person or anything like that. In fact I am former military and former police officer. I would only carry this in rarer situations and locations where, how shall I put this, the local authorities and prosecuting attorneys are less 2A-friendly. It would make it less likely for them to blame “big scary automatic assault pistols” and therefore hurt the 2A community and our rights as a whole… and if it is seized for the investigation and never returned regardless of outcome (as often happens), it’s less of a loss than one’s $600 Glock or somesuch. It also makes overpenetration very unlikely (as well making unintended mag dumps impossible), and lessens possibilities for unintended damage due to misses, etc. There are advantages and many disadvantages… and now I’m way off topic!

 

[Ed C.]

I’ve thought of what you suggest— that it may just be the outer dimensions that are off kilter. And I keep trying to look down the barrel with the flashlight but not having too much luck yet, nothing is reflecting back up? And ugh, it looks really dirty in there. Like I said I’ll have to wait until next week (all my tools are in Florida where I’ll be heading) and then I‘ll find out exactly what’s going when I take it apart.

I do have new steel frame revolvers— new Pietta steel Navy in .44 and a full-size Remington 1858. However, like I said they just don’t feel anywhere near as good as this one. They are more rattle-y, more jiggly, the handles are shaped less ergonomically… this brass one just feels super tight, the cylinder locks up tight, the hammer spring must be SUPER strong because the hammer pull is hard— which I’m hoping will mean fewer cap jams than my steel ones (even with Slix shot cones, cap jams on my steel ones are not uncommon). Plus, this one is lighter (because the cylinder is the original style, with the larger forcing cone, so it looks more like the original Navy in .36). I forgot to mention, this brass one also has a tall front site, which I’m guessing will mean it’s more point-of-aim. I’ve seen photo of these guns from that era and this is the only one I’ve seen that has a tall front site (as opposed to the tiny nub on modern Pietta clones). Also, the Remington 1858 is HUGE, and I’m a small guy. Concealing the Remington for me would be like trying to conceal a cannon! So as you say, maybe a 5 1/2” Remington would be better, though operating them is nowhere near as smooth as the Colts. Anyway, I hope this gun works out. I may make a YouTube video about it. If it doesn’t, I’ll probably resell it.

If you get near Clermont lets go shoot that thing. I did replace the nub front sight on my Pietta and now it shoots POA and is a smooth running and enjoyable gun. Oh, also had to replace the hammer and bolt but it's all good at this time.

 

[Schutzer]

If you get near Clermont lets go shoot that thing. I did replace the nub front sight on my Pietta and now it shoots POA and is a smooth running and enjoyable gun. Oh, also had to replace the hammer and bolt but it's all good at this time.

I’ll be in Mount Dora, is that anywhere near?
Yep, after only putting a couple of cylinders of rounds through my new (2021) Navy, the cylinder completely locked up (which was really embarrassing as it happened at the public range with everyone curious about it and watching!). Taylor was very nice when I called them and they paid for shipping for me to send it to them, they replaced the hammer and sent it back in less than 7 days, which was incredible. Fixed the problem, though I too had to replace a couple of things. I think maybe the factory hadn’t fully recovered from the Coof and had quality control issues. Anyway it sounds like you know what you’re doing!

 

[Ed C.]

I’ll be in Mount Dora, is that anywhere near?
Yep, after only putting a couple of cylinders of rounds through my new (2021) Navy, the cylinder completely locked up (which was really embarrassing as it happened at the public range with everyone curious about it and watching!). Taylor was very nice when I called them and they paid for shipping for me to send it to them, they replaced the hammer and sent it back in less than 7 days, which was incredible. Fixed the problem, though I too had to replace a couple of things. I think maybe the factory hadn’t fully recovered from the Coof and had quality control issues. Anyway it sounds like you know what you’re doing!

That is about 35- 40 minutes north of me. Revolvers are ingenious, but fairly simple pieces of machinery once you see them dissembled and do some research on how they operate. The problem is very small adjustments (filing, smoothing, shimming, shaping) can result in major changes in function. Here is where it is helpful to have some experience....or luck....to be successful.

 

[Stantheman86]

I was shooting a couple. 44 cap and ballers today, with 30gr of 1F and a .454 ball

I shot a tree to test penetration, and the ball took a half inch deep chunk out of the tree and bounced back, glancing off my head.....

Made me think they're either extremely deadly manstoppers as that big piece of slow moving lead smacks into tissue and flattens , causing a terrible wound cavity.......or that .44 Navy is basically operating at .41 Rimfire velocity unless you stuff 40gr of a good 3f and a conical in those chambers to maybe equal a .45 LC

 

[Ed C.]

I was shooting a couple. 44 cap and ballers today, with 30gr of 1F and a .454 ball

I shot a tree to test penetration, and the ball took a half inch deep chunk out of the tree and bounced back, glancing off my head.....

Made me think they're either extremely deadly manstoppers as that big piece of slow moving lead smacks into tissue and flattens , causing a terrible wound cavity.......or that .44 Navy is basically operating at .41 Rimfire velocity unless you stuff 40gr of a good 3f and a conical in those chambers to maybe equal a .45 LC

That's a hell of a thing when the trees shoot back! Be careful! Now you got me to thinking.....I may just line up several gallon jugs of water and test my '58 BP Remington with 25 grains of 3Fg vs the '58 Remington conversion shooting 45lc precision one cartridge.

 

[Stantheman86]

That's a hell of a thing when the trees shoot back! Be careful! Now you got me to thinking.....I may just line up several gallon jugs of water and test my '58 BP Remington with 25 grains of 3Fg vs the '58 Remington conversion shooting 45lc precision one cartridge.

I'm just curious how much of a difference the 1F makes vs the 3F. Even 25 grains of 3f in a .44 feels like a moderately healthy charge but 25 of 1F felt like a light target load

I may try some conicals in my steel frame .44's with 1F, just to see how they do .

 

[Schutzer]

I'm just curious how much of a difference the 1F makes vs the 3F. Even 25 grains of 3f in a .44 feels like a moderately healthy charge but 25 of 1F felt like a light target load

I may try some conicals in my steel frame .44's with 1F, just to see how they do .

Yikes, be careful! There are a few YouTubers who have tested 3F through these revolvers and found that once you get beyond about 35 grains of powder, you are not going to get any more energy. Because the chamber is too long, as opposed to wide, so the powder will not burn all the way down the chamber fast enough to increase power beyond that. On the other hand, more powder through a larger caliber flint lock pistol or percussion rifle WILL make a difference, because the chamber is wide versus long. Hope that made sense. in other words, black powder burns, not detonates, so it’s never an instantaneous reaction and release of energy.

 

[Schutzer]

That's a hell of a thing when the trees shoot back! Be careful! Now you got me to thinking.....I may just line up several gallon jugs of water and test my '58 BP Remington with 25 grains of 3Fg vs the '58 Remington conversion shooting 45lc precision one cartridge.

Hey I’m in FL now, let me know when you do that!

 

[Stantheman86]

Yikes, be careful! There are a few YouTubers who have tested 3F through these revolvers and found that once you get beyond about 35 grains of powder, you are not going to get any more energy. Because the chamber is too long, as opposed to wide, so the powder will not burn all the way down the chamber fast enough to increase power beyond that. On the other hand, more powder through a larger caliber flint lock pistol or percussion rifle WILL make a difference, because the chamber is wide versus long. Hope that made sense. in other words, black powder burns, not detonates, so it’s never an instantaneous reaction and release of energy.

It's a diminishing return, there's only so much that can burn before the unburned powder is just blown out . I've seen it in the snow, black unburned black powder that was blown out of my revolver. There's probably a reason why the US Ordnance Dept was happy with about 25 grains of Pistol Powder and a conical for the 1860 Army . Any more powder wouldn't give enough of a bump in velocity to justify the increased fouling, and 25 grains and a Johnston & Dow was plenty for shooting a man or a horse

 

[Ed C.]

Hey I’m in FL now, let me know when you do that!

That's on schedule for tomorrow. But I'm retired and can shoot anytime. I try to avoid weekends. During the week I just about have the range to myself. If you can't make it tomorrow we can set up a future date. Maybe give the Walker a penetration test. Or the Sharps. 45-70 obliterates single gallon jugs. Oops, no unmentionables. Pretend I didn't say that. We'll go with the .50 cal. Hawken.

 

[Schutzer]

Well after disassembling her I’m realizing how different she is from the modern Pietta’s. As you can see in comparison photos w my new steel Pietta .44 Navy, not only is the front sight taller and the cylinder smaller, but the hammer seems quite a bit shorter or differently shaped. So I don’t think the hammers are interchangeable. The handle is also smaller, which explains why it feels so much more ergonomic. Will be testing its power hopefully later this week, over the chronograph.

 

[Stantheman86]

Well after disassembling her I’m realizing how different she is from the modern Pietta’s. As you can see in comparison photos w my new steel Pietta .44 Navy, not only is the front sight taller and the cylinder smaller, but the hammer seems quite a bit shorter or differently shaped. So I don’t think the hammers are interchangeable. The handle is also smaller, which explains why it feels so much more ergonomic. Will be testing its power hopefully later this week, over the chronograph.

Is the cylinder shorter maybe as an attempt by Pietta to keep people from putting more than 30 grains in the chambers?

 

[Schutzer]

Is the cylinder shorter maybe as an attempt by Pietta to keep people from putting more than 30 grains in the chambers?

It’s a Armi San Marco made in 1979. I think it was from before they developed the larger cylinders for the later .44 1851 Navy guns. It looks more like the .36’s, with the large forcing cone. So technically it looks more “authentic”, sort of. My guess is they had the old .36 cylinder molds so they just used those, and drilled out the chambers further to accommodate the .44. Probably cheaper for them.

 

[Schutzer]

That's on schedule for tomorrow. But I'm retired and can shoot anytime. I try to avoid weekends. During the week I just about have the range to myself. If you can't make it tomorrow we can set up a future date. Maybe give the Walker a penetration test. Or the Sharps. 45-70 obliterates single gallon jugs. Oops, no unmentionables. Pretend I didn't say that. We'll go with the .50 cal. Hawken.

Haha! Unfortunately I can’t make it today, will be spending time with my parents. Besides I haven’t made all my cartridges yet! Will be making 27 grain, 30 grain, and 32 grain paper cartridges to shoot through her.

 

[Ed C.]

Haha! Unfortunately I can’t make it today, will be spending time with my parents. Besides I haven’t made all my cartridges yet! Will be making 27 grain, 30 grain, and 32 grain paper cartridges to shoot through her.

Try again later. It was fun. 25 grains put the round ball

through 4 gal. jugs filled with water and entered the fifth. I only had six jugs left for the 45lc and it went through all six and exited the last one. The round ball simply penetrated the jugs. The 45lc blew up the first two jugs. At 50' 25 grains works well in the Remington. 22 grains seem to be the most accurate in my .44 cal. 1851 Navy. Both guns are more accurate than me shooting offhand.

 

[Schutzer]

Try again later. It was fun. 25 grains put the round ballView attachment 210617 through 4 gal. jugs filled with water and entered the fifth. I only had six jugs left for the 45lc and it went through all six and exited the last one. The round ball simply penetrated the jugs. The 45lc blew up the first two jugs. At 50' 25 grains works well in the Remington. 22 grains seem to be the most accurate in my .44 cal. 1851 Navy. Both guns are more accurate than me shooting offhand.

Very nice! That's a better group than I get!

 

[Schutzer]

OK, I was finally able to put my 'new' 1979 Armi San Marco to the test. The results were both good, and disappointing in some respects. But mostly good.
To begin with, just to make sure the thing shoots straight so I could safely shoot it through the chronograph, I tried it on the nearest target, which on this particular range was 21 yards. I know, terrible small group, but in my defense, this is the very first time I fired this gun, and the target is smaller than man size:

By the way, I only had about 12 #10 caps left, so I only allowed myself 3 shots.
Then, I prepared the chronograph, and loaded up 4 paper cartridges of .454, with 30 grains of BP. Very surprisingly, I found that the .454's were way too small-- no shave ring, and I could tell that they could rather easily move and shift inside the chambers. This worried me (chain fires) so I applied generous amounts of bore butter to the chambers. So, this gun takes at least .457's, if not larger calibers.

My results for the 30grain shots were:
700.9 FPS, 713.8 FPS, 606.3 FPS, and 704.0 FPS. I believe the low number is due to a possibly different or defective chamber (for reasons you'll see below), so I disregarded it. The average works out to 706.2 FPS.
As I was really hoping the 30 grains would put it over the 800 FPS mark (which in my mind is minimum for a self-defense weapon), this was a bit disappointing at first.

I then loaded up a few 32 grain cartridges, and fired those through the chrono:
778.4, 716.4, 712.6, and 609.0 I did not check , but I suspect the low number in this batch was through the same chamber as the low one above. I don't know why the one 778.4 number is so high, but it's possible I measured out too much powder on that one. Throwing out the 609.0 and the 778.4, the average is 714.5. Barely a difference from the 30 grain loads.

On the good side, I found how excellent this gun is-- it's VERY solidly built, VERY strong hammer spring-- there was not a single cap jam, not even close. In fact, the caps were so tightly smashed onto the cones that I had to use a plastic knife to try to scrape them off the cones when I was done. Look how tight this cap was crushed around the cone, not going anywhere:

And even better-- I realized just how much powder this smaller cylinder can hold. As I mentioned in an earlier post, this gun has a considerably shorter cylinder than my new Pietta Navy in .44, so I was worried that I'd barely be able to fit more than 30 grains in the chambers, but look how much space is left over the ball, even with 32 grains:

So I don't think I'll have any problem whatsoever with loading cartridges with 35 grains, or possibly more. I believe that when I do this next time, I will achieve 800 FPS velocities, no problem.

Next, I tested my new Pietta .44 with 32 grains, so see if I got comparable velocities. Sure enough, I got 716.2 and 701.9, pretty much the same as through the ASM. So it's not the gun that's to blame.

So, now that I am completely out of #10 caps, and they are completely impossible to find, I ordered #11 cones from Track of the Wolf (as well as .457 balls)-- I have plenty of #11 caps saved up. Next time I go to the range I'll test the ASM with 35 grains of BP to see if I can achieve the vaunted 800 FPS. May also test with 27 grains or so of 777, which should achieve about the same results. If I still can't get 800 FPS, will probably sell her.

There is something else I'd like to point out-- apparently, the open top ASM and the Pietta Navy achieve FAR lower velocities than "top strapped" guns like the Remington NMA and the Ruger OA. I use for evidence for example Paul Harrell, who consistently (judging from his videos) gets velocities averaging in the 840s or even 980s with only 30 grains of BP with his Ruger OA. I will be testing my own Pietta Remington NMA with 30 grains the next time I go to the range. I would wager that she'll get considerably higher velocities than the ASM or the Pietta Navy. Of course, the Remingtons also have 8" barrels, so 1/2" more twist than the Navys.

Also-- I can't stress enough how much better the ASM Navy feels than the new Pietta Navy. So much better built-- the Pietta feels so loose and "rattly" in comparison. Much weaker hammer spring. Terribly shaped grip. Just lesser workmanship-- even though the ASM is decades older. This was surprising, as I would have expected the older guns to be shoddier.

Thanks for reading.

 

[Schutzer]

Try again later. It was fun. 25 grains put the round ballView attachment 210617 through 4 gal. jugs filled with water and entered the fifth. I only had six jugs left for the 45lc and it went through all six and exited the last one. The round ball simply penetrated the jugs. The 45lc blew up the first two jugs. At 50' 25 grains works well in the Remington. 22 grains seem to be the most accurate in my .44 cal. 1851 Navy. Both guns are more accurate than me shooting offhand.

I wonder how the jugs compare to the "meat targets". With 30 grains and about 840FPS, according to Paul Harrell's video, through the Ruger OA, the balls broke the front ribs, did damage to the oranges, and made it through the rear ribs, coming to rest in the shirts. With your 25 grains, I'm guessing it would have penetrated the first rack of ribs, made it into the oranges, but bounced off the rear ribs. Which of course is still plenty of damage.

 

[Bad Karma]

I wonder how the jugs compare to the "meat targets". With 30 grains and about 840FPS, according to Paul Harrell's video, through the Ruger OA, the balls broke the front ribs, did damage to the oranges, and made it through the rear ribs, coming to rest in the shirts. With your 25 grains, I'm guessing it would have penetrated the first rack of ribs, made it into the oranges, but bounced off the rear ribs. Which of course is still plenty of damage.

I’d sure think it was “enough“ if it was my ribs the balls was bouncing off of…