Home Made Percussion Caps

[rfcbuf]

Heard some folks discussing percussion caps for rifles and pistols being made from pieces of aluminum pop cans filled with toy pistol caps or other material??? glued in the home made cap cavity.

Fact or fiction? If fact, please describe how the caps are made.

 

[n.h.schmidt]

Fact
Forester make something called Tap O Cap. Its a hand unit that cuts and forms percussion cap cups from pop cans.I have a much older model that works on a reloading press . Getting good toy pistol caps is a problem today. The best I can find is Super Bang. Even then ,I have to be selective in the dots I use.
n.h.schmidt

 

[Kadmos]

http://www.beartoothbullets.com/open_sight/archive_open_sight.htm/9

A review on the product.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Fact. The "Tap-O-Cap" is, or was, available from DGW and others for about $30.00 some 5 years ago. The kit was used to make #11 caps out of pop/beer aluminium cans and caps from toy guns. The only one I ever saw made caps of "questionable" quality and the guy who used it said it was reliable about 80% of the time. IF Dixie still handles them there may be some reviews on their site. Think I'll stick with store bought. :wink:

 

[renovato]

I had the Tap O Cap years ago and I was underwhelmed. You had to stack several caps to get enough fire and it was still highly unreliable. I tinkered with different brands of capgun caps as I could find them and never did find any that made them as reliable as a percussion cap. To me, it was an exercise in frustration and totally not worth the effort.

 

[CoyoteJoe]

I might add that the toy cap composition is extremely corrosive. I have used the plastic ring caps. You have to cut the individual caps free of the ring but they fit a #10 or #11 nipple just fine and will fire a charge "most of the time". But if your gun has a really heavy hammer fall it will drive the soft plastic down into the nipple.

 

[Old J L]

:shake: From these replies, home-made caps do not look promising - but has anyone thought about carefully substituting small bits of the white tips of strike-anywhere matches?? (Are strike-anywhere matches still made ??)
I'm reluctant to share this with younger generations, but if you're reading this, you're probably not a detonation-dummy. In elementary school (1936-1941), we cut off the tips and compressed 6 or so in a heavy steel nut between 3/4" dia bolts slowly screwed in from either side! Hurled against the brick side of the schoolhouse - BOOM! Today, cops would be there in 3 mins. Don't ask me how, but often one of the bolts would fly loose. Don't ask me, either, how we survived those dumb stunts.

 

[Jimbo453]

Well friends I do make caps with a Tap o Cap tool and they do work (I have tried ring caps also ) why you may ask just buy the factory made caps ?
There will come a time when they wont be available and ill be ready ! I still buy caps but just wanted to be able to shoot my guns if I couldnt get caps

 

[Coot]

Given the "politically correct" climate that we live in today, I would not be surprised to see the toy caps disappear from the market before the real percussion caps do. :hmm:

 

[Tinker2]

I have a Tap O Cap, it works if you want to go the trouble.
It works better if your percussion nipples are worn out with a larger hole.


I have a A22. muzzle loading rifle made by Rocky Mountain .22 caliber.
It was made for a cap gun cap to fire the black powder load.
http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/...9557/post/235400/hl/RMAC/fromsearch/1/#235400


Tinker2

 

[redwing]

Very true. When states like Arkansas, California, New York Etc. are banning toy guns the caps will go. These bans in Left Wing states are moving under the radar. :shake: