Pietta 1863 Pocket Remington issues

[kh54]

Greetings all! I have two 1863 pocket Remingtons. (No, I don't need two, but you know how these things happen.) I took one to the range and found that it misfired (no cap detonation) on nearly every shot. I cycled through a couple of times and one or two finally went off but I still had to unload a couple of chambers. I could see where the hammer had struck the caps so I thought there might have been a problem with them, but on that day I didn't have another revolver with me to experiment.

At home I first tried caps on my other 1863 but had the same results. Now convinced that my caps were bad, I loaded caps on a full-size Colt and all six popped off without a problem. I did that twice to be sure. So now I'm thinking that the main spring on the Pietta pocket Remi just isn't strong enough to pop those caps. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any adjustment possible, at least none is obvious to me, a novice. I thought of drilling and tapping a tensioning spring, but before I do anything that drastic, I want to ask opinions here. I already thought about replacing nipples and just to be sure the nipples weren't the problem I tried backing out a couple and popping caps again. I did that with both guns. The result was the same, so I'm fairly convinced that the spring is the issue.

So, what do y'all think is going on? Anyone else have similar experiences with this otherwise nice little gun? Is my assessment correct? Are there simpler fixes? I welcome any and all comments!

 

[Phil Coffins]

The hard part about gunsmithing is to understand what the problem is before fixing the gun. Something like changing tires because the brakes don’t work, that is expensive and didn’t help the brakes.

 

[Rich44]

I agree with your findings. Since you have made sure the hammer is making contact with the nipple by backing a couple out, that does not leave much left other than the hammer force. Which is controlled by the spring. You might find you can feel the difference between the smaller and full size.

 

[CaptainVane]

I saw utube, Blackie Thomas doubled up the spring. I have ‘48 Colt Wells Fargo. I ordered a new spring from VTI, seven bucks, after doubling the spring it was so stiff I couldn’t pull hammer back.
So i put on just the new one. Haven’t been to range yet to test but the new one seems stronger. Mine is a 2004 so after 20 years maybe it got weak.

 

[kh54]

I saw utube, Blackie Thomas doubled up the spring. I have ‘48 Colt Wells Fargo. I ordered a new spring from VTI, seven bucks, after doubling the spring it was so stiff I couldn’t pull hammer back.
So i put on just the new one. Haven’t been to range yet to test but the new one seems stronger. Mine is a 2004 so after 20 years maybe it got weak.

I have been thinking about getting a new spring. I’ll check out VTI. Thanks for the tip!