Capper

[Noz]

Has anyone successfully altered a snail type capper to work on a Remington 1858?

[Dick Dastardly]

No, I didn't do that, but I did make a fine capper on my lathe.  Took a good piece of hard maple and turned a piece about as large as a medium screwdriver handle with a smooth concave taper on one end.  Then, I drilled it to just hold a #11 cap.  My big hands can easily pick up a cap and put it in the drilled recess and with the wood tool I can easily istall the cap on the cylinder with no danger of setting it off.

DD-DLoS

[Hell-Er High Water]

NR,

If you go back in this forum to a subject titled "Capping - worth using an in-line capper or not?" that was started in November of 2004, you will see photos and comments on modifing the Remington cylinder at the nipple recesses so that an in-line capper can be used with no problem.  I have done this to 3 1858's and a standard in-line capper works just great on all of them.

Take a look at this and maybe this is a better solution to your problem, I know it solved my problems.

HHW

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[Cuts Crooked]

I've moved the thread about cappers to The Dark Arts room. I'm going to have to do some editing to remove the BS posts but it's a good one to be saved fer posterity! Thanx to HRHW fer reminding me of the existance of that thread!

[Noz]

I love the "Dark Arts" archive. I thought I had read every word of it but missed the part about cylinder mods. I'll do that, buy a snail capper and be on my way. It's harder for me to load an inline capper than it is to finger load the cylinder.

[sundance44`s]

Cuts i gotta ask what brand caps were you useing when you had one go off and mangle your thumb ?
after seeing the pic you posted it got me thinking my wife caps her own pistols and if that were to happen to her purdy little thumb she would probally never shoot again ...so i`m half way undecided to show her the picture .. maybe i`ll just do her capping for her from now on .
Anyway i thought i might ought to see just what it would take to set my caps off while capping a remmie cylinder .. so i took a cylinder out and pushed one of my #10 remington caps on a nipple rather hard ..but after seeing your picture i didn`t really even want a cap only going off under my thumb ..so i used the blunt end of my pocket knife and pushed as hard as i could .. nothing happened ..so i started to tap on the cap getting harder with each tap .. still nothing i`m just tapping the cap out of shape it`s all deformed now and still not going off ... so i try another one .. still noting .. so i`m thinking maybe some caps are more sensitive than others ? I know things just seem to happen when we least expect it .. so i`m by no way saying remington caps won`t go off when capping ... i`m sure it could happen ..... and i`m not going to let the wife cap her pistols anymore .... Thanks for posting the pic .. one pic is worth a thousand words !

[Howdy Doody]

Well, before the rules change, I was one of those that got a cap on a nipple and then seated them with the hammer. Since that is no longer allowed, I tried a snail on ROAs and the stick cappers on Remmies and decided to just get some of the stick cappers. I like them enough I guess, except I cannot use them for #11 Rem caps, as they are too short and turn sideways on me, which is alright anyway, because it is no problem to stick with #10 Rem caps.
I had a good pard give me a nifty device he made. In fact he gave out several at a big shoot not long ago. He took antelope horn and drilled and epoxied a 90 degree pointed metal piece into the one end of the tool and the other cut off flat. The pick end is great for prying off spent caps and the other end will seat caps onto the nipples. He put a lanyard on it too. I made myself a pouch that is fashioned along the lines of a medicine bag that I string around my neck on a piece of leather lanyard. I can put both the pick/seating tool and my stick capper in there and they are both handy to grab when needed. I like the type capper with the two fingers of steel to hold the cap. They seem to work the best for me.

[Mason Stillwell]

On the 58  Remington's one has to remove a small amount of material from around the nipp area on the cylinder. I have a spare cylinder and I have started this improvement. It will work and is not noticeable unless you are a 58 expert LOL

Mason

[Cuts Crooked]

Sundance,

Sent ya a PM.

[sundance44`s]

Mason i used my dremmel and a small sanding drum to make the relif on all 4 of my remmies around the nipples .. How nice ..easy too once ya get one done the others don`t take no time ..nice rainy day project . Now a snail type capper works on mine or even capping with the fingers is much faster too like a breeze .. can`t beleive i waited so long to make this improvement .I started with my Pietta i knew i could buy a new cylinder for 34 bucks at Cabelas if i messed it up .. only problem now last time at the range i shot 100 round balls in no time .. between the great cylinder loading stand .. and now a snail capper that holds 100 caps . I never thought i could have made such drastic improvements in my Remmie shooting .Who said ya can`t teach an old dog new tricks .

[Noz]

I got the Dremel tool out last night and did the cylinder mod on both guns. Too simple, too easy. Why didn't I think of that!  I had already bought 3 different cappers. One broke on about the 3rd or 4th cap, one bent on the second cylinder and one works after modification.
Now any of them will work.
Any experience on which snail capper is the best?

[sundance44`s]

I have 2 Ted Cash snail cappers i use alot they are both still in great shape . I think they are worth the extra bucks ..over the cheaper ones i`ve seen .