Shooting cap and ball with paper cartridges

[rebsr52339]

Will Lees footed bullets load as is with lube into an 1860, .36 or .44 cal C&B? I see they have three of them.

[Professor Marvel]

Will Lees footed bullets load as is with lube into an 1860, .36 or .44 cal C&B? I see they have three of them.

Greetings My Dear Monsieur Rebsr -

In this instance, I need to fall back upon my trademarked answer "It Depends" ™

"It Depends" ™ upon the diameter of the  mouths of "the  chambers of your cylinders" .
In my Piettas Remmies, the base of the .36 Lee conicalc ( ~.370 ) fits the  chambers  fine
In my Pietta Remmie .44 the base of the Lee .44 conical fits as well

I have not yet tried the .44 conical in my old ASM 1860.

thus it would be wise to slug all your chambers as  "your milage may vary"

If you choose to make traditional paper cartridges (back on topic) the added thickness of the paper may or may not matter for you.

hope this helps
prof marvel

[rebsr52339]

Thank you. It does.

[Drayton Calhoun]

Mike, I always enjoy your articles in GOTOW and thanks for the Facebook updates.

[triple w]

This was a lot of fun. One of our readers sent me some of his combustible paper cartridges to test.

Great stuff Mike, in fact, I was so impressed I went out and added a London 1851 to my collection!! Can't wait to shoot'r

(anyone know where I can get 50-100 .36 conical bullets to try my hand at makeing some of these?)

TW

[Drayton Calhoun]

Dixie used to sell a booklet on making combustible cartridges. It has the template and dimensions for shaping wooden dowels for the forms and instructions on nitrating the paper.

[Bottom Dealin Mike]

Drayton,

Was the Dixie book for revolver cartridges? Years ago I made .54 caliber Sharps paper cartridges using a kit they sold.

[triple w]

Looks like they still list it.

BK2067 Self Consuming Paper Cartridges for the Percussion Revolver $4.95
Written by W.J. Kirst. Lists materials and step by step illustrated instructions on how to make the cartridges, and loading and shooting instructions. Soft cover, 5 ½ X 8 ½, 7 pages. Mr. Kirst has graciously donated his royalties from this booklet to the National Muzzle Loading Rifle Association's Gunmaker's Hall. Pioneer Press will send as additional ten percent, matching Kirst's royalties, to the same fund.

https://www.dixiegunworks.com/product_info.php?products_id=1759&osCsid=a9f5a006431f2f4721bcd341c768d8d9

[Drayton Calhoun]

Yep, that's the one TripleW. I picked it up about twenty years or so ago.

[SGT John Chapman]

I posted this here a LONG time ago and it dissapeared but THE OPEN RANGE still has it,....the "Envelope" on those rounds are too big they should drop right to the bullet when they are inserted into the cyl. you should not have to push them.
I use the Lee mould because I think the modern rams are shaped for balls and not traditional conicals. I think the underside of the original rams were shaped more for the conicals but I can't prove it because as of yet I have had no access to an original.

http://www.theopenrange.net/forum/index.php?topic=326.0

[Mako]

,....the "Envelope" on those rounds are too big they should drop right to the bullet when they are inserted into the cyl. you should not have to push them.

You are so right Sgt.,

If you look at any of the original paper cartridges or even the boxes you can see they were short.  If you read accounts of the amount of BP in the cartridges it seems light compared to what many put in loose powder loads.

I used to attribute this to the fact they were using heavier bullets instead of balls until I found a box with a bunch of cartridges I made about 30 years ago.  I finally realized that the charges seemed light because a charge equivalent to a loose powder load wouldn't fit deeply enough in the chamber to allow it to go under the rammer.

As far as the backend of the rammer goes, I can tell you that the Uberti shape is similar to the two original 1860s I have.  I also have an original 1849, but the Uberti rammer on my reproduction is an odd radius.  It is less of an elliptical shape or a "bullet" shaped end, it is just a smaller radius.

1860 ARMY PLUNGER



I learned a lot about the rammer end shapes because when I was building the rammer plungers for my cylinder loader I was trying for a shape that would distort a ball the least during loading.  I found you are always going to distort a soft lead ball and that ultimately a radius greater than the ball radius "seemed" to make the least amount of distortion.  It was during this I measured the old Colt's rammers and found hey did have more of a bullet shape which is one of the reasons we get that deep ring depression when we seat balls with the barrel mounted rammer.  The rammer hits the balls around the periphery of the rammer instead of the face.

I'm assuming that Colt's made their rammer faces to accept either the bullets or the balls at least as far back as 1853 (the 1849), the shape would help keep a bullet from tipping during seating.

You said that you thought modern plungers were shaped for balls and not bullets, which models are you speaking of?  Obviously on later models Colt's was designing the loading area to accommodate the bullets which had come into vogue by the late 1850s.  The 1860, 1861 and the 1862 Pocket Police are a testament to that.  They opened the underlug up to allow any of the bullets of the day to fit under the rammer.

~Mako

[SGT John Chapman]

Sorry I didn't specify,....Most of what I have delt with is the Pietta guns and an ASM 3rd Model Military Dragoon....the ASM is shaped for conicals,...and that's what sent me thinking.....

[Mako]

SGT,
Are those Pietta Navy models?  I'm trying to determine if you're having problems with the newer style revolvers like the 1860 and 1861.  I find most Navy models except for the '61 have trouble with conicals period...  I have been working on a 130gr .36 caliber conical with a Big Lube groove for sometime now, the problem I run into is getting it to fit under all of the different manufacturers plungers.  Because it has a big groove it is longer than other 130gr. conicals.

The large frame dragoons have the clearance you need partially because of the size, but primarily because the cylinder was shortened from the original Walker length.  The frame was left the old Walker length and you get a nice gap between the barrel lug and the cylinder face.  I've never tried a paper cartridge in a Walker, but it might be tight as well.

Regards,
Mako

P.S. I like your work, the cartridges look good.

[SGT John Chapman]

Two, '58 Remingtons and a '62 Colt Sheriff,.. the '62 is from about 1987/88 the '58s are from 2001/2ish...
There's not really a problem I just shoot the LEE Conicals and they load and shoot real fine,....
How does the loading area on the originals compair?,.....Is it also small?....Yes,... the Dragoon has A LOT of space to load in....

[Mako]

Two, '58 Remingtons and a '62 Colt Sheriff,.. the '62 is from about 1987/88 the '58s are from 2001/2ish...
There's not really a problem I just shoot the LEE Conicals and they load and shoot real fine,....
How does the loading area on the originals compair?,.....Is it also small?....Yes,... the Dragoon has A LOT of space to load in....

Sgt,
My Remington has a lot of room, are yours .44 caliber or .36?  And I always get confused when talking about Pietta "model 62s," do you mean this pistol?



Since Pietta doesn't really make a 5 shot '62 I hear people calling them everything.  That is what is sold as a Sheriff's model '62, bu tit is really more of a Navy '61 with a shorter barrel.  If you are talking about that pistol I am surprised because it has the redesigned barrel geometry that appeared on the '60 and was carried over to the '61 and the actual smaller frame  '62 Police pocket pistol shown below.


On the Remington '58s and the Pietta pistols built on the '61 platform I would have thought you had enough room to get a paper cartridge in.

This is very interesting and useful for me, because as I said I am trying to get just a conical bullet without the cartridge under the loading plunger of a majority of the Navy models out there.  Anything you can tell me helps me in that effort.

Regards,
Mako

[SGT John Chapman]

Yes,....Mine's the 6 shooter called a "62 Sheriff"..... It has enough room for the DGW 135gr 36cal Colt Conical mould I have but the ram is rounded for a ball,.....so I shoot mostly balls in it ...
My '58s are 44s and they do have the room for a pointed conical but the ram is rounded for the ball that's why I use the LEE Conicals in them,....



My 31cal Remington Pocket Pistol has barely enough room to get the right size ball in it so I load the cylinders outside the gun....




The ASM Colt 3rd Model Dragoon has enough room for whatever I can fit into it and the ram IS cut for pointed conicals,....in fact I can load slugs from a Lyman 452484 mould for 225-230gr 45 ACP,....it's the same as the 452374 but it's cut for a gas check and lends it's self to starting well becaues of that.   

[Mako]

Sgt,
Thanks for sharing, that's all cool stuff.  

I can tell you my Uberti Navy models have a plunger that resembles the Army model one I showed above.  There is a limit to how deep they can be though.  If you look at yours you will probably see there is "lead-in" like I show on the illustration above to guide the plunger in if it isn't aligned.  With the .36 caliber diameter once you add the lead and a flat there isn't much room for a deep conical feature.

~Mako

[SGT John Chapman]

So are you making these loaders you talked of earlier to sell?

[kurt250]

stg.chapman, how do you make the small boxes for the combustable pistol cartridges?thanks, kurt250

[SGT John Chapman]

I bought a crafters tool that makes folds,.....  I cut a box pattern I made and fold it,...I tape the corners with the Craft paper tape you wet to stick. Then I load it up and tape the two ends and last edge...AS you put the last end of tape on put your pull string in tie a double knot in the end and put it in the back corner of the box and put the tape piece on trapping the string and bring the string on the outside to the front corner,......then run it across the side opposite the fold and tape over it, last put the opposite end on and run the string along the outside to the back corner,...I hold it in place with the spray glue.........after that I wrap the whole box... spray it with 3m spray glue and wrap it with an off white paper,....then I put a label I made off an original on it,......takes more time to tell than to do it,....

Most of the originals you see are an orange color,....they started out off white to tan colored,...a collodion glue that seals the outside turns orange/sienna colored as it ages. This is why mine are tan/off white....