how do you stop chain fire?????

[farmallcrew]

I seen on YouTube about people putting crisco on their cap and ball pistols to prevent a chain fire. Then seen some people put a was over the ball.

What is the best method of loading for a cap and ball revolver.
Yes yes, powder, wad, ball.

But is there advantages to dry or lubed wad?

I kind of want to remain clean playing with the c&b. For my single shot .45 Jukar I have prelubed patches.

Could I just use a patch instead of a was in the revolver?

I'm getting the revolver aspect more since I got the revolver that was in swappin and sellin auction a few weeks ago.

Thanks guys in advance.

[tomme boy]

I used a prelubed wad. I also wiped a thin amount of lube on the face of the cylinder. Also, don't use #11 caps. Use the #10's like you are supposed to. I had a chain fire once and it was from the caps. Not the front end.

[farmallcrew]

Learn me on caps too. I've had a lot of percussion guns and I've always used #11's. Why use #10's?

Are 11's like a magnum cap compared to 10's?

[Czech_too]

I'm curious about the #10 caps now too. Not to high-jack the OP, but I picked up a used Pietta which, as I understand it, has nipples sized for #10's. I'm replacing them with some AMPCO sized for #11 so that I don't have two sizes to deal with.

[Flinchrock]

The size of the nipple determines the size of the cap.
They need to fit snug without squeezing, but all the way on.
Most chainfires DO originate from the nipple end!

[Mike Brooks]

Crisco over the ball is not to prevent chain fires but to provide lube. All chainfires are from poorly fitting caps, considering you are using the correct ball diameter.

[farmallcrew]

Yea I will be using correct ball. Also getting a mold for it.

Right now all I have is number 11 caps. I'll take it to the gun shop and seen if I can twist his arm to see if the nipples have been switched. Possibly open a can of #10's to see.

If it is #10's and I want to convert it to #11. Can I just use any #11 nipple or is there specific ones for revolvers?

[RhodeHunter]

Treso nipples are supposed to fit the #10 the best. Although my stock Pietta nipples seem to fit the #10 fine. The other advantage to the Treso are the smaller opening inside, which would allow you to soften the hammer mainspring, which fast shooter like to do.

You are going to need six nipples and they have to match the correct thread gage and pitch, and metric vs standard, etc. The Pietta is a metric thread.

[Omnivore]

Search around a bit and you'll find a detailed article by a guy who claims to have scientifically proven, beyond doubt, the cause and cure of chain fire.

In short, he concludes that "clean loading" will cure it completely. By clean loading he means no powder granules on the face or mouth of the cylinder, which are then dragged and crushed into a very fine powder "pathway" around the ball into the chamber. Pour your powder cleanly down into the chamber and it's cured. He claims that grease over the ball makes practically zero difference, ball fit makes no difference so long as the ball is bigger than the chamber. Using wads helps though, mainly because the wads will swab the powder off the chamber mouth and wall before the ball goes in. "Clean loading" with or without wads makes no difference - he got no chainfires. Repeated firings with adjacent, loaded yet un-capped chambers fail to cause a chain fire, so long as "clean loading" is practiced, so he says he has proved that chainfires only occur by ignition from the chamber mouth. "Dirty loading" will cause a chain fire fairly often, with or without grease over the ball.

His claims, not mine. I don't know one way or the other because I've never had a chain fire. I have to take it as a matter of trust that they exist at all. I have had caps fall off while shooting, and so I can attest that missing caps on adjacent chambers have not caused a chain fire - not for me anyway, so I fail to see how a pinched-to-fit cap can be any worse.

I suppose that if you want to argue with any of his points you'll have to do the extensive tests, back and forth, over and over, that he claims to have done. Or else he is a very, very sophisticated liar (which is always possible for Homo Sapiens - look at politics) but unless he can be disproven I'll take him more or less at his word.

I would only add that a dinged chamber mouth (a burr) that cuts the ball smaller somewhere, than the chamber, leaving a small gap, might be another cause of chainfire. Cleanly chamfering your chamber mouths would seem to be a good preventative there.

Use the caps that fit and work best for you. they should hold on tight enough to stay put until they're fired, and not so tight that the hammer spends its energy seating the cap instead of firing it. That's about all there is to that. Caps will jam the action now and then (some guns are wose than others in this regard) but you get so you know how to deal with them. The worst cap jam is when a fired cap falls down into the lockwork as the hammer is cocked. If you can't shake it out, you have to dismount the action.

[longbow]

Wait a minute... you want to stay clean while shooting a cap and ball revolver!?!

[farmallcrew]

When I said I want to stay clean when I'm shooting is in, I don't want to be dealing with crisco or oily things that will attract powder to my fingers and get the gun all greased up.

I love the smell of burn black powder in the morning as much as the next fella. Lol

[DIRT Farmer]

The best way to stay clean shooting black powder guns is to wear black clothes.

There are many theries about what causes chain fires. All I know is that 40 plus years ago I was tought to use a moderate load of powder, corn meal filler to the chamber mouth load a proper size pure lead ball that shaves a ring of lead and use the correct size caps for the nipple. We bought either #10 or #11 revolver caps which were shorter than regular caps generaly RWS or the Dixie Italian caps that were crossive as salt.
In answer to your question there are now 3 sizes of caps avatible The smallest are #10. In #11 you can get standard and magum and musket, the largest

[uscra112]

Got a Ruger Old Army. If the balls are properly sized they shave lead when seated, so a chain fire at the front end seems unlikely, espcially since I also use a felt wad. BUT, that end has a lot more flame around it when fired, so I'm careful to butter up my chambers after they're loaded anyhoo. Keep a tube of Bore Butter in my pocket for that.

Ruger calls for #10 caps. Had some plastic sleeves that were sold to put on over the caps - alleged to keep them tight and prevent flashover, but they caused 50% misfires, so I don't use them now.

I find it a PITA to get the #10 caps fully home on the nipples of the ROA. That also causes frequent misfires. I've taken to using the screwdriver blade of my Swiss Army knife and prying gingerly against the flash shield to seat them. Seems dangerous, but it's the only solution I've found to get the gun to fire reliably.

[RobsTV]

I started out with lubed wads, sometimes mixed the step of adding grease over top of ball, skipping lube wads, using unlubed wads, different locations of wads, and once I switched to using lube discs and no wads, everything fell into place perfectly.

Try BP lube thin discs. Melt some BP lube into a thin layer in a pan, then use cookie cutter (45-70 brass for my original 1858 Remington 44 New Army) to cut out the semi-hard thin discs, which then fully harden a few minutes later and are ready for use. Load powder then ball, no fiber wads, and top it off by pressing one of the thin hard lube discs over ball. No mess, never any leading, and results in best accuracy.

[Flinchrock]

I started out with lubed wads, sometimes mixed the step of adding grease over top of ball, skipping lube wads, using unlubed wads, different locations of wads, and once I switched to using lube discs and no wads, everything fell into place perfectly.

Try BP lube thin discs. Melt some BP lube into a thin layer in a pan, then use cookie cutter (45-70 brass for my original 1858 Remington 44 New Army) to cut out the semi-hard thin discs, which then fully harden a few minutes later and are ready for use. Load powder then ball, no fiber wads, and top it off by pressing one of the thin hard lube discs over ball. No mess, never any leading, and results in best accuracy.

How do you carry them in your pocket?? or at the range? or anywhere else for that matter?

[Sergeant Earthworm]

farmallcrew, there are lots of shooters who put grease of one form or another over the ball. I find that doing so is very messy and after the cylinder warms up whatever you are using just melts thereby increasing the mess factor. I don't grease (crisco, borebutter, whatever, and I know a guy who uses wheel bearing grease) the cylinders and have never had a chain fire. My opinion is that making sure the ball is seated directly over the cylinder to get a nice ring of shaved lead is the best way to seal the cylinder.

I also use a lightly lubed felt over powder wad which I consider cheap insurance and helps to prevent leading since the burning powder doesn't melt the ball as well. I am intrigued by Omnivore's post to the effect that as you are loading, the wad swabs the inside of the cylinder clean of any powder dust. Never thought of that but it makes sense. I've heard people say that too much lube on the wad has the potential for fouling the powder, but that shouldn't be a concern unless you are using gobs of lube.

As for the patched ball idea, I can't see how that would work in a revolver. Single shot handguns and long guns are designed to use patched balls, not so with revolvers which is why revolvers are designed to use balls that are larger than cylinder diameter, the shaved ball sealing the cylinder.

I agree with the majority view, using caps that don't fit tightly on the nipples is the probable cause of most chain fires. When the revolver is fired, a good bit of burning powder gas is vented through the nipple. If the neighboring cap is loose allowing burning gas to enter, voila, chain fire.

[OverMax]

Remington #10 caps fit the best & tightest.
When using a patch lube on the wad. It helps soften the B/Ps residue/crud to ease reloading and latter for totall crud removal during cleaning.

O/M

[fouronesix]

Cleanliness, tidiness when loading, shooting and cleaning BP? Next, someone will be selling BP specific latex gloves and disposable coveralls. To the best of my knowledge neither BP fouling nor Crisco are hazardous to the fingers :)

As to lube on top of the seated ball in C&B. It can help in at least a few ways: help prevent chain fire, lube the ball as it starts into the bore, lube the cylinder pin and helps keep the fouling soft as it builds up between the cylinder and the frame. I've found at the very least it doesn't hurt anything.

[Sergeant Earthworm]

Cleanliness, tidiness when loading, shooting and cleaning BP? Next, someone will be selling BP specific latex gloves and disposable coveralls. To the best of my knowledge neither BP fouling nor Crisco are hazardous to the fingers :)

As to lube on top of the seated ball in C&B. It can help in at least a few ways: help prevent chain fire, lube the ball as it starts into the bore, lube the cylinder pin and helps keep the fouling soft as it builds up between the cylinder and the frame. I've found at the very least it doesn't hurt anything.

Yes, but, using Crisco to lube your BP revolver may increase your cholesterol level... [smilie=1:

[telebasher]

Just a quick tip, I carry a plastic jar of those disposable baby wipes in my shooting box. Makes for a quick wipedown of hands and or gun.

[John in WI]

The best way to stay clean shooting black powder guns is to wear black clothes.


Ha! Hard to argue with that logic!

[RobsTV]

How do you carry them in your pocket?? or at the range? or anywhere else for that matter?

"..Try BP lube thin discs..."

These carry the same as the round balls, caps and powder. They harden to about the same consistency as a crayon. Has to be that way here in hot Florida, and all by BP lube (bought on ebay by the brick) is hard lube. The lube discs made with 45-70 brass as a cutter are nearly identical size to normal commercial wads I used to carry, but a tad thinner. With BP shooting I carry a very small tackle box that I keep all the loading supplies and tools in.

This method also greatly increased shooting ability between cleanings. Using lubed wads, plain wads, grease, moist lube, etc, all yielded only about 3 cylinders before the cylinder would start to get tough to turn. Switching to hard lube discs only and now I am done shooting before the gun is. I don't do this in fear of chain fire, but to improve overall performance, with possible chainfire elimination an added bonus.

Something else not mentioned that will affect all of this is powder used. Switching to real BP is the first major step. 777 and pyrodex suck. (free leftovers FTF). But, this is when using my 155 year old revolver, and perhaps modern era replicas might work better with the fake stuff.

Edit: Flinchrock, see your location is also same, so you might see me shooting this at HSC.

[Mike Brooks]

Ditto, lots of lube keeps those guns running for as long as you care to shoot them.....I like them sloppy greasy from the nipples forward. and ditto on 777 and pyroducks, crappy stuff when compared to the real thing.

[blixen]

I found my chain fires disappeared when I got quality nipples and the right sized nipples. The two chain fires I had seemed to be caused by sparks getting into unfired cylinders through the nipples after the unfired caps fell off italian nipples.

If you have a nice lead ring--you shouldn't get sparks past the balls.

BTW, I don't make lube pills. I just use a popsicle stick to smear a pill-sized goober of lube into the cylinder between the ball and powder. It's less of a hassle and inconsistencies in the amount of lube don't seem to influence accuracy that much.

[Flinchrock]

"..Try BP lube thin discs..."

These carry the same as the round balls, caps and powder. They harden to about the same consistency as a crayon. Has to be that way here in hot Florida, and all by BP lube (bought on ebay by the brick) is hard lube. The lube discs made with 45-70 brass as a cutter are nearly identical size to normal commercial wads I used to carry, but a tad thinner. With BP shooting I carry a very small tackle box that I keep all the loading supplies and tools in.

This method also greatly increased shooting ability between cleanings. Using lubed wads, plain wads, grease, moist lube, etc, all yielded only about 3 cylinders before the cylinder would start to get tough to turn. Switching to hard lube discs only and now I am done shooting before the gun is. I don't do this in fear of chain fire, but to improve overall performance, with possible chainfire elimination an added bonus.

Something else not mentioned that will affect all of this is powder used. Switching to real BP is the first major step. 777 and pyrodex suck. (free leftovers FTF). But, this is when using my 155 year old revolver, and perhaps modern era replicas might work better with the fake stuff.

Edit: Flinchrock, see your location is also same, so you might see me shooting this at HSC.

Yeah,,I get up to HSC once in a while, I'm the semi crippled guy shooting the M1A...

Now that you explained the hardness of your lube discs, it makes a bit more sense.

Awhile back I used felt wads soaked in beeswax and lard over the powder, found it to be more trouble than not.
Went back to just slobbing the lard on top of the balls.

I might try making up some of those discs using a hard mix of wax and lard, or mink oil and wax, or bear oil and wax, or deer tallow and wax, see what ya started...

[uscra112]

Anybody tried dental wax? BP cartridge guys use it as an over-powder wad. Comes in sheets. Bought a box on evilBay a few months ago for a trial come spring.

[John Taylor]

I always hear guys talking about the ring of lead shaved off the ball as being a good thing. I got tired of having little pieces of lead hanging on in the lube so went a different rout, I polished the sharp edge of the chamber so the ball swedges into the chamber without shaving lead.
I have had only one chain fire and that was with an original 1858, the chamber at 6 o-clock went off and the ball was stuck to the loading lever. This happened about 35 years ago and I have done quite a bit of shooting sense then.

[Ohio Rusty]

I always use a lubed felt wad under the ball and tight fitting caps on the niples. Never had a chain fire yet.
Ohio Rusty ><>

[Maven]

It seems that Mike Brooks' advice has been given short shrift. If you want to prevent chain fires, heed his admonition: "Crisco over the ball is not to prevent chain fires but to provide lube. All chainfires are from poorly fitting caps, considering you are using the correct ball diameter." Btw, the Bevel Bros., writing in "Muzzle Blasts" (NMLRA publication) researched chain firing and were able to reproduce that occurrence on demand. In essence, they reaffirmed what Mike said.

[Omnivore]

How do you stop chain fire?
Hmm, well they happen so quickly it would be darned near impossible to stop. :)

[Omnivore]

Perfectly reasonable, plausible theories are one thing. Evidence is another. Experience often produces evidence, yet sometimes it may be misinterpreted or missed altogether. Proof on the other hand is something altogether different. Proof comes from results that can be repeated on demand by uninterested parties. That's all I'm sayin'.

[Sergeant Earthworm]

Perfectly reasonable, plausible theories are one thing. Evidence is another. Experience often produces evidence, yet sometimes it may be misinterpreted or missed altogether. Proof on the other hand is something altogether different. Proof comes from results that can be repeated on demand by uninterested parties. That's all I'm sayin'.

Yes, but, without empirical data one must go with the best information they have, don't you agree? In this case, it appears the consensus among shooters is that loose fitting caps is the major culprit. It also seems fairly obvious that it is going to be awfully difficult to tell just exactly what happened after the fact because the chain fire is going to blow the caps off the discharged cylinders.

Although I have never experienced a chain fire, it seems fairly certain that someone using #11 caps on nipples made for #10s is asking for an exciting day at the range. Maybe what we need here is research with different guns and different methods with lots of rounds fired to see what really works and what is unnecessary.

Another thing I do wonder about is how chain fires were avoided in the Civil War era, when cartridges of nitrated paper containing powder and ball were inserted into the cylinder. You would think chain fires would have been commonplace but in all my years of reading about the war I don't ever recall reading about a chain fire in combat.