Installing Musket Nipple in TC Rifle.

When possible I like to have musket nipples installed on my BP rifles. I prefer the extra umph to ensure reliable ignition.

Recently I picked up 2-3 TC Hawken style rifles but wasn't able to find the nipples in local stores in a 250 mile circumference from my house. I know I could have internetted them but wasn't yet that desperate. Walked into a gun shop in Salmon Idaho while out that way fly fishing and camping off the back of a Road King and ran across them.



CCI Musket Cap and nipple on left. #11 cap and nipple on right. Respective cappers in background for scale.



From the business end: Musket Nipple on left. #11 Nipple on right.



Installed Musket nipple:



Seats and lines up nicely on this .45 cal TC:



For in shop work a good selection of decommissioned dental instruments comes in very handy for cleaning out nipples and nipple drum/flash channel.

I've only ever used one brand of Caps and that's CCI. Probably because I've never been close to a dedicated Muzzle Loader shop and use the CCI's because that's all SW carries



I have over the years used different musket nipples. I just went out to the shop and took some pics. Here are 3 different types of musket Nipples I was able to find easily by rummaging around.

L to R: Traditions, a no name brand and Thompson. Easy to see the slight difference in each nipples taper.



This pic is of all three caps being placed where I first felt resistance to the cap. Note how high up the Traditions Cap sits.



This pic doesn't show it to well but that last 1/16 inch or less push on the Thompson and no name brand firmly seats the cap on each of them. Kinda has the same feel as seating a primer and you know its where it needs to be. No way that will fall of in hammer at half cock in a hunting situation. But, notice how high up the cap sits on the Traditions musket nipple. That seating depth took a little bit more force than I'm comfortable with just to get it to that point. Will it fall off. Highly doubt it, but there's some space between the cap and the nipple. I think I put that same style nipple on a CVA Kentucky in 50 cal. I'll go later and look at that and see if its the same gap on the gun. If so, I might dremel the sides down evenly to ensure the cap sits on the nipple top so that it acts like the anvil it is without the space issue as noted in the pic.