Franco2shoot
Member
I finally got to the range yesterday and was anxious to try out the off-line bench loader instead of using the 1860 Uberti Remington. What a miserable experience. I first want to report that the Uberti does not like CCI #11's. I broke a long standing tester's rule and had gone from #10's to the 11's and that was a large part of my problem.
I should have known better, the Goex pellets were dropped in 6 holes, then a wonder wad felt circle, and finally the ball. The bench loader did not fit precisely and shaved off a little brass from its ram, but I didn't think much of this. Where I really went wrong was in pressing the ball down. It is one thing to do it on the 1860 frame, you can feel when the lever has fully seated the ball. This same feel and look are different for a free standing loader. As it turned out most of the balls were not fully seated. Then the cap issue swung in. I put the poorly loaded cylinder into the frame, then pushed on #11 caps. I seated these with a seperate dowel, so I know the caps were fully seated. First shot, resulted in a fizzle, with caps dropping off, now I had copper caps jambed in behind the cylinder. I used a small pocket knife, and finally removed the cylinder. This time I squished caps and replaced the fallen off ones with fresh 11's, carefully placing the cylinder back in. Again a fizzle, on number 1, 2 went off no joy on 3, or 4, but 5 and 6 went off. It was at this point that I realized something was not right. The caps were not exploding and falling out. Number 10's, when they go off, expand outwards such that you have pieces of copper that falls to the ground. The 11's would expand but not self destruct, as such they would wedge in the cylinder backing making it nearly impossible to remove the cylinder. After lots of prying and poking with the small knife, I pulled the cylinder back out and tried to re-press the ball in the 3 remaining. I also switched to #10's, which would go bang but not ignite the Goex. I pulled the cylinder back out and used a pick to clear the nipples. After 3 more tries I finally got all shots to fire in the cylinder.
I am guessing that the start of my problems was in not fully compressing the ball down onto the wad and Goex, and that the 11's were also a mis-match that only made things worse.
When I switched to the Pietta Colt, I used the #10's and the pistol's loader. I also used the dowel to fully seat the caps. On firing the Colt every shot went off on the first hammer fall, and this was a pleasant surprise since it would usually mis fire at least 2 shots in the past. The difference being that yesterday I pressed the caps down firmly using the dowel.
For the future, I am going to load the Remington using the pistol's loader, then remove the cylinder and place it in the bench loader. I plan to take some red enamal paint and place the ram down on the ball then mark the position on the brass ram so I have an indication of just how far down the loader should be when correctly pressed. Any other tips would be greatly appreciated.
KKKKFL
I should have known better, the Goex pellets were dropped in 6 holes, then a wonder wad felt circle, and finally the ball. The bench loader did not fit precisely and shaved off a little brass from its ram, but I didn't think much of this. Where I really went wrong was in pressing the ball down. It is one thing to do it on the 1860 frame, you can feel when the lever has fully seated the ball. This same feel and look are different for a free standing loader. As it turned out most of the balls were not fully seated. Then the cap issue swung in. I put the poorly loaded cylinder into the frame, then pushed on #11 caps. I seated these with a seperate dowel, so I know the caps were fully seated. First shot, resulted in a fizzle, with caps dropping off, now I had copper caps jambed in behind the cylinder. I used a small pocket knife, and finally removed the cylinder. This time I squished caps and replaced the fallen off ones with fresh 11's, carefully placing the cylinder back in. Again a fizzle, on number 1, 2 went off no joy on 3, or 4, but 5 and 6 went off. It was at this point that I realized something was not right. The caps were not exploding and falling out. Number 10's, when they go off, expand outwards such that you have pieces of copper that falls to the ground. The 11's would expand but not self destruct, as such they would wedge in the cylinder backing making it nearly impossible to remove the cylinder. After lots of prying and poking with the small knife, I pulled the cylinder back out and tried to re-press the ball in the 3 remaining. I also switched to #10's, which would go bang but not ignite the Goex. I pulled the cylinder back out and used a pick to clear the nipples. After 3 more tries I finally got all shots to fire in the cylinder.
I am guessing that the start of my problems was in not fully compressing the ball down onto the wad and Goex, and that the 11's were also a mis-match that only made things worse.
When I switched to the Pietta Colt, I used the #10's and the pistol's loader. I also used the dowel to fully seat the caps. On firing the Colt every shot went off on the first hammer fall, and this was a pleasant surprise since it would usually mis fire at least 2 shots in the past. The difference being that yesterday I pressed the caps down firmly using the dowel.
For the future, I am going to load the Remington using the pistol's loader, then remove the cylinder and place it in the bench loader. I plan to take some red enamal paint and place the ram down on the ball then mark the position on the brass ram so I have an indication of just how far down the loader should be when correctly pressed. Any other tips would be greatly appreciated.
KKKKFL
