Mr. Farknocker
Member
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2011
- Messages
- 120
I recently acquired an 1873 Springfield Trapdoor (.45-70) and fired my first rounds (handloads) through her this past week. The groupings were a lot better than I anticipated. However, upon close inspection of the spent cases, I noticed a series of dents (3 in particular) and scratches that uniformly appeared on all of the cases at the 6 o'clock position.
I cleaned out the bore and took a cleaning brush and vigorously scrubbed the chamber back and forth several times in an effort to dislodge debris or rust scale that may be the culprit but my efforts were to no avail as the dents continued to appear on the spent cases.
I then chambered a couple of loaded rounds and removed them to determine if the damage only occurred when the rounds are fired. When I extracted the loaded round, the cases showed galling but no dents as with the spent cases.
I managed to take a few photos of the chamber and was able to capture what appears to be three pronounced ridges in the chamber that matched the dents on the spent cases. The chamber looked heavily pitted but otherwise unremarkable except for the three ridges that could easily be seen.
I took a sharp pick and gently scraped the largest ridge (closest to the lens) to see if I could dislodge whatever was there but was unsuccessful. To my naked eye, the ridges appear to be formed by galling of the metal rather than rust but I can't tell without having the chamber inspected with a bore scope. My thoughts are to have the chamber inspected with a bore scope and if it is galling, to have the chamber gently reamed with a something like a flexhone of the correct dimension. Of course, this could be the wrong thing to do. Thus, i turn to all of you for your thoughts and opinions.
Has anyone had any similar experiences? Your comments/recommendations are welcomed.
TIA
~F
I cleaned out the bore and took a cleaning brush and vigorously scrubbed the chamber back and forth several times in an effort to dislodge debris or rust scale that may be the culprit but my efforts were to no avail as the dents continued to appear on the spent cases.
I then chambered a couple of loaded rounds and removed them to determine if the damage only occurred when the rounds are fired. When I extracted the loaded round, the cases showed galling but no dents as with the spent cases.
I managed to take a few photos of the chamber and was able to capture what appears to be three pronounced ridges in the chamber that matched the dents on the spent cases. The chamber looked heavily pitted but otherwise unremarkable except for the three ridges that could easily be seen.
I took a sharp pick and gently scraped the largest ridge (closest to the lens) to see if I could dislodge whatever was there but was unsuccessful. To my naked eye, the ridges appear to be formed by galling of the metal rather than rust but I can't tell without having the chamber inspected with a bore scope. My thoughts are to have the chamber inspected with a bore scope and if it is galling, to have the chamber gently reamed with a something like a flexhone of the correct dimension. Of course, this could be the wrong thing to do. Thus, i turn to all of you for your thoughts and opinions.
Has anyone had any similar experiences? Your comments/recommendations are welcomed.
TIA
~F
