BP and Sixgun questions.

[Omnivore]

Hello,  I new here.  Got some questions.

This is my first year shooting black powder rifles.  Smoke poles have proven to be more fun than I first thought.  The only down side is cleaning.

I'd like to save up and buy a six gun one day.  One that could handle factory loads with smokeless and my own hand loaded shells with real black powder. Reloading with home cast bullets and my own BP seems like it may be fun to try.

One thing I'd like to know is are any of the common six shooters easier to break down for a clean up?  My sidelock rifles have to be totally disassembled for clean up.  BP gunk gets everywhere. Lock,stock and barrel.   I'd figure that BP residue would be bear to clean up on a six shooter.  Especially with all the hiding places in a revolver.

How difficult is it to clean a BP shooting revolver well?  Thanks.

[Flint]

From your desire to load both smokeless and BP, we presume you are talking about a cartridge firing revolver.  The easiest to clean would be the Colt SAA, which can be had from Cimarron, Uberti/Beretta, etc.  The cylinder releases easily, and cleans easily, and very little fouling gets past the cartridge case toward the rear, unlike a cap and ball.  Using Black Powder lube in the bullets and Bore Butter and Ballistol, it should run very well.  Either 45Colt or 44-40 will shoot black powder very well.  Incidently, a BP fouled revolver cleans up cleaner and faster than a smokeless, as water washes awat the carbon.  Smokeless carbon is much harder to remove from the chambers.  A Ruger Vaquero will handle BP well also, and in stainless would be very easy to clean.

[Omnivore]

Thanks, Flint.  Just the kind of input I was looking for.  

Yeah, I thought that reloading shells with BP (already have that) would be fun to give a go.

Is it OK to reload spent factory brass with BP?  How many times can you reload  a brass case?

[Dan Chamberlain]

Spent factory brass is perfect.  It must be cleaned just like the firearms and make sure you dry it well.  Other than that, you're on the right track.

Dan c

[Gatofeo]

One thing to consider when reloading the same caliber for smokeless and black powder.
For best results, use a soft lead bullet with black powder; certainly no harder than wheelweights. And a black powder type lubricant such as SPG or Lyman Black Powder Gold must be used on that soft bullet.
Because black powder creates more fouling, you'll want ample lubricant on that bullet too.
This means that modern, soft, swaged bullets such as those made by Speer and Hornady --- even if you lubricate them later with a black powder lubricant --- will almost certainly lead your bore and be inaccurate because they don't carry enough lubricant to keep the black powder fouling soft.
 
Conversely, for smokeless loads you'll want a bullet at least as hard as wheelweights, lubricated with a smokeless-type lubricant such as an Alox/beeswax blend.
Thus, you'll need to have one type of bullet alloy and lubricant for smokeless, and another for black powder.
If you use a hard bullet lubricated with a smokeless-type lubricant in black powder loads, you'll get a lot of leading of the bore and accuracy will be lousy.
If you use a soft lead bullet and blackpowder-type lubricant over smokeless powder, you'll get leading and accuracy will be lousy.
This is my experience from over 30 years of shooting the .45 Long Colt in a Ruger Blackhawk, and five years of shooting a .44-40 rifle.
I use Winchester WLP primers in both the .45 Colt and .44-40 for both types of loads. Yep, .44-40 brass is designed to accomodate a pistol primer, even if it's assembled for use in a rifle.
A rifle primer in a .44-40 case will almost always fail to seat flush, as it should be.
I think a .45 Long Colt would be a good choice. The .44-40 has a very limited bullet selection, generally of 200 to 215 grains.
With smokeless powder, you can load the .45 Colt with everything from the 185 grain semi-wadcutter intended for target shooting with the .45 Auto to 300 gr. bullets meant for hunting.
Dan Chamberlain is right. Right after shooting black powder, you'll need to deprime your brass and scrub it clean in hot, soapy water. Then, you'll need to dry it in a pan in a warm (150 degrees or less) oven to chase all the moisture out.
Shooting black powder cartridges is a lot of fun but it's work too.
I avoid the middleman by shooting cap and ball revolvers!

[The Shrink]

Eats Anything

I have great respect for both Dan and Gatofeo, and have learned a lot from both.  There is an easier way of cleaning BP from cartridges, and that is ceramic media in a tumbler with a little water and dish soap.  It's a lot easier than scrubbing with brushes in a sink full of water, and for me it keeps the sulpher stink out in the garage.  

I use 2mm beads from BuffaloArms.com and others use varioul shapes of ceramic media, but it works.  I then dry them and drop them in another bowl with walnut media to polish and am done.  

Wayne the Shrink

[MOGorilla]

Might I suggest a 58 Remmington Cap and Ball. You can buy a couple of cap and ball cylinders and a R&D conversion cylinder, or a Krist conversion cylinder.  I think the Remmington is ~165 from Cabellas, another 25 per cap and ball cylinder,  and I think 250 for a Conversion cylinder.  For about what a Colt clone will cost you, you have a very versatile revolver.   Just a suggestion.

[Omnivore]

Thanks to all who responded.  Going to print this for future reference.

Gatofeo,  I have pure lead, wheel wieghts, Alox and blends.

Mogorilla,  What caliber is that revolver you mentioned?  That sounds like a decent deal.  Especially if you can get a convert cylinder.

[MOGorilla]

the 58 remmington comes in a .44 and a .36 (.454 balls and .376 balls).  R&D conversion and Kirst Conversions can be had for both calibers as well. (45 colt and 38 specl.)   Check out

http://www.riverjunction.com/  

--They offer the Kirst conversion_

and
http://www.taylorsfirearms.com/

They offer the R&D cylinder.

For a movie reference, watch Pale Rider,  Eastwood is changing out the cylinders in a converted remmington.  
I hope some others will chime in, I have shot both the R&D, and Kirst, but own neither, most of my arsenal is Colt Cap and balls, with one brass frame buffalo revolver.   I like them all and both have their pluses and minuses, hopefully an avid Remmington shooter will post soon.

[Flint]

MOGorrilla is correct.  The 44 Remington bore shoots a 45Colt bullet very well.  My Remington Revolving Carbine by Uberti will shoot one ragged hole groups at 50 ft with 45Colt cartridges.  However, recent personal experience makes me prefer the R&D cylinder in 45Colt.  The Kirst is wonderful in 38Special, though the Kirst is very hard on hands, as the hand is soft and the Kirst is hard and sharp in the rachet.  The 45, 5 shot Kirst is VERY hard to time due to the safety position's ratchet being so short, it gets behind the hand and locks the gun up when trying to hand rotate the cylinder.  The R&D runs very smoothly as a drop-in, and does not damage the hand nose.  The slightly angled chambers do not hurt the accuracy at all.  Needles to say, $250 a copy make the R&D and Kirst cylinder into expensive experiments.  Incidently, if you get a Ruger Old Army, you can get R&D and Kirst (6shot) cylinders in 45Colt for it as well.

[jgalar]

You can get the cartridge cylinders for the colt style guns also. Both types are expensive. you can check them out at www.midwayusa.com
look under shooting/muzzleloader and accesseries/accessories