Garrison Joe, SASS #60708

I run the S&B cases through a Dillon primer pocket swager, and they load forever after that without problems. good luck, GJ

Or order a Ruger Bearcat mainspring seat from one of the parts supply houses....I found some in stock today at Numrich. Advantage of the Bearcat seat is it has a divot cut into the top surface to allow inserting a compressed-spring retention pin when you disassemble. GJ

Be aware of the internal lock in grips. Ruger has quit providing parts for the hammer assembly for those, no keys for the lock available any more, so if you want to remove and tune the guns, you are in for some work. Take off the grips to make sure neither gun contains the discontinued and unsupported locks! GJ

Shooter could have reloaded 2 new rounds and shot them at the still standing KD target in the hopes of reducing his miss-count to zero. GJ

I'd probably use a hard stone and just lightly polish the bolt nose sides and corners at the A position in diagram above. Just enough to make sure you have any minute burr removed, and enough to just remove the blueing or any manufacturing defect in the surface. If no stone, get some 600 grit sandpaper and hold it tightly over a small piece of flat hardwood (oak or walnut are fine), and polish the surface with that. good luck, GJ

As a lube - no. Cleaner - pretty good stuff. Like some others, I do not use liquid lubes on firearms. Too easy to flow off, or penetrate into wood and soften it. Mobil 1 syn grease or even better (clear) Battle Borne syn grease, which is thicker yet and runs fine on 1911, 97, single action cylinder base pins, even M1 and M1A rifles. The Battle Borne is about all I use except a little Rem Oil for fire control parts inside of actions. good luck, GJ

Well, trade for a mold that is close to 500 grains. You cannot alloy enough to change the weight by more than about 10 grains lighter, and the tin will cost you a bunch! Some mold mechanics are able to mill the thickness of a base-pour mold to cut the mold down to a lighter weight. If you are going to leave it as a plain base bullet, then milling to remove the current base and the lowest grease groove would take quite a bit of weight off. Not a job for a home hobbyist in most cases, as the sprue plate mounting screw hole has to be deepened. And make sure that does not cut into the block's handle mounting slots. good luck, GJ

Oh, well that's a different horse than the OP rode in on. Let's check what moly CAN do. It is a fine molybdenium sulfide powder that has natural lubricating capability. It does work well om smokeless powder loads to prevent lead alloy "leading" in the barrel with cast bullets, and prevent copper fouling with jacketed bullets. Is lead fouling what is in the barrel when shooting Black Powder? Nope. That fouling is the residue from the black powder combustion/explosion in the barrel. The charcoal, sulfur, potassium nitrate mixture only gets to a partially completed state, leaving leftover lube, unburnt carbon, sulfur, carbonates, nitrates and sulfates in the barrel. The combustion has a high temperature, so very little lead is left in the barrel, just the (mostly) water soluble fouling. Black Powder lube works to keep that inorganic salts mixture (fouling) soft enough that the 10 or 20% of the powder charge which makes up the fouling does not clog up the barrel for the next shot, or accuracy suffers. So, moly really can do nothing to help with BP shooting. It doesn't need to be there to prevent lead deposits - a good BP load never leaves lead in the barrel. It does not soften the inorganic salts in the barrel. So, either the moly has no contribution in BP loads, or it just adds a non-water-soluble component to fouling, making things harder to clean up. AFAIK. So, bottom line - the moly coating on a bullet used with real black powder is "wasted" and costs the shooter a little more for the slugs. good luck, GJ

I used a Lyman moly-content, smokeless lube made about 2000 one time with a BP .45-70 loading. Never again. The very hard fouling took a lot of scrubbing to remove. I have never seen a moly-content BP lube. If you need a guarantee of success use a conventional BP lube. GJ

That difference in lengths is to allow a firing or two (each stretching the length a little) on bottleneck RIFLE cases, otherwise rifle shooters would have to trim every time they fire their cases. Lots of work. So, trimming is done a little short of the "critical" too-long dimension. Trimming pistol cases is RARELY needed, the pressures are lower and there is no bottleneck shoulder to help stretch the case lengthwise. .45 Auto cases even SHORTEN with 20 or so firings. good luck, GJ

This usually IS a problem with the opening lever spring having been lightened or replaced. Longhunter used to have some good V springs for the lever, IIRC. I would first check that the sliding bolt has correct engagement. The slot it slides is not fouled with crud preventing bolt from engaging. Lugs on barrel not damaged preventing engagement. If the bolt is not wide enough to reach into the barrel lug, then I'd weld up to add more material to that bolt - "just a chunk of steel." But I've never heard of an 1878 wearing out it's locking bolt. good luck, GJ

IMHO, I don't. I have run the same powder for SASS cartridge loading for years now. It doesn't clump or attack the plastic in Dillon loaders. I check the first couple drops every new session, and sometimes I have an extra 0.2 grains on the very first charge on my 550. That either gets adjusted or recycled back into the hopper. Some loaders make it very tedious to dump out all the powder. Like a 550 running Dillon powder measure. So, I'm loading a lot more from experience than from opinion anyway. GJ

When I loaded for a fast shooter, I threw 2.6 to 2.8 grains of Clays and that worked really well for cowboy shooting. If you are within the published tested charges, you should be getting very safe pressures. Regardless of reports of spiky pressures when above the tested loads. Throw out the first (startup) charge you drop on any progressive press, as you can never be sure how much packing of powder has occurred since the last loading session. Carry on, sounds very normal. GJ

Pressure rises very quickly (very non-linearly) as the charge weight increases - sometimes "explosively" good luck, GJ

45 cal slugs? and small pistol primers? Were you loading small primer 45 auto cases, or just misnamed the primer size? Depends upon if you want to leave the bullets in "good" condition for reloading. For seven hundred and just saving the lead (not reusing the slugs), I'd use a pair of large pliers and a single stage press. Place round in shell holder, raise it up, catch the slug in jaws of pliers, and lower ram, extracting bullet. Faster than impact hammer. Hint - large side cutter pliers grab the bullet very well, have plenty of leverage, and span the die opening in the frame of the press. If you want to reuse the bullet (I would not), probably a collet bullet puller die that somewhat protects the bullet from damage. But you would be out the price of the die, and if you don't do large volumes of this task, may not be worth it. If hard cast slugs, will be successful. If soft, well, good luck not damaging the slug. This reinforces what I tell all BEGINNING reloaders - until you get good a this, don't EVER load more than 25 or so rounds until you have range test fired the stuff you are making. Too many hidden mistakes can occur - leading to the exact painful situation as occurred here. Remove primers in a press too. Just take it easy on the stroke and wear eye and ear protection. I've never set off a primer after depriming thousands over the last 50 years. good luck, GJ

Lassiter has done a couple for me. I'd bet that Ken Griner - El Mulo Vaquero could do it as well. He's in Farmington of course. And, Colonel Lou in El Paso. I'd also bet. And calling Longhunter - Jim Finch might get his attention to this repair. good luck, GJ

The list of legal shotguns in SASS Wild Bunch has been expanded in the last few months. Although this qualifies lots of shot guns, it does not make the Ithaca 37 design or the Mossberg 500/590 design pumps legal. With or without heat shields on the barrels. Those do not meet the restrictions on pump shotgun models - the rules specifically list only the legal ones. Read the paragraphs where that looser description is included, and you see that looser standard are for break-open and lever action shotguns ONLY. Pumps are called out by specific models. good luck, GJ

Almost all single actions with fixed sights are made with the front sight pretty tall. It will probably be close to the right height for a factory load, with heavy slug and good speed. We shoot a light bullet at slow speed, and that needs a lower front sight to force the barrel muzzle higher and put the bullet on your point of aim. So, yes, this is a common problem. Filing the front sight is common with most single actions set up for our sport. Factory sets them to have enough height for any common factory load. Then we come along and shoot low velocity low recoil loads and they hit low. But, be real careful about adjusting your sight until you as a new cowboy shooter are SURE you are controlling your trigger break well enough that you get tight groups when you shoot - like less than an inch at 7 yards. You have a hard time (expensive repair) if you take off too much metal early in your shooting only to find you are flinching or pulling your shots low. Have an experienced shooter test your guns and verify they are shooting low before you take metal off, as it can't be put back on easily. good luck, GJ

YES! Slapping forehead. SOME Uberti 1866 were made very early on (1980s) with a short carrier length and chambered for .38 Special ONLY. I know this for certain, as I used to have one in the family and did have to load short rounds to fit that 1.500" carrier block and shaft. Many were imported by Navy Arms. As the story goes, the Italians claimed they designed their 1866 clone early on to take the ammo that the US military issued and that was a very short-nose FMJ slug in a .38 special case. Only after importing them that way for a few years, the US customers demanded a .45 Colt version, and Uberti wised up and stretched the frame design to hold a 1.600" carrier (lifter) block. But, if this IS TRULY a more-modern made gun (this century), it will have a carrier shaft of 1.600", like Uberti builds all their toggle lever guns now. So, it would be VERY unlikely that a 1.490" Overall Length of cartridge is TOO LONG to feed it. So, the OP seems very confused. He stated a 1.490" cartridge would not feed because it is too long. I've already asked that he VERIFY the carrier block or shaft length measurement. I've already asked the OP to verify that he really means that cartridge "won't feed" because it is too long. I've already asked the OP if the gun fails to feed during the beginning of the rearward stroke of the lever (which would likely be a failure to return the second cartridge on the carrier due to TOO SHORT an OAL) or if the gun jams with the cartridge already partially in the chamber near the end of the lever stroke, which could be a VERY poor bullet design that he chose or a fat slug or a dirty/tight chamber or even a ring of brass left in chamber from a separated case. We can't get a clear picture of what the REAL problem is, UNTIL THE OP REPLIES with more information! good luck, GJ

You can look down into the carrier and SEE if your load is too short for your toggle link gun. The shortest length that will not jam the carrier with one round cleanly on the carrier and part of another also out on the carrier, is that the rim of the second cartridge has to be on (vertically above) the downward sloping ramp on the front edge of the carrier. If the rim is far enough rearward to be close to or on the FLAT inside the carrier's channel, it will not be able to be pushed back into the mag tube when the carrier rises. This results in a jam of the lever as you begin to bring the lever back toward your face. And the rounds are too long IF the nose of the only cartridge in the carrier is hanging up in the magazine or hitting the frame as you start to close the lever stroke. The shaft of the carrier is 1.600" on modern made Uberti toggle links. It was 1.500" on very early production .38 special only lever guns. If your gun is jamming as you try to finish the chambering portion of the stroke, then it's not due to a short length of the cartridge. It is commonly caused by trying to shoot a poor design of slug for a lever gun, such as a SemiWadCutter (SWC) design. That number he supplied with the gun (1.490") is a very short OAL for an Uberti toggle link gun, unless the carrier has been modified for a very "long" slope of the cartridge return ramp. Or this is a gun that was made way back in the 1980s or so when a shorter carrier was the standard for a .38 special Uberti lever gun. Measure your carrier shaft length (forward/back direction) in the frame. It will give you the MAXIMUM working length of your cartridges. Your loads are "TOO LONG"? At 1.490? Think you mean they are too short, if you have a gun made this century. good luck, GJ

Rifling will spin a round ball on it's axis (perpendicular to the shaved section of the ball). It has to - the ball is forced into the grooves of the barrel unless it is undersize. How far the ball retains it's spin without beginning to tumble I don't have a clue. Probably at least the first 50 yards, since the ball retains pretty good accuracy that far, IME. And from the experience that Dave Tutt obtained in 1865. good luck, GJ

No, I understand that very clearly. Not running down your past use of TB; you now also have to know that I have never wanted to use it and never will, afaik. So, moving on is the only real alternative anyone has right now. Maybe it gets fixed in the future, I'll bet it does not, for years if ever. GJ

Yes, HP-38 and Win 231 are the same powder and use the same data. Just two different brand names. Hodgdon used to compete with Winchester powders, now they own the name and oversee the making of all "Winchester" powders. That is why HP-38 name was first created, and now is duplicate and to some folks, confusing year after year. good luck, GJ

The professional tool is a revolver range rod. Here's Brownell's selection: https://www.brownells.com/tools-cleaning/gun-tools/action-frame-tools/revolver-range-rods/?sku=080617045 I don't doubt your drill extension is cheaper. I don't doubt Brownell's range rod being accurate enough to spot even minor rotation and axis position problems. I would have my concerns that a big box store part was not made to serve this special high-precision job. good luck, GJ

No, I too don''t believe military has use for Trail Boss OR the same family of formulations of flake canister powders we all are missing. And if Trail Boss EVER shows up again, I will be very surprised. It is technically difficult to make it so fluffy, which makes it hard to manufacture (2 plants burned down in 10 years), and expensive. But it is not worth the $250 a bottle that the 300 Blackout shooters are driving the price to. You are getting second hand info here, not first hand directly from Hodgdon management. Instead of spending time asking for it for the next few years and wishing it were around, find a powder that IS being made and grab it before pricing increases. It has already been missing in action for the last couple of years. good luck, GJ