What Size balls for my ASM .44 Colt Walker

[DesG]

You might try out the easy-to-find .454" - .the .457" ball you mention are those used for the Ruger Old Army - usually exclusively - so you might find difficulty in locating them.

Ever thought of making your own? You don't need much in the way of equipment, and the saving is nigh-on unbelievable - around £1-50 a hundred instead of ten times that much....

tac

£1.50? Interesting figure that got me checking my own cost. Lead- zilch. Scrounged from mates who want fishing weights now and then and have piles of old lead piping in their sheds; Equipment- bought in the eighties and now worthless but still working; Electricity-17.8 p per kilowatt hour. Takes an hour or so to make about 300 454 balls with a lee smelter which doesn't use much power after the lead is melted; Time- retired- who cares. The only way that I could make it up to £1.50/100 balls is in the beer I drink while I'm casting.

Sorry back to the thread. 454 work fine in my Rogers and Spencer although that probably doesn't answer your question.

[tacfoley]

£1.50? Interesting figure that got me checking my own cost. Lead- zilch. Scrounged from mates who want fishing weights now and then and have piles of old lead piping in their sheds; Equipment- bought in the eighties and now worthless but still working; Electricity-17.8 p per kilowatt hour. Takes an hour or so to make about 300 454 balls with a lee smelter which doesn't use much power after the lead is melted; Time- retired- who cares. The only way that I could make it up to £1.50/100 balls is in the beer I drink while I'm casting.

Sorry back to the thread. 454 work fine in my Rogers and Spencer although that probably doesn't answer your question.

Some people don't have pals with loads of FREE lead in their sheds.

Hence my approximate cost for somebody who has to buy it.

tac

[Fronteria]

I can purchase .457 lead balls from two sources these are Henry Krank who stocks Pedersoli Italian manufactured balls at £24 per 100 or for cast balls for £13.50 per 100 both of these prices include postage costs, which you have to include if you are going to get the true cost.
To be honest I can't be bothered to cast my own,
I am more interested in the chamber size problem, if a .451 ball falls under its own weight to the bottom of the chamber, is an additional .003" enough to ensure that the chamber is sealed well enough to prevent a chain fire?
I use Wonder Wads and I don't have a problem with them, but with any muzzle loading revolver the first line of defence against a chain fire is all said and done the ball and it's capability to seal off the chamber.
If necessary I will ream the other chambers out to match the size of the largest one, what surprised me was the different manufacturing tolerances they allowed that passed their inspection process if indeed they had one!

[tacfoley]

I can purchase .457 lead balls from two sources these are Henry Krank who stocks Pedersoli Italian manufactured balls at £24 per 100 or for cast balls for £13.50 per 100 both of these prices include postage costs, which you have to include if you are going to get the true cost.
To be honest I can't be bothered to cast my own,
I am more interested in the chamber size problem, if a .451 ball falls under its own weight to the bottom of the chamber, is an additional .003" enough to ensure that the chamber is sealed well enough to prevent a chain fire?
I use Wonder Wads and I don't have a problem with them, but with any muzzle loading revolver the first line of defence against a chain fire is all said and done the ball and it's capability to seal off the chamber.
If necessary I will ream the other chambers out to match the size of the largest one, what surprised me was the different manufacturing tolerances they allowed that passed their inspection process if indeed they had one!

Chain-fires happen from the rear of the cylinder - worn nipples and loose caps mean that the flash comes back out and over into adjacent nipples and flash channels. If a well-swaged-into-the-chamber ball is in the wat, how can the flame get around it?

I recently posted a great night-time image of the back-flash showing exactly this. A .457 ball would certainly do the trick, but you might be putting excessive pressure on the loading lever in doing so - can't you get some to try off a pal with a ROA?

As for manufacturing tolerances, I'll only say that when the ASM Walker was new it cost substantially less than half that of the Uberti model. Like everything else, you don't get a Mercedes-Benz for paying for a Ford.

tac
muzzleloadingforum.com

[Fronteria]

Chain-fires happen from the rear of the cylinder - worn nipples and loose caps mean that the flash comes back out and over into adjacent nipples and flash channels. If a well-swaged-into-the-chamber ball is in the wat, how can the flame get around it?

I recently posted a great night-time image of the back-flash showing exactly this. A .457 ball would certainly do the trick, but you might be putting excessive pressure on the loading lever in doing so - can't you get some to try off a pal with a ROA?

As for manufacturing tolerances, I'll only say that when the ASM Walker was new it cost substantially less than half that of the Uberti model. Like everything else, you don't get a Mercedes-Benz for paying for a Ford.

tac
muzzleloadingforum.com

Hi. Tac
I had a look at your photograph could the spurt of flame from the percussion cap area be caused by the pressure in a chamber taking the line of least resistance and blowing a cap off a nipple before it moves the ball, as it doesn't have the hammer to support it and to add a bit more resistance against the cap being forced off by pressure trying to escape from the chamber.

[tacfoley]

Hi. Tac
I had a look at your photograph could the spurt of flame from the percussion cap area be caused by the pressure in a chamber taking the line of least resistance and blowing a cap off a nipple before it moves the ball, as it doesn't have the hammer to support it and to add a bit more resistance against the cap being forced off by pressure trying to escape from the chamber.

Ahah! You have got the point!! The pressure should NOT have been able to blow the hammer back like that - THAT is the sign of a worn nipple that should have been changed.

I've been shooting my ROA since 1986, and have yet to have a chainfrie - as the nipples are good and the caps are a tight fit, I don't expect to have one, either.

tac