• This community needs YOUR help today. We rely 100% on Supporting Memberships to fund our efforts. With the ever increasing fees of everything, we need help. We need more Supporting Members, today. Please invest back into this community. I will ship a few decals too in addition to all the account perks you get.



    Sign up here: https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/account/upgrades

Ruger Old Army vs Remington 1858

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

fourbore

40 Cal
Joined
Oct 22, 2019
Messages
186
Reaction score
84
Location
New England
I like to ask how these two compare right out of the box. I have a Ruger now. Are there any significant differences between how the two perform. Does the 1858 hold a little more powder? I am thinking about one of the Remington repros with adjustable sights. The image is a Navy Arms model.
 

Attachments

  • NavyArms.jpg
    NavyArms.jpg
    69.5 KB · Views: 94
Rem 1858 are still being produced.
Parts for Rem 1858 still very much available.
Rem 1858 more cost effective to maintain.
Rem 1858 target will hit inside 2" bull at 25 yards all day long even better with young eyes.
More or less powder irrelevant. Powder load per best accuracy.
My pair of Pietta 1858 target shoot conicals good at 18 grains. No knuckle busting.
Ball at 21 grains.
Any more is waste of powder plus just makes more crud build up.
 
Brother Bang wrote -

Rem 1858 are still being produced. Ruger stopped producing the Old Army in 2008.
Parts for Rem 1858 still very much available. Parts for the Old Army rely on a few companies making them - things like the somewhat fragile cylinder base pin and bits of the advancing mechanism ARE available, but you have do do some real searching to find them.
Rem 1858 more cost effective to maintain. See above.
Rem 1858 target will hit inside 2" bull at 25 yards all day long even better with young eyes. Same with the ROA, which came either with target sights, or in a shorter barrel version with plain iron sights.
More or less powder irrelevant. Powder load per best accuracy. Exactly.
My pair of Pietta 1858 target shoot conicals good at 18 grains. No knuckle busting. My ROA likes 25gr for conicals.
Ball at 21 grains. My ROA likes the same for ball.
Any more is waste of powder plus just makes more crud build up. Yup.

I'll add another one - in general, you might buy TWO Remington NMAs for the price of a single ROA.
 
I like the idea of getting an 1858. One question. If I load a max charge, no felt wad, all the FFF BP the 1858 will fit how bad will the accuracy get?

I know this is not for everybody. This is my desire to approximate the 44/40 in a cap and ball. With max crud and knuckle busting and only 6 shots before cleaning, what accuracy can I hope for.
 
At the moment, I am asking for those who did the load development what is the accuracy penatly when using a max full cylinder FFF black powder in the 1858?

Give me a few numbers, does a 2" group open up to 4" in YOUR actual experience shooting at what ever range, perhaps 25 yards.
 
I get my optimum accuracy in all my .44's with 23 Gr. 3F, a TP wad with a tiny bit of patch lube folded up inside, then the RB.
If you want to show off & produce billowing clouds of smoke that will make everyone notice, get a Dragoon. Max load of 41 gr. 3F catches the attention of even surrounding .44 mag. shooters.
ROA vs Dragoon to post1.jpg
 
At the moment, I am asking for those who did the load development what is the accuracy penatly when using a max full cylinder FFF black powder in the 1858?

Give me a few numbers, does a 2" group open up to 4" in YOUR actual experience shooting at what ever range, perhaps 25 yards.

While there are some on here who have maxed out their Remingtons most are willing to settle for a less than full house load and reasonable accuracy. I've never seen where anyone shot a max load off the bench and reported here, why not buy a Remington and try it yourself? They aren't all that expensive compared to a Ruger and it'll give you the answer. Myself I never shot for anything except accuracy and have never fired more than 22 grains of 3f in a .44 of any make except for load development so I'm afraid I can't answer your question. My experience was that above that load the groups began to open up and I stopped there.

I have a lot of respect for the (blackpowder) .44-40 and I doubt you can achieve that level of performance in a '58 or a Colt Army.
 
This is my desire to approximate the 44/40 in a cap and ball. With max crud and knuckle busting and only 6 shots before cleaning, what accuracy can I hope for.

Not going to happen, Sir.

If you want to equal a .44-40 load, get a revolver that shoots the .44-40 cartridge.
 
I have two Pietta/navy arms 1858s, apietta 1860 colt, a pietta 36 navy and a 1989 made ROA. All of the Italian Guns have had something break over the years. The ruger has not. My navy is a shooter but it hits way off POA because of the sights. I can’t group anything at all with the 1858s. None of the Italian Guns compare to the ROA accuracy or reliability. The ruger has had 1000s of rounds through it. I also have a box full of ribbons ive won with it. All of my Italian Guns are factory and have not been tweaked though so that may make a difference. Off a bench at 25 yards my roa with 20gr of 3f is the most accurate 1” group handgun I own. That includes modern center fire handguns too.
 
I used to shoot cowboy with an FBI agent who always used 40 grains FFFg in his ROAs.
His theory was, that since he shot guns "for a living", he didn't want to get used to light loads.
He always hit the pistol targets, but I have no idea about his groups.
If that's not enough powder for you, ClassicBallistx makes a cylinder that holds 5 grains more.
If you shoot 'em a lot (In cowboy Action, we shoot 6 or more 5-shot stages at a match), and you shoot real black powder, since there is no shielding of the base pin from powder residue in the front of the cylinder, Remmies bind up after a few shots.
Mine could not get through a 5-shot stage without significant binding.
Remmies also have a reputation of breaking hand springs.
I can't shoot them comfortably, as the back of the triggerguard beats up the knuckle on the middle finger of my gun hand.
The hammer has a large arc, so by the end of the day, it puts a lot of wear on my cocking thumb.
ROAs don't have any of these issues.
Don't get me wrong, I like Remmies, but the design of the Ruger is better thought out, and it is a much better gun.
Yes, they are pricey, but you will pass it down to your son, who will pass it down to his, etc.
--Dawg
 
THE BITE & TWIST IN A REVOLVER'S BARREL MATTERS
The Ruger Old Army's have always produced much tighter groups because their barrels have deeper rifling & a faster rate of twist that is proper for a .45 cal. revolver..
Modern Italian repro revolvers have shallow rifling, I suspect this is why they use a much slower rate of twist in the rifling in order to try & reduce projectile skidding when the projectile jumps the gap between cylinder & barrel.

Original 1858 Remingtons had deep progressive-twist rifling, they produce superb accuracy.
Very few of the Italian made 1858 Remingtons have been produced with original style progressive-twist rifling, those were special runs made with Lothar barrels primarily for international BP team shooters.

Most originals have some barrel pitting but if they still retain sharp rifling the bores & some scrubbing can make them even better. I've found that with lubed wads they will hold the same tight groups as ones I've fired with mint bores.

Deeper rifling was used in most original revolvers in order to prevent projectiles from skidding as they jumped the gap from the cylinder. A barrel with progressive-twist rifling barrel has literally no twist at the cylinder- barrel junction so the projectile is stabilized before it reaches the faster twist further up the barrel.

The other part of obtaining optimum accuracy is fine-tuning your powder charge, R/B diameter or picking the right style of bullet, but that's another subject for another time.
~$$$ & GRINS~
The cost of one of these upper end repros approaches the price of an original so many like myself have elected to purchase originals as they hold their value. Most of us in the BP crowd are history buffs, there is something special about owning & firing a piece that is directly connected to that period of history !
 
When I first got into cap and ball revolvers many years ago I tried to get the most powder in and still seat the ball. That was with a Remington 1858 and a 44 caliber Colt 1851, both Piettas. Accuracy was terrible but the smoke was impressive. You can get more powder into a Ruger Old Army but the same conditions apply. In my experience, anything over 30 grains of 3F powder and accuracy suffers.

If you already have a Ruger Old Army, you have probably the finest and toughest C&B revolver ever made and about the most accurate. (Doesn't mean don't get the Remington, of course.)

I don't know the power numbers but I seriously doubt you are going to get 44-40 power from a C&B revolver.

Jeff
 
Not going to happen, Sir.

If you want to equal a .44-40 load, get a revolver that shoots the .44-40 cartridge.

I don’t know about that. My ROA shoots a weighed 38 grns of 3F Olde Eynsford with my 195 grn WFN bullet. There’s still a bit more chamber space I intend on filling with more lead when I modify my design and order the mold, a bullet that also fills my NMA up, though it’s charge is a weighed 33 grns. Anyway, my ROA comes mighty close to the .44-40.
 
THE BITE & TWIST IN A REVOLVER'S BARREL MATTERS
The Ruger Old Army's have always produced much tighter groups because their barrels have deeper rifling & a faster rate of twist that is proper for a .45 cal. revolver..
Modern Italian repro revolvers have shallow rifling, I suspect this is why they use a much slower rate of twist in the rifling in order to try & reduce projectile skidding when the projectile jumps the gap between cylinder & barrel.

Original 1858 Remingtons had deep progressive-twist rifling, they produce superb accuracy.
Very few of the Italian made 1858 Remingtons have been produced with original style progressive-twist rifling, those were special runs made with Lothar barrels primarily for international BP team shooters.

Most originals have some barrel pitting but if they still retain sharp rifling the bores & some scrubbing can make them even better. I've found that with lubed wads they will hold the same tight groups as ones I've fired with mint bores.

Deeper rifling was used in most original revolvers in order to prevent projectiles from skidding as they jumped the gap from the cylinder. A barrel with progressive-twist rifling barrel has literally no twist at the cylinder- barrel junction so the projectile is stabilized before it reaches the faster twist further up the barrel.

The other part of obtaining optimum accuracy is fine-tuning your powder charge, R/B diameter or picking the right style of bullet, but that's another subject for another time.
~$$$ & GRINS~
The cost of one of these upper end repros approaches the price of an original so many like myself have elected to purchase originals as they hold their value. Most of us in the BP crowd are history buffs, there is something special about owning & firing a piece that is directly connected to that period of history !

My 2013 Pietta NMA has a 1:16” twist and these bore dimensions:

rare baby boy names 2019

 
I like to ask how these two compare right out of the box. I have a Ruger now. Are there any significant differences between how the two perform. Does the 1858 hold a little more powder? I am thinking about one of the Remington repros with adjustable sights. The image is a Navy Arms model.
The Ruger is a better made both in material and tolerances from the factory but the Pietta's can be tuned into real shooters with some creative gun work. I feel my Pietta is more accurate than my ROA Centenial model but it has been fire lapped, chambers reamed and a new trigger made of tool steel fit to it.
 
I thank you all for the input so far. I spent a lot of time watching you tubes yesterday. I think I have a problem many of us share. That is I like them all. I currently have the ROA and Uberti 3rd dragoon. In the distant past had a repro Colt Navy and Walker. I am pretty sure I will add a some flavor of Remington repro. The sick part is I have expanded my wanted list not narrow it down.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top