Questions about my new Dragoon

My new Uberti Dragoon came today, finally. The action is quite stiff and I attribute that to the abundance of lube on the gun and also to the fact that it is brand new. With use I hope it will loosen up.

I removed the cylinder from the barrel and cleaned all the parts per the instructions. Do you think I should disassemble the trigger assembly totally and clean the internal action as well?

I am used to using my ROA and this Whitneyville will take a while to get used to. :hmm:

First of all, I am used to removing the grips on my ROA and getting the whole gun wet during cleaning. I see now that removing the grips on the Colt requires disassembling the grip frame.

It looks like that on the Dragoon, I might be able to get by with cleaning the barrel and cylinder in a soapy water bath, and wiping the separate grip fame portion of the gun down with Hoppes #9 and oil. But my concern is if corrosive powder residue might be left over on and in the grip frame and damage it. How do you clean your Colt replicas? Do you remove the wooden grips every time you clean it?

The case hardening looks very nice. Do you think this is real case hardening or just a surface finish, like the type you can get with a blowtorch that I have read about?

I will need a nipple wrench I realized. I was hoping a deep hex socket would work, obviously it won’t now that I see the nipple design. TOW has a few for the Colt’s, is there a specific model that someone can recommend to me?

When I shoot my cap and ball revolvers I rarely shoot more than two or three cylinders. If I shot 4 or more cylinders I'd do the complete disassembly and clean bit. But because I don't do that I just clean the barrel,cylinder and exterior of the frame really well and run some pipe cleaners down into the frame via the hammer recess and trigger opening. Every so often when I've taken one particular revolver out a few times I'll to the complete take down bit. I was surprised how little fouling build up I found and zero rust or corrosion. Like I said, if I used them alot I'd clean them more thoroughly.

Don

I wouldn't take it apart to clean it (grip frame). As I use Butch's Black Powder Bore Shine, distributed by Lyman, I haven't a fear of rust or corrosion. Bore Shine emulsifies BP on contact, and comes in quite useful in all of the nooks & crannies that these wheelguns have. A small screwdriver and a patch wet with Bore Shine will accomplish a lot. Then I use Masters synthetic grease (really light in weight) and apply it liberally on all of the metal-to-metal contact surfaces, especially the cylinder and yoke. After a little shoot-in, it'll loosen up a little and your in for some real fun!

Hope that this helps! If you need any more advice, we'll be here.

Dave

oldwolf said:

My new Uberti Dragoon came today, finally. The action is quite stiff and I attribute that to the abundance of lube on the gun and also to the fact that it is brand new. With use I hope it will loosen up.

I removed the cylinder from the barrel and cleaned all the parts per the instructions. Do you think I should disassemble the trigger assembly totally and clean the internal action as well?

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Two things:

1. Yes, the grease Uberti (and others) use for corrosion protection during shipping/storage does affect the action. It needs to be cleaned out to get a good feel for how the action works. Completely disassemble the action and use a good bp solvent (I use Thompson Center No. 13) on all the action parts and the inside of the frame.

2. On any new gun, I always reassemble after initial cleaning and fire a half dozen cylinders with light loads, then again completely disassemble and clean, and then polish the action parts where they come together with India stones. Finally, I reassemble using a light coat of gun oil on the action parts. Firing a few cylinders before stoning gets the action parts moving together and helps to see exactly where polishing will do the most good. Once that's done the action is as good as it's ever going to be.

oldwolf said:

It looks like that on the Dragoon, I might be able to get by with cleaning the barrel and cylinder in a soapy water bath, and wiping the separate grip fame portion of the gun down with Hoppes #9 and oil. But my concern is if corrosive powder residue might be left over on and in the grip frame and damage it. How do you clean your Colt replicas? Do you remove the wooden grips every time you clean it?

Click to expand...

No, you do not need to completely disassemble the action for cleaning each time out. Removing the fouling with hot soapy water (or bp solvent or Windex or mother's secret bp cleaning fluid recipe or whatever, except, of course, no petroleum based cleaners) in the barrel and cylinder only is sufficient most of the time.

I do disassemble, clean and oil the action parts every so often, probably about every fourth or fifth time out. It's really a labor of love rather than a strict schedule; I just like to take them apart and keep them shiny inside. I probably do it more often than is really necessary.

It is important to wipe down the hammer and frame (recoil shield and under the cylinder) with a bp solvent each time (when you don't do the whole gun cleaning). Cap residue is just as bad as bp fouling, and those areas will get fairly dirty. It'll be obvious where to clean. I don't use the regular Hoppe's No. 9 as it does have petroleum based material; their bp solvent is better for this, or again, T/C's No. 13, or Windex or mother's recipe, or whatever doesn't have the petroleum stuff.

oldwolf said:

The case hardening looks very nice. Do you think this is real case hardening or just a surface finish, like the type you can get with a blowtorch that I have read about?

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It's real case hardening. Case hardening is a surface finish process regardless of the method, so it can wear away over a few (well, several) years.

oldwolf said:

I will need a nipple wrench I realized. I was hoping a deep hex socket would work, obviously it won’t now that I see the nipple design. TOW has a few for the Colt’s, is there a specific model that someone can recommend to me?

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Man, I sure wish I could. I have several nipple wrenches; some work and some don't. But I haven't kept track of where they came from, so I can't tell you which ones to get. I did get one from, I think, Dixie Gun Works, that seems to work well for Walkers/Dragoons. It's a Walker original design, so you might try that. Sorry I can't be more help on that.

I don’t plan to shoot this gun until I can get hold of a nipple wrench that fits it. I like to remove the nipples for cleaning mostly because I am concerned the threads will lock up from corrosion if I don’t. So, since I am not in any hurry to take it to the range, I will take the grip frame apart and give it an initial cleaning as recommended.

The action is much smoother now that I have cleaned the base pin and cylinder journal. When I first got the gun and pulled back the hammer, the cylinder would not rotate far enough to lock the cylinder into the bolt. Now, I can cycle the hammer and I get a nice “click-click” as the cylinder locks up.

One other thing, I noticed the cap relief on the right side of the frame is not very large, meaning that it would be easy to scratch the gun with a capper if you are not careful.

Maybe it is better to put the cap on with fingers, if you all don’t know of a “scratchless” capping tool to use.

The nipple wrench for the Walker should work on the 3rd Model Dragoon cylinder as well. It's available from Cimaron and runs $10.95, and you might want to get the small T-style one as well, as the screwdriver built in to that one is also good for using on top of a cleaning patch soaked with fluid. Several manufacturers make nipple wrenches, and they come in three basic sizes: a huge straight pole with an arm on it that's used for rifles only, and a small and a large pistol/revolver versions. You want the large revolver version for the Dragoon. The small version is good for the 1860 Army and the 1858 Remington NMA.

Haven't found a capper yet that I like, so I'll just use my fingers, I guess.

Glad to see that the action "cleaned-up" after the heavy grease was cleaned-off as I've said before.

Dave

I got a Ted Cash round capper and took a Dremel to the 'jaw' area to grind away excess metal that just got in the way of placing the cap on the nipple. Doesn't work on everything, but it did help with a couple of guns. Haven't tried it on the Walker or either of my Dragoons but it should work. I usually use my fingers anyhow.

oldwolf said:

I will need a nipple wrench I realized. I was hoping a deep hex socket would work, obviously it won’t now that I see the nipple design. TOW has a few for the Colt’s, is there a specific model that someone can recommend to me?

Click to expand...

I emailed TOW for a nipple wrench recommendation. Let's see what he says.