I am looking for some History on Percussion Rifles

I am about to start building a 50 Cal. Traditions Kentucky Rifle kit. It is percussion and I am wondering when the Kentucky Rifle made the transition from Flint Lock to Percussion?? Or is that just a marketing ploy established when kit manufacturing became a "Thing"???

That's a tough question, there really isn't an answer for a specific rifle style making a specific ignition change.
Percussion ignition was "invented" around 1805-07 with the system beginning to be widely available in the 1820's,
But the "Flintlock" never really stopped being made.
The issue of available caps and cost affected the market then even as it does to this day.
Many cap-lock rifles languish in safes with no caps, while the flintlock is pulled out and ready to use,,

At least one Ohio maker produced full stock percussion guns well into the percussion era. Ŕead the Association of Ohio Longrifle Collecters on line news letters to ferret it out. I can't tell you which issue it was in.

I believe it was likely the cartridge era that really sent the flintlocks in to obsolescence. It appears it took a while for percussions to over take the flint system but both still saw lots of use into the cartridge age. This is probably because most folks, Appalachians for instance, were rural and often far from sources of cartridges or caps for that matter. And don't forget that $$ was in short supply for these people.

The term “Kentucky “ denotes a muzzleloader generally with a full stock. To say that it is a distinct model only applies for our modern manufacturing. It’s a handy term for conversations but is very vague.
Enjoy your kit.

Actually, the percussion era was very short by the time frame of other ignition systems. Let's talk about common usage vs invention. By the early 1830s caps were beginning to be made reliable, However, the military was still sticking to the tried and true, by that time the flintlock had been around for about 200 years. The rest is history as they say, from the first reliable cap to the self-contained cartridge was less than 30 years.

get Ned Roberts "the muzzleloading cap lock rifle".

Gun Nut said:

I am about to start building a 50 Cal. Traditions Kentucky Rifle kit. It is percussion and I am wondering when the Kentucky Rifle made the transition from Flint Lock to Percussion?? Or is that just a marketing ploy established when kit manufacturing became a "Thing"???

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About the 1820's the new-fangled percussion cap came in; so many great Flint rifles were converted to percussion; nowadays there's lots of scholarship out there and craftsmen who can convert back to flint a nice rifle. Not to mention the selection of locks from L&R, and others.

deerstalkert said:

get Ned Roberts "the muzzleloading cap lock rifle".

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Great suggestion.

realized my answer was or could seen terse or curt. i apologize if it seems that way. firing on 1 cylinder today. or since this is a muzzloading site, firing a short charge. Dry Ball?

1820 we see them, rare. Special brand new gun style. 1830 lots of percussion guns and many being sent west. But lots of flint being sent west in the late 1850s. An English company was making flintlocks for the African trade well in to the 1950s
We think about the frontier as isolated and out of touch. But the latest fashion was moving west since early colonial times, Boone could buy the finest Irish linen. At rendezvous you could get awls and axes, beads, and cloth. Practical stuff. And Chocolate,raisins, new books, spices, ect.
A thousand caps in boxes can be held in one hand, that made a big difference when packing a horse compared to a bag of flint.

By the American Civil War, percussion, muzzle loading firearms and percussion revolvers were already obsolete.

The United States Army didn't begin a wholesale switch to percussion until after the Mexican War, and by 1855 when the US Ordnance Dept basically copied the concept of a .58 rifle from the British Enfield, European countries were already playing around with the idea of the Breechloader. The Sharps rifle existed in the 1850's but was very expensive and not suitable for regular military use.

The percussion era was very, very short in the grand scheme of things because immediately after the Civil War, the Ordnance Dept began to convert unissued 1863 Springfields into breech loaders. The Needle Gun and others were already in use in Europe.

However, it's hard to say when the percussion period actually "ended" given that Belgian reserve troops began WWI with Enfield rifle-muskets, as well as some of the Arab nations like Yemen, that used P53 Enfields into the 1920's.

Even the British still issued Enfield rifle-muskets to Colonial Troops into the 1870's in some cases.

necchi said:

That's a tough question, there really isn't an answer for a specific rifle style making a specific ignition change.
Percussion ignition was "invented" around 1805-07 with the system beginning to be widely available in the 1820's,
But the "Flintlock" never really stopped being made.
The issue of available caps and cost affected the market then even as it does to this day.
Many cap-lock rifles languish in safes with no caps, while the flintlock is pulled out and ready to use,,

Click to expand...

When supplies were really, really thin last year I ended up buying a few pounds of 1F and a bunch of Musket flints, and had fun with my Pedersoli 1795 Springfield for a while because I didn't want to pop off precious Musket caps or #11's that were impossible to find then.

So, I kinda laughed because this was the same reason the US stayed with flinters in the Mexican War, because the Army didn't want to be crippled by percussion cap supply chain issues. You can always find some kind of flint, somewhere and lead balls can be cast or purchased if I just want to go shooting.

I wasn't about to pop off precious "unmentionable" ammunition either , at that time.

Wow! Some very good historic information here. I Thank everyone for their input.

hanshi said:

I believe it was likely the cartridge era that really sent the flintlocks in to obsolescence. It appears it took a while for percussions to over take the flint system but both still saw lots of use into the cartridge age. This is probably because most folks, Appalachians for instance, were rural and often far from sources of cartridges or caps for that matter. And don't forget that $$ was in short supply for these people.

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Up until after WWII flintlock and replacement parts were available in some hardware stores in Western NC

flconch53 said:

Up until after WWII flintlock and replacement parts were available in some hardware stores in Western NC

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Audie Murphy hunted with a flintlock long rifle as a kid , because his family was dirt poor. He was trained by his Dad not to waste a ball by missing and to only take a shot that harvested meat.

andy52 said:

Actually, the percussion era was very short by the time frame of other ignition systems. Let's talk about common usage vs invention. By the early 1830s caps were beginning to be made reliable, However, the military was still sticking to the tried and true, by that time the flintlock had been around for about 200 years. The rest is history as they say, from the first reliable cap to the self-contained cartridge was less than 30 years.

Click to expand...

I believe the convenience and better weatherproofing of the percussion system was a major factor in the demise of the flintlock arms. To keep a flint lock firing reliably requires the shooter to fiddle with it a lot. As newer shooters came along, and the old flintlock guys died off, the convenience of percussion was very appealing to the new guys.
At some point, in all areas, caps would have been easier to come up with than properly sized flints.

smoothshooter said:

I believe the convenience and better weatherproofing of the percussion system was a major factor in the demise of the flintlock arms. To keep a flint lock firing reliably requires the shooter to fiddle with it a lot. As newer shooters came along, and the old flintlock guys died off, the convenience of percussion was very appealing to the new guys.
At some point, in all areas, caps would have been easier to come up with than properly sized flints.

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Plus there was no need for gunmakers , owners or armorers having to worry about lock timing, angles, quality of flints, weather affecting function like you said, low quality powder not being effective in the pan, etc. etc .

Soldiers and civilians could just load the rifle or musket, cap it and fire. All the lock has to do now is effectively pop a cap. There is less skill needed to make the locks.

Gun Nut said:

I am about to start building a 50 Cal. Traditions Kentucky Rifle kit. It is percussion and I am wondering when the Kentucky Rifle made the transition from Flint Lock to Percussion?? Or is that just a marketing ploy established when kit manufacturing became a "Thing"???

Click to expand...

If you can find a copy of The Age Of Firearms by Robert Held I would recommend it.
It’s light, and full of dry humor, it is not encyclopedic. You won’t be reading PhD work. However it does give a good outline of civilian and military gun development from cr 1300 to 1900. And although it mentions guns of the east it concentrates on the UK,France and Central Europe and later America. So it is far from an in depth study, but you will enjoy it and have a good outline.

Stantheman86 said:

Plus there was no need for gunmakers , owners or armorers having to worry about lock timing, angles, quality of flints, weather affecting function like you said, low quality powder not being effective in the pan, etc. etc .

Soldiers and civilians could just load the rifle or musket, cap it and fire. All the lock has to do now is effectively pop a cap. There is less skill needed to make the locks.

Click to expand...

The cap lock is the demonstration of the triumph of technology to replace the skill sets of the flint lock shooter with the mechanical reliability of the hammer to strike the cap on the nipple to make the rifle fire. Sure, the flash channel has to be kept clean and the cap must be set securely on the cone, but this is a mechanical function that doesn't require all the integrated skills to make a traditional rifle fire.