Is there a safe way to dry fire a percussion revolver?

[bubba.50]

No! Striking a nipple, solid or regular, with the hammer repeatedly will deform the nose of the hammer.

Putting something like an aluminum or otherwise empty cap on the nipple will still have the same effect as above.

Removing the nipples may lead to other issues. It could let the breast of the hammer strike the frame and doing this repeatedly could work harden the hammer. Back in the 60s I used to hang out in a gun store where a friend who shot competitive pistol worked. He knew of 2 club members who had broken the hammers on their S&Ws from work hardening after dry firing countless times.

I have some rubber vacuum tubing from an auto parts store that is a snug fit on the nipples. I find a length that just clears the frame works for me as it compresses enough under the hammer blow to allow the action to reset. As mentioned earlier leather or rubber in the hammer channel works fine too.

The vacuum hose is what I was also going to suggest.

 

[necchi]

The vacuum hose is what I was also going to suggest.

I hear ya and that makes sense, but most today don't know what yer talkin about.

p.s. Folks, it's a piece of tubing, that you would take and cut to just the right size,,
,, but that's just it,, ya gotta sit down and cut it, too just the right size.

p.p.s. you can find the stuff in stores and buy it by the foot.

 

[TrapperDude]

I feel like you'd be needlessly beating up the internals of a revolver that was never designed for 1000's and 1000's of cycles when they were made originally, and a repro of such would also carry these characteristics over.

Dry firing the percussion revolver you actually shoot is just going to eventually turn your gun into a half-broken beater.

I seem to remember John Wesley Hardin having a pair of Double Action revolvers he used just for dry firing,late in his life because he knew better than to beat on his actual carry guns with 100s of cycles per day.

It just seems like a diminishing return to me, I feel like if you were that serious about your skills with a cap and baller you'd just live fire it and actually train , if improving your marksmanship is something you want to do.

If you want to practice drawing and cocking, such as for CAS matches with percussion revolvers, you wouldn't need to use the same guns you use in the matches and could use a couple brassers just to work on drawing and cocking. There really isn't going to be enough of a difference here to matter from gun to gun unless you're competing at a World Class level against guys like Dr Nemeth with a highly tuned Walker or something.

Well, marksmanship and training, in general, are the same for BP revolvers and unmentionables, both, and dry fire is very highly recommended for unmentionables. It stands to reason, therefore, that dry fire with BP revolvers would be the smart thing to do as well.

You don't have to be training for high level competition to integrate dry fire into your training cycles with BP revolvers any more than you have to be training for high level competition with unmentionables.

As far as only live firing goes, percussion cap limitations are an important factor--as several posters have already mentioned here. Additionally, dry firing provides more reps than what you might achieve with live fire, given how many times the average person can get to the range, how many rounds can be fired at the range and how long it takes to clean a revolver after the range sessions.

Parts can be replaced when they get worn. If you wear out a revolver from extensive dry fire, then it would also be worn out from the same number of live rounds fired if one were just to shoot live as you suggested. The bottom line is that wear will occur with extensive use, whether it is with live rounds or with dry fire.

 

[45D]

Unless, as many do, you have your guns "tuned". An out of the box revolver just won't run like a tuned version . . . so "wearing one out" won't happen.

Since I set them up with a hammer/ nipple contact , a pair of cyls without nipples to swap out would give you the ability to dry fire as much as you want with basically no wear to the revolvers. The springs installed and packed with Mobil1 will last the life of the revolver.

Mike

 

[TrapperDude]

Unless, as many do, you have your guns "tuned". An out of the box revolver just won't run like a tuned version . . . so "wearing one out" won't happen.

Since I set them up with a hammer/ nipple contact , a pair of cyls without nipples to swap out would give you the ability to dry fire as much as you want with basically no wear to the revolvers. The springs installed and packed with Mobil1 will last the life of the revolver.

Mike

Cool idea just taking out the nipples. I don't know why that wasn't already mentioned. It's not like they're hard to remove and then replace. That cushioning on the frame that's been mentioned would round out the whole deal.

 

[Eterry]

Is it safe?
Yes.
Is it hard on a revolver?
Yes.
Do I do it?
Rarely.

I pull the cylinder and keep dry firing to a minimum.

 

[M. De Land]

M De Land, those photos really helped. I didn't understand what you were describing in just your written post. Actually I work in the window industry (Vinyl Extrusion Company) and I can get some of these shims from our fabrication shop ! I think I'll pick some up the next time I am in the office...

You won't ever wear out the gun or harm a cone from dry fire if you keep these in use , properly adjusted and the gun routinely lubed. No work hardening of parts at all and if anything it just smooths the action from use.

 

[Snydly]

Yes. Most people do not realize the ROA is designed so the hammer does not actually hit the nipple. The hammer is stopped by the frame just a tiny fraction from the nipple but close enough to hit and ignite the cap. Dry fire away.

One of my friends tried that. After just one afternoon of dry firing, he had go replace every nipple!

 

[Mike in FL]

The best dry practice is to use caps. They will make enough bang to help you learn not to flinch. Do without some luxury item you want and buy the caps. Since the gun won't move from recoil, you can see if or how much your sights got out of center when the hammer falls. You will develop the follow thru we all want.

 

[cynthialee]

The best dry practice is to use caps. They will make enough bang to help you learn not to flinch. Do without some luxury item you want and buy the caps. Since the gun won't move from recoil, you can see if or how much your sights got out of center when the hammer falls. You will develop the follow thru we all want.

that's what I am saying
just fire caps

 

[Uncle Miltie]

A properly set up revolver will have just enough clearance to detonate the cap without touching the nipple. Dry firing a revolver like this does not hurt the gun, hammer or nipple.

 

[Old-Duckman]

OK so I just 3D printed some dry fire caps for my Uberti 1851 Remington…they work great, I have only fired them half a dozen times so far and they are holding up well. I will post when they get broken as they have have not been tested long enough to put them through a real cycle test…but they are promising!

Dimensions/material:

7.5mm OD
5.0mm ID
Height (or length…whatever you want to call it) 6mm
Thickness on the surface that the hammer hits 1.4mm
Material: Raise 3D Premium PLA

You could shrink that ID down some as I kept them a little loose so they wouldn’t get stuck on the nipples.

I think that the height is right, when I looked at them once I pulled them off the nipples it appeared that the “wear” was occurring where the base rested on the nipples. In other words, the top of the nipples did not contact the underside of the “snap caps”. I believe that this contributed to them not being destroyed on the first shot.

I hope some of you with 3D printers or access to one will try these out and post your results and/or improvements.

 

[Old-Duckman]

Forgot to mention that I have replaced the Uberti nipples with Slix.
Plus, I’m printing one now with a 4.9 ID. I’ll post when I have settled on a more ideal ID.

 

[Johnny Tremain]

I have one of those cap making kits. I used 6 cap hulls with no powder in them. they stay on the nipples.

 

[Old-Duckman]

So I’ve been fooling around with different IDs and have settled on 4.8 for the time being. 4.7 held onto the nipple but took more of a beating so I went back to the 4.8.

After about 25 to 30 cycles, the cap has mushroomed on both the top and bottom ends and now you can see the imprint of the top edge of the nipple on the inside of the cap. This doesn’t seem to cause any harm to the cap and of course the nipple is unharmed as it still has plenty of “cushion “ between it and the hammer. The mushrooming has only changed the length by a maximum of 0.2mm. I continued to cycle for at least 10 more times and no further change to the cap was evident.

I consider this a success and now have a cheap, safe and easy method for dry firing. Obviously I’m not counting the exact number of cycles but if/when they break, I’ll print another set and post an approximate cycle count.

If you print some of these for yourself, be aware that if you pull back the hammer with the muzzle of the handgun pointing toward the sky, the cap across from the percussion cap loading cutout in the frame may fall off the nipple and thus expose the uncapped nipple to a hammer strike if you didn’t notice it missing.

I’m happy…

 

[TrapperDude]

So I’ve been fooling around with different IDs and have settled on 4.8 for the time being. 4.7 held onto the nipple but took more of a beating so I went back to the 4.8.

After about 25 to 30 cycles, the cap has mushroomed on both the top and bottom ends and now you can see the imprint of the top edge of the nipple on the inside of the cap. This doesn’t seem to cause any harm to the cap and of course the nipple is unharmed as it still has plenty of “cushion “ between it and the hammer. The mushrooming has only changed the length by a maximum of 0.2mm. I continued to cycle for at least 10 more times and no further change to the cap was evident.

I consider this a success and now have a cheap, safe and easy method for dry firing. Obviously I’m not counting the exact number of cycles but if/when they break, I’ll print another set and post an approximate cycle count.

If you print some of these for yourself, be aware that if you pull back the hammer with the muzzle of the handgun pointing toward the sky, the cap across from the percussion cap loading cutout in the frame may fall off the nipple and thus expose the uncapped nipple to a hammer strike if you didn’t notice it missing.

I’m happy…

That mushrooming is just an indicator that the cap is cushioning the blow. Unless it starts to crack along the radius of that mushroomed area, that shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Old-Duckman]

One last thing, I went back to 4.7 ID. The caps will not fall off and seem to take no more of a beating than the 4.8…however you will have to use something to pry them off of the nipples. A small jeweler’s screw driver works as I would assume a small pair of needle nose pliers would As well.

Just some printer settings: Infill 100%, layer thickness 0.1mm.

 

[springfield art]

No! Striking a nipple, solid or regular, with the hammer repeatedly will deform the nose of the hammer.

Putting something like an aluminum or otherwise empty cap on the nipple will still have the same effect as above.

Removing the nipples may lead to other issues. It could let the breast of the hammer strike the frame and doing this repeatedly could work harden the hammer. Back in the 60s I used to hang out in a gun store where a friend who shot competitive pistol worked. He knew of 2 club members who had broken the hammers on their S&Ws from work hardening after dry firing countless times.

I have some rubber vacuum tubing from an auto parts store that is a snug fit on the nipples. I find a length that just clears the frame works for me as it compresses enough under the hammer blow to allow the action to reset. As mentioned earlier leather or rubber in the hammer channel works fine too.

Good info thanks.