Ramrod question

[tryinhard]

I bought a rought T/C Hawken to clean up & sell. The ramrod is broken in half. How would a guy go about taking the ends off to fit them to a hardwood dowel? I'm going to refinish the stock anyway. Also, I'm finding 45 engraved on some of the brass. Could this have been a kit gun? The barrel is a warning era 50 caliber. Thanks!

 

[bubba.50]

Measure the length of the ends from the bottom of the recessed end, subtract that from total length of ramrod. Measur depth of each end & mark that distance on yer dowel and rasp it down ‘til yer ends fit. Epoxy them on & cross-drill/pin the ends on.

As their was some level of hand-fitting involved in the assembly of these guns, the numbers scratched on the brass pieces could either be the last digits of the gun’s serial number to keep all the parts together or an inspectors mark.

 

[Carbon 6]

For removing the brass ends, I use a propane torch to heat the brass ends, burning any glue or epoxy, I continue to heat until the wood inside the ends carbonizes and shrinks, then they come right off.
Note: The ends may be cross pinned so you'll have to carefully drive the pin out.


Also: Great care must be taken if selecting a hardware store dowel rod. The dowel must be diligently examined for grain run-out. 99.9% of hardware store dowels are unfit for ramrod use.
You can order hickory rod blanks from Track of the wolf. (buy several)

 

[Black Hand]

The ramrod is broken in half. How would a guy go about taking the ends off to fit them to a hardwood dowel?

The ends on commercial rammers appear to be glued on - you can try heating the brass end enough for the epoxy to let go. Clean up the inside, fit to a ramrod blank, glue AND PIN.

Beware of using any hardwood dowel as a rammer. Find a good-quality HICKORY ramrod blank...

 

[necchi]

Sage advise from the 3 above,
I'll climb on board to and warn against using a "dowel" from the hardware store.
Grain run-out can cause a split will using it and a nasty wound in someones hand.

 

[sawyer04]

Dowels, not good. If hickory is available, it is kind of fun to split and form a ramrod pulling through a steel plate with the proper size diameter. I would just purchase a ramrod is the rifle is for resale. Dowel rods are chancy.

 

[45man]

Buy hickory from Track of the Wolf. Pin the brass.

 

[Zonie]

I bought a rought T/C Hawken to clean up & sell. The ramrod is broken in half. How would a guy go about taking the ends off to fit them to a hardwood dowel? I'm going to refinish the stock anyway. Also, I'm finding 45 engraved on some of the brass. Could this have been a kit gun? The barrel is a warning era 50 caliber. Thanks!

Finding a split ramrod on a commercially made muzzleloader doesn't surprise me.
The factories seem to have the idea that a ramrod is more of a decoration rather than something that is needed to load the gun so, the ramrods they furnish almost always have grain runout. (Thompson Center was notorious for doing this and CVA and Traditions aren't far behind them.)

Ideally, the wood grain will run uncut from one end of the ramrod to the other. When this happens you won't see any partial "rings" on the surface of the wood. It basically will look like one unblemished piece of wood.
About the only way to achieve this is to split the wood from a long piece of wood letting the woods grain dictate where it splits.

Unfortunately, almost all wooden dowels are not made this way. The wood is put into a sanding machine and ground round reguardless of the direction of the wood grain. This leads to grain runout or "breakout".
Grain runout looks like elongated rings on the surface of the wood, like the picture below.

If you see this, don't use it for a ramrod. Very often, when pressure is applied to it when loading the gun, the wood will crack and split along those grains leaving a very sharp spear. More than a few people have had those spearlike ends puncture completely thru their hand.

In the posts above, pinning was mentioned.
Backing up a bit, almost all of the modern commercial factories just glue the ends onto their ramrods. This is a very poor practice because if someone is using the ramrod to clean their gun with a brush or trying to pull a stuck "dry ball" that was loaded without any gunpowder under it, the glue will fail and the metal end of the ramrod will pull off leaving it WAY down in the barrel.

To keep this from happening a good ramrod will have the metal ends "pinned" in place.

To do this, after you've filed the wood down so it fits into the hole in the metal end go ahead and glue it in place but next, pin it with a small brass or steel pin.
I recommend using a wire size of 1/16" made out of brass.
These 1/16: brass wires can be bought at any good hardware store or almost any hobby shop.

To install the pins, drill a 1/16" hole thru the metal ramrod end about 1/8" from where it shoulders on the ramrod.
Then, using a pocket knife or a countersink form a small tapered entrance to the hole on both sides of the metal end.
Cut the wire so it is about 1/16" longer than the ramrods diameter and push it thru the hole so it is sticking out both sides about 1/32"

Rest one end of the pin on a hard metal surface and using a small hammer, tap the upper end of the pin to force it down into the countersunk hole.
Turn the ramrod 180 degrees and repeat the tapping on the pin to force that end down into the countersink.

Now, use a small file to file off any of the pin that didn't go into the countersink leaving the end of the pin flush with the material around it.

This is what you should end up with.

 

[Black Hand]

Best practice is to pin across the grain.

 

[tenngun]

Finnising nails work well as a pin. As above Track Of The Wolf sells good blanks. Buy the hickory not the rammin. They also sell brass pins and steel. Brass will blend in well with the ends.

 

[necchi]

Finding a split ramrod on a commercially made muzzleloader doesn't surprise me.
The factories seem to have the idea that a ramrod is more of a decoration rather than something that is needed to load the gun so, the ramrods they furnish almost always have grain runout. (Thompson Center was notorious for doing this)

That's why I made a post in this thread. I have a scar on the palm of my right hand today, that was left from my very first rookie year 35+ years ago from a TC Renegade wood ramrod. Nobody was there to teach me the right way or wrong. I had to learn myself and I did it the hard way!
To this day I don't trust a wood rod. I know-I know,, they work just fine if used properly and I'll use one. But ALL of my personal guns either have a fiberglass rod or a dedicated "range rod" for common use.

 

[Grenadier1758]

With respect to the T/C kit guns, the first letter in the serial number is a K.

Don't use a hardware store dowel as a ramrod. I also don't like to recommend a fiberglass rod as the side can be very abrasive and cause early wear at the muzzle.

 

[Carbon 6]

Nobody was there to teach me the right way or wrong.

Just the other day, I was watching this feller on the "youtube" He was shooting a new fowler that he bought. It had a wooden ramrod and he made some comment about replacing it with fiberglass. He the proceeded to load using both hands, hand over hand with gun between his knees as if he was climbing a gym rope and he was stand in a pit full of crocodiles. A couple shots later, he broke that rod.

That is definitely the wrong way.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Finnising nails work well as a pin. As above Track Of The Wolf sells good blanks. Buy the hickory not the rammin. They also sell brass pins and steel. Brass will blend in well with the ends.

I have used brazing rod, brass nails and copper electrical wire. I like the wire the best as it peens and sands flat with ease. Brazing rod can be very hard to work.