Traditional Muzzleloading Association

Traditional Firearms => Caplock Long Guns => Topic started by: mike on December 23, 2009, 05:48:02 PM

Title: CVA Mountain Rifle not firing cap
Post by: mike on December 23, 2009, 05:48:02 PM

I have an old Mountain Rifle, made in USA, that doesn't fire consistently on the first hammer fall.  Usually it will fire on the second hammer fall.  It has set in the corner of the closet for years and I just recently started shooting again.  As I remember it did this occasionally but I chalked it up to a bad cap.  I have read on a couple of posts that CVA locks don't have the most reliable main spring, do they ever just weaken a little or do they usually break completely?

Mike

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Post by: Captchee on December 23, 2009, 06:07:00 PM

naa most times they dont break , just weaken .
 you might take a good look at yur nipple first  before replacing  the spring though .
sound to me like it might be starting to mushroom alittle and thus the cap isnt setting all the way down on the nipple .  so on the first fall it pushes down and on the second is able to go off

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Post by: BEAVERMAN on December 23, 2009, 07:43:19 PM

first thing I thought of also Cap! most times when this happens on a capper it's the nipple

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Post by: Riley/MN on December 23, 2009, 08:06:56 PM

Yep, I put a hot-shot in mine. Works great.

Err, ahh I mean. That piece of junk isn't worth the price of a new nipple... Best to just put it on the trade blanket (pm me first).

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Post by: Shadow Hawk on December 23, 2009, 09:31:38 PM

yep the same problems happens on cap and ball revolvers. over time with the amount of shootings i did i ended up mushrooming all 6 nipples.

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Post by: mike on December 25, 2009, 08:32:06 AM

Thank you gentlemen.  I have a new nipple in the rifle.  I had to have the bolster re-threaded and an oversize nipple installed.  The original blew out.  
Is it possible that the new nipple is just a tad on the large side and the caps just need to be forced down a bit?

Mike

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Post by: Captchee on December 25, 2009, 08:52:10 AM

make sure you have #11 caps and not #10 .
 something you can do is take a needle file or some sand paper and touch up around the head of the nipple  so as the cap will set down alittle farther .

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Post by: Riley/MN on December 25, 2009, 09:01:40 AM

Check the hammer alignment to nipple as well.

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Post by: Gordon H.Kemp on January 03, 2010, 12:42:24 PM

Speaking of hammer aliignment, check to see that the hanner isn't rubbing the stock, also you may be overtighting the lock mounting screw(s).

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Post by: flintlock62 on January 26, 2010, 09:58:27 AM

With all the above information stated, you may also want to try RWS 1075 Plus caps.  They are the hottest.

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Post by: ridjrunr on January 26, 2010, 12:46:19 PM

Had the same problem a while back and eventually upon firing ,the hammer would actually get blown back to 1/2 cock. Eventually I bought an L&R flint lock for it. A pretty easy change over,but the new lock was far from ready to go. Needed alot of tuning,in fact I am still tweeking it.
ridjrunr