I've been eyeing Uberti's Remington 1875 revolver for a while now and was thinking it would be pretty cool to get one in 44-40 and shoot black powder. I figured this would be as authentic as I could get to a real "period" Remington as possible without shooting an original.
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Anyone around here ever try this caliber in this gun using black powder? How did it run? Any issues with fouling? How does it compare to a S&W or Colt of the same "time period" and black powder?
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Thanks,

Patrick<O:p

Hey Patrick,

A .44-40 in BP is just about authentic as it gets! Whether in the Remington-style frame or Colt-style.

While having no experience other than a couple friends shooting the Remmys, I do shoot 2 different Colt-style revolvers in BP. I have a pair of "P" revolvers, BP type frames in .357, and a pair of 1871 Open Tops in .38 spl/Colt. I had a pair of 1860 Armies (.44) & 1862 Police (.36) revolvers I used for a while as well.

The main problem I've seen and been told regarding the Remmys, is that the cylinder base pins are a smaller diameter than the Colt-style guns, and in the cap & ball frames, the Remmy pins don't have concentric grooves like the Colts. (These grooves allow the fouling to "build up" longer, letting the Colt type guns run longer without binding).

Lots of BP lube helps, on the bullets (using bullets specifically designed for BP, having somewhat larger lube grooves than smokless types helps) and wiped on the base pin before shooting. The 1st, 2nd & latest variations on Colts have a separate cylinder pin bushing which was & is their solution to keep binding to a minimum when shooting BP!

Some Remmy shooters said that wiping the cylinders and applying lube to the pins after every 15-20 rounds in competition keeps them going. Others
claimed they had no problems during a whole match. Different makers have different tolerances, so YMMV.

With my Colt-style guns, I can go a whole match and not have any problems - using plenty of lube (specifically for BP) on the bullets, and I occasionally wipe the face of the cylinder off and spritz a little Ballistol/water mix on the pins.

The S&W style Schofields are a whole different ballgame. Everyone that I know who have tried BP in them, don't use BP in them anymore. The tolerances in the Schofields are too tight, and binding occurs within just a few rounds. They are wonderful with smokeless, though. Rate high on the cool factor scale! One thing - They do fit better in larger hands, though. They were awkward and didn't point well for me, but the fella that owned them was 6'8" & probably 300 lbs! He shot them extremely well.

If you get a chance, try before you buy.

One thing about the .44-40 cartridge. Being a bottleneck case, and the metal in the neck being thinner than just about every other caliber, it's real easy to crush the brass when reloading if you aren't careful (been there, done that!:mad:). But the bottleneck shape does help to prevent any blowback in chambers (especially rifles), the guns generally end up cleaner at the end of the day than those of straight wall calibers.

The original cases were made different, called balloon head cases. They actually held 40 grains of powder due to larger volume capacity (read - thin thin case walls all around), but were not near as strong as today's brass.

Hope this helps you some! Now, go out and blast away!

. . . One thing about the .44-40 cartridge. Being a bottleneck case, and the metal in the neck being thinner than just about every other caliber, it's real easy to crush the brass when reloading if you aren't careful (been there, done that!:mad:). . .
Good point there, Belle! Might add that due to the thin brass in the neck, it is very important that the bullet be carefully aligned with the axis of the case before being seated or the bullet will seat crooked and the cartridge may not chamber. There is simply not enough brass in the neck to help guide the bullet while seating and the case neck will simply bulge. Have tried RCBS and Hornady dies and the Redding competition bullet seating die on the .44-40. The Hornady New Dimension dies with the alignment sleeve on the seater die worked the best for me. Unfortunately it was the last choice of my die sets for this caliber. While I really like the .44-40 (authentic Western cartridge), it is the most work intensive revolver cartridge that I load.:)

I started CAS shooting the 44-40 and it always shot cleaner than any straightwall cartridge. Cost was too much of a factory so now I shoot .45 caliber. One way I keep the fouling down is to use Triple 7. I know, it's not "real" black powder but it shoots clean with all the smoke and boom and doesn't require a lot of soft lube as the hard blue lube works better with it. I also load the short Cowboy .45 Special with about 13.2 grains of 777 and a 230 grain round nose bullet for shooting BP out of my 75's. Again, it works great and fouling is at a min.

I've been eyeing Uberti's Remington 1875 revolver for a while now and was thinking it would be pretty cool to get one in 44-40 and shoot black powder. I figured this would be as authentic as I could get to a real "period" Remington as possible without shooting an original.
<O:p</O:p
Anyone around here ever try this caliber in this gun using black powder? How did it run? Any issues with fouling? How does it compare to a S&W or Colt of the same "time period" and black powder?
<O:p</O:p

Thanks,

Patrick<O:p