Original Civil War revolvers vs original cartridges: Colt Army, Remington, Starr, Adams

hello YouTube uses cap-and-ball here and it's a very special day because I have four original percussion revolvers from the time of the American Civil War they are all original they're only shooting condition which means that we have a beautiful chance to compare them with the same cartridge because during the American Civil War even if revolver makers maker was a cartridge maker as well it was absolutely not certain that the soldier received the same brand of cartridge to his revolver now we had the truly production of the Johnston and doe bullet eros con is making this bullet molds and they are hundred percent accurate three pros of the original civil war time bullets with joseline doe bullet is 217 grains weight and its largest diameter is 0.46 to which is very close to the original it has a beautiful heel just like the original head the diameter of the heel is zero point four three zero which means that it will easily fit into the chamber of any of these forty four professional robbers some better some not so good but this means that we can we can have a really good picture about the external ballistics of these revolvers compared to each other and as the cartridge is the same now that's a clear situation for further research in external ballistics I purchased a ballistic radar this ballistic radar is very useful if you're shooting historic alarms because you can calculate the bc of the bullet this ballistic coefficient of the bullet which is very very necessary if you are calculating the trajectory along the distances now this ballistic radar is measuring the velocity of the bullet not just at the muscle but also at several other distances as well actually at five distances so up to 25 meters where I'm going to shoot this revolver I will have five data fall so I'm going to be able to calculate the bc which is good for further researches the Johnston and doe combustible envelope cartridge was patented by Algernon Cay Johnston of Middleton Connecticut and Lawrence adore topic of Kansas in 1861 they approached LM a Potter of New York City to put their invention into use in the production of military cartridges for the u.s. government when we designed our percussion revolver cartridge formers we paid attention to copy the size of the original cartridge as much as possible the internal volume of the case holds 24 grains of 2's twist powder so the volume of the original cartridge could be close to this one forming the cartridge with a former is piece of cake if you have experience you can roll one cartridge in a minute the paper I'm using is called hair-curling paper but anything paper will work without neat rating the pre-cut sheets with some glue on one edge are rolled on the devil first in one layer when we are done we apply some glue to the base of the cartridge to accept with the closing sheet this small piece of paper is cut from the same kind of paper as the envelope now simply insert the devil into the former a few turns and the paper case is ready now it's time to fill it with the powder charge the last step is to apply some glue to the base of the bullet and insert it to its place and there you go your cottage is ready waiting to be deep lubed the composition of the loom was one part of beeswax and three parts of tallow just as it was done in the Watervliet arsenal the other factor I'm not going to check during this during this whole process is the subjective factors so I'm not going to care about let's say let's say how economic this revolver is which is very important if you're if you're looking for accuracy I'm actually going to fire the guns from the rest to to exclude all the human errors I'm also not taking care about the logistics when you're gonna Army's adopting guns it is a large as the accuracy and the strengths of the cottage that is important but but the logistics is just as important actually it's the maintenance the easiness of maintenance the the availability of availability of spare parts the cost the method of and speed of production these are all very important factors of course I'm not going to compare them I'm also not paying attention now to the to the mechanism of this revolvers I'm not going to compare which is more advanced which is less advanced but of course there are some points that really affect the accuracy and and and the operation of the gun so this has to be mentioned but technically I'm not going to compare the mechanics Lord the the quality of the materials they were using because I cannot do that so what we can actually compare is the accuracy and of course the external valise ticks so the energy velocity and stuff like that so let's follow me to this beautiful historical journey today I like in the case of cavalry carbines the government concentrated only on to rev other calibers the 36 Navy and the 44 army calibers in theory all four revolvers here should have fired the same cartridge with the same accuracy but ballistics is not only depending on nominal caliber so this will remained only a wish and ladies and gentlemen this is the 1860 Colt army as we call it today by the time it was made it was only called the new army revolver or the revolver in army caliber the 1861 6160 two numbers were added by later collectors they were not called this way by the time they were manufactured this is a complete new family with the 1861 Navy and the 1862 called pocket revolvers all made with the same production method which on the material which God called the silver steel with spring tampering according to called this give an extra force an extra power to the shot we'll check that out how the external ballot ballistics of the struggle that is different from the other 44 calibers the US government bought around 130,000 pieces of this gun and the Confederate States also bought through open market or or agent so this is quite popular revolvers by the time of the American Civil War my original 1860 Colt army was manufactured in 1862 based on the cartouche on the grip the main inspector of the arm was C Samuel Leonard it was delivered to the US Army the overall condition of the revolver is good the bluing nearly completely vanished leaving a light gray color quite common on the 1860 Colt family besides the main inspectors monogram the small letters on the main parts of the revolver indicate the military acceptance the revolver has matching serials so none of the main parts were replaced the grip of the 1860 army is quite comfortable but the sight picture is not the best rear sight is a notch on the hammer it's quite small and when the hammer starts to wear the height of the aim will move the bore is 0.45 6-4 57 in the grooves and four four eight four four nine between the lands the twist is progressive with seven groups the diameter of the mass of the chamber is 0.45 seven and it's shrinking towards the bridge altogether the Colt army was a very good sidearm of its age it was vulnerable to cap jam but let's not forget that we are in the beginning the very beginning of the multi shot era or my shooting session started with snapping a few caps on the nipples to get rid of the oil from the chambers by Jocelyn dough cartridges fit well into the chambers and they were very easy to load [Music] even if you're loading your percussion revolver with paper cartridges it still takes a lot of time I'm pretty sure that in the heat of the battle the average soldier seldom had the time to reload I was happy to see that the recess of the loading planner completely fits the Johnson and all bullets so it did not destroy the point the cause of my revolver are replaced in new ones and the air WS caps are a bit large for them so I squeeze each of them to have a tight fit my cult are we fired the Johnston and O bullets with an average of 202 m/s 'm with an extreme spread of 20 4.5 m/s 'm the average muzzle energy was 288 choose the group of the best 5 shots could be covered with a 32 point 4 square centimetre rectangle and this was the last access code so alive as he died at the age of 47 in 1862 january and he was in deep depression by the time because he just could not overcome the death of his daughter and he was also suffering from rheumatism so i don't wish to anybody that kind of death even if he was a successful businessman in the west man well the way he died no Abin easier thousand star was only 17 when he enlisted to the Navy and he made a beautiful service career he was mustered out from the Army or he was retired from the Army by the time the Civil War started it was equal to service but he refused to come in fact he established his own firearms factory from eight hundred thousand US dollars and started to manufacture arms from the US government a part of the business were revolvers percussion revolvers well this is his double action 44 caliber revolver he manufactured this toggle other is 36 cutter and 44 caliber and he sold this to the US government the double action model was based on a patent of 1858 but the single action version of this revolver also existed it was manufactured from 1863 because the handling and the operation of this gun was just considered too complicated for that every soldiers so they reverted back to the single action system well I'm pretty sure that this is the the the least accurate revolver of all the four we have before I should I can tell it to you because the diameter of the internal diameter of the bore and the internal diameter of the chambers are larger compared to the others which means that if you know the same cartridge then it will be loose in the bore loose in the chamber start manufacture his own cartridges for these revolvers now the US government bought only fifty thousand of them this technically meant that these revolvers were fed with the same cottages as the courts and the Remington's so probably this is why they were so inaccurate also if you check the back of the cylinder you see that there are no fire shears between the nipples which means that spark of one nipple can enter the flash hole of the other one if the cap falls off so but probably this was also a reason why so many chain fires occurred with these revolvers although it's a good construction it's a solid frame construction it is very easy to disassemble the gun and to remove the cylinder you just have to ask through this small screw here and then you can remove the cylinder it's a good design but it's over complicated compared to the others this star revolver is also a Marshall II marked piece and I really have to say that I completely understand why it was not favoured by the soldiers the system is mainly designed for DEA use and the hammer cannot be cut the same way as it can be done on other percussion revolvers first the front trigger must be pulled a bit to disengage the cylinder lock and the other hammer can be pulled to [ __ ] the action in sa mode the rear trigger is used for firing the gun there's actually a small switch on the trigger for selecting the firing mode just as in the case of cults the rear sight is located on the hammer and it's really really small even if the system is over complicated the disassembly of the gun is quite ingenious it takes only a few seconds to remove the cylinder the caliber of the star revolver is actually larger than the normal 44 caliber the chamber mass is 4 6 4 diameter but it's shrinking towards the breach the land to land diameter of the bore is 0.45 4 inches but it is zero point four seven nine four eight zero in the grooves the rifling has six grooves with one turning 40 inches to straight the average muzzle velocity of the star a wall that was 157 m/s M with a muzzle energy of 172 point 5 joules the extreme spread of the velocity was 26 m/s 'm the group of the best 5 shots could be covered with a 200 and 1.6 square centimetre rectangle and that's an 1856 model then one atom struggle of the ladies and gentlemen in 54 caliber as the British call it well that's the same as the 44 car nearly the same as the 44 caliber of the American rebels the survivor was patented by Robert Adams in 1851 it was originally and double action only system which means that you pull the trigger it rotates the cylinder and fires the gun it could not be conquered manually in 1856 an officer of the Royal Engineers called Frederick Berman redesign the system to make it single action and double action what are the benefits of this revolver first of all it has a solid frame and a solid frame and the barrel are machined from the same steel which makes it a very strong design second it is can be fired single action and double action the hammer is hitting the caps through a small hole on the frame which means it is safe from from particles of kept falling into the action it is a five shooter at a six shooter so we have one less chamber but it can still be carried safely because it has a small safety that engages in a restless recess on the back of the cylinder so it can be carried with five chambers loaded another benefit of this system is that you can easily remove the cylinder just by pulling just the pin cylinder axis pin forward and also there's an info important feature of this gun that the hammer is not in direct contact with the hand so when you actually fire the gun and the gas is through the touch hole are bouncing back the hammer it will not move the hand and the hand will not hit the ratchet on the back of the cylinder meaning that the parts will not wear as fast as on in the case of the court or ramming Torrell others this is the ingenious design let's not forget that in 1851 and also in 56 the locking mechanism and rotating mechanism of the quote and Remington revolvers which we see later on the Remington revolvers was still protected so Robert Adams was genius the permanence traveller was adopted by the British Army the Russian army the Dutch army but it was so selection in the American Civil War it was imported by both and also it was manufactured in the US by Massachusetts arms and they supplied the government with 36 caliber versions all together the Pomona dempster Grover is a very comfortable and straight for our design the site is unknown moving part it is part of the solid frame and he's giving a beautiful sight picture this pistol handles very well thanks to the ergonomic grip and it's really well balanced the bore is 0.45 7 inches in the grooves and zero point four four two four four three between the lens the twist rate is progressive with three grooves the mouth of the chamber is 0.46 four inches but it shrinks best at 1 centimeter deep it is already zero point four four five inches rendering loading very hard the loading lever is less comfortable than the case of the American rebels proving that the original British cottages were under sized the British do everything the opposite way so this gun is loaded on the left side of the frame the average muzzle velocity of the beam on Adams revolvers 166 meters per second and with the muzzle energy of 192 Jews the extreme spread of the muzzle velocity was 32 meters per second 'm the group of best four shots could be covered with a rectangle of two hundred and forty three point one square centimeter and this is a Remington New Model Army revolver it's a gentleman and its history is strongly connected to the history of court because up until 1862 courts position was rock-solid he had beautiful political connections so he was protected but in 1862 he died and also in 1862 the US government established the Commission called oven hot Commission to review all the contracts that the army had Army and the Navy had this was necessary as they realized that this work will be much longer than it was expected and so the logistics had to be rationalized they met a lafalot Remington on the 27th April 1862 the remington made an excellent offer for them to make a solid frame 44 caliber percussion revolver for 12 US dollars apiece this was much better than the court offer which means that the US government could now change from the court contract to remington contract and that's my marshall amok ramming tour revolver manufactured in 1863 the key features of this revolver are the removable axis pin allowing the fast disassembly of the gun and the solid frame the sights are on the moving parts also better than uncaught but the internal SI mechanism is a copy of the code method the bore has five groups the twist rate is progressive faster at the muzzle than at the breech the lentil and diameter is zero point four four zero four four one the groove to groove diameter is zero point four five six four five seven the chamber mouse is zero point four five six four five seven and it's shrinking towards the bridge the Remington fired the Johnson and doe bullets with an average velocity of 190 m/s 'm resulting 255 juice of muzzle energy the extreme spread of the velocity was 18.9 m/s 'm the group of best 5 shots could be covered with a rectangle of 22.5 square centimeters firing these revolvers with origin or cottages was an excellent adventure this short test proved that the remington sand the coats are nearly equal with the Johnson and O bullets I created a simple table to summarize the measure of values so we can distribute the code but as among these beautiful ladies it starts with muzzle velocity velocity is an excellent measure for showing how well the refer you to Liza's the energies of the black powder and the clear winner here is called so ladies and gentlemen probably Colin as Sam was not lying in his marketing and if caught one the velocity contest he will be in the energy contest as well leaving cold with two gold medals but let's check the extreme spread now the difference between the highest and lowest muzzle velocity this is mainly depending on the condition of the chamber so probably this is the less important indicator for us now but that's the point for Remington finally to cover the lead and ladies and gentlemen now we arrived to accuracy or most noble measure and although it was a very equal competition between court and Remington finally Remington took over the lead with a slightly better group so the winners of today's show are the Remington and the Colt and I really have to say that regarding the external ballistics experience we just had they are comparable they are head-on-head absolutely I really have to say that polls are really accurate guns with the Johnson and the cartridges but let's not forget that the solid frame of the Remington having the sight on no moving parts they are really more advanced if the edge of the colt where's the revolver I lose accuracy also the percussion-cap particles can easily fall into the action of a Colt revolver causing the revolver to Jam which means that altogether the Remington is a better arm but as I said regarding the accuracy and external ballistics they are head-on-head so ladies and gentlemen thank you very much for watching you have been watching the cap and a youtube channel if you like what I do then please subscribe also like this video and also please comment if you have any information additional information for this topic if you wish to support me and you can support me then please do it through patreon you can find a link to the patreon site under this video as well but you can also buy our American Civil War time authentic percussion revolver cottage boxes and cottage warmers now they are available for dragoon and work revolvers as well you can find these offerings in or eBay store and little vac shop as well you can also find their or us ours now stadia repros these are 19th century range finders just excellent companion to your historical gear so ladies and gentlemen until next time stay cool and keep your powder dry

Channel: capandball

Views: 101,147

Keywords: Remington New Model Army, Starr Army, Adams revolver, Colt 1860 Army, percussion revolver, american civil war, capandball

Id: -dNAMcJQ8T0

Length: 30min 43sec (1843 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 30 2020