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Good afternoon gentlemen,
I have a Pietta 1858 New Model Army black powder pistol in stainless steel which I shoot mainly for fun but also in competitions run by our club here in Kent.
I have three questions, firstly, is it safe to use only half a wad as opposed to a full length one? the reason is purely economical. A box of wads holds 200 so cut in half will give me four hundred making it cheaper to use.
Secondly, I use a load of 25 grains of Hodgsons Pyrodex for use either just shooting or for competition cards, if I increase the load will it make it more accurate and more importantly what would be the safe maximum?
Thirdly, I always but always clean it after use using hot soapy water and then rinsing off with boiling water and then sit all the washed parts on a radiator to make sure everything is dried off and then a reasonable light coating of oil before putting it away. The only parts I am unable to clean are the insides of the nipples, are there any products out there that are fine enough to clean the hole in the nipple that is inside the cylinder port hole?
Any information on any / all of these questions would be greatly appreciated.

Regards
Graham (Newbie)

Slicing your wads will not make it dangerous but it may make the revolver bind up sooner. Wads even unlubed ones primary function is to keep the fouling down in the barrel and the cylinder gap, far superior to slathering the cylinders with lard or what ever.

Look to Hodgdon's pyrodex published data for safe loadings miniumum and maximums.

Remove nipples, soak in Aquoil and clean with pipe cleaners, replace with a smear of copper slip. choke lube or the like.

Wads aren’t expensive, don’t be tight

I doubt you’d get enough Pyrodex in your Pistol to do any damage. I used 30 gr in my Remington 1858, no problem, nice and accurate if I do my bit.

I use TePe dental brushes for cleaning my nippples, so to speak. The yellow ones seem to work best.

Thank you for your replies gentlemen I'm off to the chemist for some dental brushes though not sure where to get the pipe cleaners.
Just after posting my question, I was advised that a set of gas jet/carburetor needles may be fine enough to clear the small hole at the end of the nipple so combined with everything else I should be on a winner.

Tobacconists sell pipe cleaners.

Piano wire is excellent for making nipple picks.

I use acupuncture needles for clearing the flash holes of nipples. You can buy them for not much money on Ebay. They come in various diameters to suit. They have nice grip-able 'handles' and the length can be cut down to suit your bits and pieces box.

As for cleaning the firearm - a guy in my club removes the grips on his stainless model and bungs the lot in his dishwasher (when the wife's not looking). He swears by it - I've not tried it but like the sound of how easy it is.

I have a question for Dark Skies. In your post you said that you used acupuncture needles to clean the nipples in your firearm, my question is "What size needle/s do you use and are they effective?

Kelly44

kelly44 wrote:I have a question for Dark Skies. In your post you said that you used acupuncture needles to clean the nipples in your firearm, my question is "What size needle/s do you use and are they effective?

Kelly44

According to the packet they are 35 x .25mm
I bought 100 for about four quid including shipping from China.
They do the job nicely and are a handy size for popping into the partition of my range box.

As with others I also use a TePe brush (about two quid or thereabouts for five) for the larger hole of the nipple inside the cylinder.
The acupuncture needles are handy to have if you have the odd cap that fails to set off the charge due to a nipple clog. A quick poke clears the blockage.

Those needles are great. 3D printer head cleaning needle, three for a fiver. Or 100 for a fiver.

I also used to use pipe cleaners for cleaning the inside of the nipples. This was after pouring hot water over them to soften up any crud.