Will it fire after the powder dries???

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CoHiCntry

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This has been my first hunting season using a side lock (.54 Renegade), up to now it's been inlines only. I hunted the Elk season with no luck. Kept the load in all week. Had a few small drizzles of rain here and there but nothing too bad. I shot the load out at the end of the season and all was good. Was able to get an antelope at 65 yards the the next week during the antelope muzzleloader season. Next was a moose hunt that was actually during the rifle season but I wanted to take one with the muzzleloader. Conditions were really bad. Snowed over a foot in the first 24 hours when we got there. Really high humidity and everything was wet. I tried keeping the lock away from the snow when it was falling. Kept the muzzleloader in the truck at night instead of in the tent with the wood burning stove. On day 3 I finally had an opportunity at a moose that was 10 yards away. I aimed, pulled the trigger and only a pop from the cap! I was actually able to re-cap while it stood there looking at me, and the same thing again...pop, and no ignition! At this point they ran off. I switched to the rifle and was fortunate enough to get one the next day. I'm home now and need to get the load out of that gun. I've never had a misfire once in the last 10 or 15 years shooting and hunting with muzzleloaders, even at the range. So my question is... if the powder has dried out enough will it fire now? I might have to try a ball puller or something if it can't be fired out. Thanks for the help!
 
it may or may not. for no more than is involved I believe I would just pull the bullet/ball & give it a good cleanin'.

if you don't have a ball-puller or if it don't work you can get a 1/4 inch grease fittin', screw it into the nipple threads finger tight & pump the load out with a grease gun. clean-up afterwards won't be as bad or as hard as it sounds.

this is my opinion & yer welcome to it. luck to ya & have a good'en, bubba.
 
Remove the nipple. Using a nipple pick or small wire work some powder into the flame channel. Stuff some more power into the nipple recess. Cap and fire.
 
I agree with both methods above, if you decide to pump it out with a grease gun I advise you get the taller grease zerk, Idahoron taught me this, the short zerk is to short to get the gun fitting over due to the lip around the Snail, the taller zerk solves this problem

Here it is
 
CoHiCntry said:
This has been my first hunting season using a side lock (.54 Renegade), up to now it's been inlines only. I hunted the Elk season with no luck. Kept the load in all week. Had a few small drizzles of rain here and there but nothing too bad. I shot the load out at the end of the season and all was good. Was able to get an antelope at 65 yards the the next week during the antelope muzzleloader season. Next was a moose hunt that was actually during the rifle season but I wanted to take one with the muzzleloader. Conditions were really bad. Snowed over a foot in the first 24 hours when we got there. Really high humidity and everything was wet. I tried keeping the lock away from the snow when it was falling. Kept the muzzleloader in the truck at night instead of in the tent with the wood burning stove. On day 3 I finally had an opportunity at a moose that was 10 yards away. I aimed, pulled the trigger and only a pop from the cap! I was actually able to re-cap while it stood there looking at me, and the same thing again...pop, and no ignition! At this point they ran off. I switched to the rifle and was fortunate enough to get one the next day. I'm home now and need to get the load out of that gun. I've never had a misfire once in the last 10 or 15 years shooting and hunting with muzzleloaders, even at the range. So my question is... if the powder has dried out enough will it fire now? I might have to try a ball puller or something if it can't be fired out. Thanks for the help!

Not sure the powder did get wet. And personally I would have brought the rifle in at night and let heat of the stove dry the powder if it were wet. Going from warm to cold has very little effect on the humidity of the rifle. My grand father always brought his caplocks inside and placed them by the heating stove overnight just to insure it was dry for the next day. Before going to bed or even sometimes in the middle of the night he would move the rifle from it's place by the stove to a much cooler place and let it sit till morning. The opposite is the real problem - going from cold to hot. If you wear glasses you would know exactly what I mean. I HATE glasses when hunting!

I would bet your problem lies in the nipple... If you got enough moisture in the nipple the cap would be ineffective at starting the ignition process. Did the first cap even pop? Even if it did and there was moisture you probably plugged the flash hole with debris. A nipple pick at that point probably would have cleared the obstruction. The second cap without picking probably compounded the problem.

Suggestion - remove the nipple clean it, insure that the flash is clean, then place a very small amount of powder in the breech put the nipple in and shoot away.

This is what I do to protect the cap area - there are lots of other ways but this works for me because I do not have to remove anything just pull the hammer back and shoot...

capwrap-1.jpg
 
Totally off the topic. Were all these hunts in Colorado? Heard Moose tags took forever to draw one. VERY jealous good job.
 
twild said:
Totally off the topic. Were all these hunts in Colorado? Heard Moose tags took forever to draw one. VERY jealous good job.

Yes, all Colorado tags. I drew and killed my once in a lifetime Colorado bull moose in 2012. This was a cow tag.
 
Update... after reading the replies here, I took the gun to the range. I started by removing and picking the nipple, reinstalled the nipple, put a cap on it, and still no ignition. I thought maybe the primers in my capper that I'd been carrying around during the hunt got damp (going out on a limb here), so I repeated the removal, picking, process. Used a new cap from my supplies, and still no ignition. Then I repeated the process one more time but this time added a pinch of fresh powder under the nipple. BOOM! That worked!

So at this point I'm not real sure what happened? Was the powder damp? Or did the powder move too far away from the nipple area that it wouldn't fire? I'm not sure why that would happen? Why did I have to add a pinch of powder to get it to go off is my main question? Thanks...
 
Nothing goes boom like fresh powder, even just a little. If the charge got damp enough to prevent the flame from your caps from igniting the charge, putting a little fresh powder in behind the charge but in front of the cap acts as a big primer at ignition and allows the flame to shoot thru the damp stuff to still active powder in the barrel.
 
It's been a long time since I hunted with a cap lock but putting fresh powder under the nipple is the method I have used after hunting in wet conditions.
 
I'M LOOKING INTO BUYING THE MAG SPARK,I'M SITING HERE LOOKING AT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE #11 AND THE 209'S. WHEN I PULL THE TRIGGER I WANT TO HERE BOOM! EVEN THO THE PRICE IS OFF THE CHARTS AS FAR AS I CAN SEE,$24.95 + SHIPPING $5.95.
 

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