A Tale of Two Barrels
 

Fellow forum member lastoftheloaners and I have been exchanging PT's on an issue that I thought I would throw out for discussion.

We both have basically the same gun - TC Renegades with .45 caliber Green Mountain 1:30 twist LRH barrels. My barrel is blue. His is stainless.

We're using the same bullet, Ed Mehlig's 465 grain soft lead conical sized to .451 by Ed. Lastoftheloaner's barrel is clearly a bit tighter than mine. The bullet is a hard thumb start in my barrel. He finds it necessary to use a short starter. The load is 85 grains GOEX (FFFg for me and FFg for him). My load chronographs at 1400 fps. He has not shot his load over a chronograph.

Lastoftheloaners gets hammer reset to half cock with the 85 grain load. I've never had hammer reset with that load and while recoil is noticeable, it's not horrible.

I suggested nipple erosion might be the problem, but his nipple is the one that came on the barrel from GM and has been shot only about 50 times. I have something like 800 shots out of mine.

He's of the opinion that the lock spring has weakened and needs to be replaced, or perhaps was always on the weak side but it didn't show up until he tried these conicals.

Although I've seen a few statements on various forums regarding the possibility of a weakened mainspring, I've always figured that was with traditional flat springs, not the type of coil in TC locks. I have five TC's. Most of them have seen something in excess of 1,000 shots, and have never experienced a weakened spring.

What say you? Have you had actual experience with a TC spring becoming weakened to the extent that it needed to be replaced?

It was the very first thing I changed on mine. Hammer spring, shim set (for the CF barrels) little work on the trigger, hinge pins.

I fail to see what an encore has to do with the question anout a TC Renegade ( a sidelock)

He's talking about a Renegade....sidelock.

Semi...I never heard it before, but it could happen. Especially if the hammer is stored cocked.

Well, considering he stated TC SPRINGS I kinda figured he meant TC SPRINGS not only TC SIDELOCK SPRINGS. And the fact is most all TC hammer springs, including the one on my Hawken, are a little on the weak side. Guess I should have added that I replaced that one pretty quick as well.

I have replaced almost all of my main springs over time - I even make a point of having a couple on had at all times.

And I should also say that solved my blowback problem

I would change both, the spring and the nipple. Get a Spitfire or Redhot nipple.

I have many T/C traditional sidelocks and flintlocks. I've never had to change out a spring. I wouldn't even know where to purchase one. But if the hammer is coming back after shooting, that would be one place I would address.

How did Ed's bullets shoot out of that .45 stainless barrel? I have the same barrel scoped. It shoots sabots excellent.

I really don't know Cayugad. We didn't discuss that. I got the impression he didn't take enough shots to get sighted in with that bullet because of the hammer rebound thing.

In his last PM he said he was going to back the charge down to 75 grains and see what happens. I'll ask him to post his results.

I never thought using coil springs was a good idea for locks. The spring is at it's weakest when fully extended. That's when it's trying to hold the hammer against the nipple. Leaf springs always worked well, and should have been used by TC.