Gramps-
Sounds so.
Thin little rims work fine for pinfire, the firing pin is the extractor.
With the more modern centerfire guns, the rims needed to be tougher and stronger to withstand being used against the extractors or ejectors.
Email me at
engineeringandclosure (which is my email ID on yahoo.com)
Just put the ID name and the yahoo part together with the symbol @ and fling me an email.
The reason I don't just spell that one out on this thread message is that there are special computer programs made by hackers (develish little critters like viruses) that scrub websites for spelled out email addresses, then litter those email addresses with spam emails. Nasty.
From there I'll drop you a couple of suggestions on getting yourself set up with brass for your WR.
The hammer double people have somehow gotten a patent together on the pinfire shell (can you freakin believe that?) and I don't know how that affects anyone else making custom made cases for your rifle. I wouldn't have an issue with them having a patent on pinfire hulls if they'd actually provide something that'd work for the rifles. The thin wall brass cases just won't cut it. Also, I have yet to hear an account from anyone who's actually using them with black powder, and frankly, I doubt thier plastic base wad will survive more than one firing with black powder.
I bet dollars to donuts that if they'd make paper cases with paper basewads, they'd sell. I'm not holding my breath though.
Now, as to those plastic cases you modified.
The plastic case walls can be sized down in diameter, but the rim feature of the brass is part of what's holding things together down at the base of the cartridge. It'd take some special tooling to resize the brass and still have enough of an internal crimp holding things together by the pinch created by the rim, yet still have a rim small enough to work out in the pinfire chamber.
Couple of things come up with the issue of using plastic cases and black powder together in the rifle.
One is that the black powder burn is hot enough for a long enough time in there (unlike smokeless which is really hot, but quick) to screw up the plastic cases, melting them.
That's not so bad though, cause plastic cases are cheap to start with so throwing them away after each shot's not such a shame -- but then there's the kind of work that'd be needed to get them to fit the rim recess of the pinfire gun...
Then there's the isue of plastic fouling at the leade of the rifling. I haven't worked on this issue enough to know if it's really an issue. But as you can imagine, if the black powder burn is enough to melt the cases, chances are that there's some distinct possibility that plastic fouling deposits could quickly accumulate in the bore near the chamber. With a rifle that could easily lead to pressure issues, bullet engraving issues, and without a doubt cleaning issues.
Now, for what I said about a central anvil.
Nothing special there, just an anvil in the center of the case head for the percussion cap.
I don't think it's necessary, as long as there's a sufficently thick case wall down near the rim to withstand the repeated hammering of a firing pin against a percussion cap.
You've come a long way in the past couple of days.
You have good chamber casts, you know what ball size to run, you know that modern cases won't chamber, and you'll soon know what to do about your brass situation.
--Tinker