Old Cleaning Solutions

[rollingb]

Surely I'm not the only one on this forum who lives in the "boonies", and has their own water well.     

Snow melt, rain water, or a nearby stream,.... it all works to dissolve black powder fouling. 

[Hank in WV]

With the price being the same, you can drink either one...

[Bigsmoke]

Hmmmm, interesting things you have to say, BUT,

Snow Melt?  at sea level??? 

Rain water, in a drought area?? 

A near by stream - see item two. 

Not much chance of any of those things being of aid.

Oh well, guess I will just have to use my remaining stock of Ol' Thunder Patch Lube and Bore Solvent.  At the rate I have been shooting lately, I think it is a lifetime supply.

John

[One Shot]

Well my worter is free. Speaking of which I have a well and a spring. I also can get rain and or snow worter when in season. if they are all on annual leave then I have 1000 gallon tank I can get water from a friends shop near the city. I can use it cold an I can use it warm. It arks all the same.

[Ohio Joe]

One thing about it, these kind of topics have endless opinions... In the end it's your own opinion that you're comfortable with doing that counts. 

[RobD]

One thing about it, these kind of topics have endless opinions... In the end it's your own opinion that you're comfortable with doing that counts. 

exactly.   

however, truth be told, proper shooting maintenance goes a looooooong way to making the cleaning chore easier.

i see this with folks ALL the time.  i look at neglected barrels that have a thick coating of bp residue that also makes loading and ignition a tough chore, and breech plug faces that haven't been cleaned in years.  and then there's those patent breeches (this means all offshore built trad muzzleloaders) that are just about plugged up and people wanna know why they get so many pan flashes or at best late ignitions.

negligence means one Must use more than just the primary water because bp residue has been left to harden, which if left too long results in metal mitigation.

"proper maintenance", at least for me, simply means that after the last shot of the day is taken, swab out the bore with moose milk or straight water soluble oil (ballistol, NAPA, etc) or wd40, using a few jagged patches to remove the bulk of the bp residue, then a patch that's sloppy wet with moose milk or water soluble oil or wd40 gets sent down to the breech and left there.  this will mean subsequent tube cleaning can easily be accomplished with pure water.

some guns just absolutely requiring lots of fouling control during shooting.  they is what they is.  pushing off the need for fouling control on those guns makes them not work so well and guys are scratching their heads as to why so many pan flashes are happening. 

as always, ymmv! 

[Ohio Joe]

Yes sir, those patent breeches are in a class of their own which require special needs when it comes to a good thorough cleaning,,, (which all smoke poles should receive whether they have the patent breech system, or not)... Once your cleaning methods are mastered there's no ("I hope it goes off") in the back of your mind every time you pull the trigger - and that alone is worthy of better accuracy, believe it or not. 

[Uncle Russ]

"..........and that alone is worthy of better accuracy, believe it or not."
FWIW: Confidence is everything to this old boy!
Years ago, when trying to master the art of Flintlock shooting, I was indeed my own worst enemy once a "misfire" took place.
Although I fully realized what had just happened, my scores went south for the day, and there was darn little I could do to improve after that.
Fortunately, for whatever reason, that no longer happens....I will still on a rare occasion get a pan flash, but it's so rare it does not upset my mental makeup, it just happens and I move on from there with mext shot breaking right where I call it....that comes from confidence in my opinion.
Can't say I clean any different,  or do any tut hing else differently, it just seldom happens anymore. My Flintlocks are all over 20 years old, been fired hundreds if not thousands of times, with a misfire being the last thing on my mind.
I suspect all the shooting over the years gives me the confidence to concentrate on only where that ball is going, and not if the gun is going to shoot.
I've cleaned my guns with about everything available on the market that is listed as  BP Bore Cleaner, and I have also used just plain old water.
If one should work that much better than the othe other I've never been astute enough to see that difference.
A "proper" cleaning to me means removing all traces of Black Powder, proper drying as in multiple wiping with a clean dry patch, and insuring a good coat of oil is applied to protect the gun and the work you just did. That final coat of oil can be anything of your choosing that going to protect the gun against rust, your real enemy when shooting Black Powder.
My old stand by this last and final chore is a very lite coat of -3 In 1-oil, it has been around forever and it still works like a charm.
Many of the newer oils, ie, RemOil works every bit as good, and it all results in a sure-fire, gun that goes boom every time, and that builds confidence.

Uncle Russ...

[Ohio Joe]

I have to share one technique I came up with that seems to have worked great for me when coming back from the local Range and cleaning my rifles with the patent breech ("flint and cap lock")

Once my cleaning cycle is done - I turn on my small air compressor and use my left hand to cup the hose end into the muzzle and blast that air through the bore and make sure that breech area is dried out after the good cleaning flushing & swabbing it gets... Have never had a problem with ignition...

I will also mention that I do not use any patent breech rifles at Rendezvous 'cause I can't "air" flush 'em after cleaning... No electricity...  

 

[Two Steps]

I do/did something 'bout like that Joe.  First, I'd do like Rob and do some swabbing at the range leaving a wet patch down the bore.
When I got to my work bench I'd do my cleaning routine and then do dry patches.
NOW...I would put my bench vacuum cleaner hose in the exhaust port and put it on the rifle muzzle using a short hose and step down.  Lay the rifle down with the vent hole facing down and hit the go button on the vacuum.  While I'm cleaning my lock, there's hot air blowing my Bbl bone dry!

[Ohio Joe]

I do/did something 'bout like that Joe.  First, I'd do like Rob and do some swabbing at the range leaving a wet patch down the bore.
When I got to my work bench I'd do my cleaning routine and then do dry patches.
NOW...I would put my bench vacuum cleaner hose in the exhaust port and put it on the rifle muzzle using a short hose and step down.  Lay the rifle down with the vent hole facing down and hit the go button on the vacuum.  While I'm cleaning my lock, there's hot air blowing my Bbl bone dry!

I like that idea, Al! 

I bet I could rig up my shop vac to that as well... Ah,,, a Spring project.

That really is a great idea for sure!