Do you swab? Why?

[taylorh]

A recently written post of mine brought up the topic of swabing the barrel between shots. Why? I use T/C's natural lube. I thought that by using this natural lube (on a patched round ball) I wouldn't need to swab, because the patch pushed all the fouling to the bottom with each reload. In fact T/C advertises that you can fire hundreds of shots without cleaning your barrel because the fouling is removed with each reload. For those of you that do swab between shots, why do you do it, and how do you do it? With a patch and jag? For those of you who don't swab, how do you avoid fouling, and do you worry about unextinguished embers remaining?
Taylor in Texas

 

[John Wasmuth]

I swab some of my rifles after about the tenth shot, or once the patched round ball starts getting fussy about goin down the bore. Some of my rifles never have a problem with it. I use wonderlube patches, and for the most part they do ok. Never had a problem with embers.

 

[Runner]

Most of my shooting is at gatherings or events. I am shooting targets, and sometimes some darned hard shots are required. I swab between every shot because my guns are all more accurate that way. I run a spit patch on both sides and a dry patch on both sides between every shot. If I shoot out of a clean barrel and then run those two patches, the second ball will fly the same as the first. So will number 50.

 

[Mad Professor]

ACCURACY!!!

 

[chipper]

After the first shot a lining of black **** forms. The second shot it gets baked on. By the third shot it's baked on enamel. I like to swab between shots for accuracy reasons, the ball goes down easier and I find that cleaning at the end of the day is easier.

Regards
Wounded knee

 

[Stumpkiller]

I swab with a spit patch about every fifth shot as, otherwise, I start to get stringing. (The holes begin to walk away from the bullseye; I'm not sure how they do that after I put them solidly in the center. :winking: ). Also keeps loading easier without resorting to a short starter. I'm not using Wonder Lube or Natural Lube, though.

. . . because the fouling is removed with each reload.

Is that what that funny little screw on a T/C drum is for? To empty the grease trap? :haha: "Removed" is a good trick when your're pushing it down ahead of a patched ball. With a flintlock you will eventually crud up the vent. You may gain enough leeway with the drum channel on a percussion that it will never be a problem.

 

[rayb]

??habit??

beats me

need to experiment more

rayb

 

[roundball]

A recently written post of mine brought up the topic of swabing the barrel between shots. Why? I use T/C's natural lube. I thought that by using this natural lube (on a patched round ball) I wouldn't need to swab, because the patch pushed all the fouling to the bottom with each reload. In fact T/C advertises that you can fire hundreds of shots without cleaning your barrel because the fouling is removed with each reload. For those of you that do swab between shots, why do you do it, and how do you do it? With a patch and jag? For those of you who don't swab, how do you avoid fouling, and do you worry about unextinguished embers remaining?
Taylor in Texas

I hate wasting time wiping between shots...I shoot a 40-50 shot ranage session most every Saturday morning year round and 99% of the time I never wipe between shots because I use Natural Lube 1000 in the bore and on patches.

However, I have found that on dry, very low humidity days in the winter time (here in NC) and I'm using patches without enough Natural Lube 1000 on them, I have to wipe between every 8-10 shots.

I fix that problem one of two ways:

1) I melt more lube into the patches using a microwave.

2) Or, I sprinkle some drops of Hoppe's No9 BP Plus onto a stack of patches already prelubed with NL1000...this works so well and is so much easier than all the microwave business that it's the winter time approach I've now adopted...it's really only a few cold dry Saturdays a year, but it let's me keep shooting without wiping between shots.

PreMature Ignition

I always keep a muzzle leaning away from my face & head while shooting & reloading...but have never had a hint of a premature charge just from pouring powder down a bore soon after a shot...I've even tried leaning the rifle against the bench, and immediately poured in the next charge while smoke is still boiling up out of the bore as fast as I could for an entire range session...barrel got so hot I couldn't hold it but there were no ill effects otherwise.

But having said that, even if I don't need to wipe from a fouling point of view...I can't and won't argue with the probable benefit of wiping a bore to eliminate even the remote possibility of a premature ignition from any residual combustion activity down there...

 

[taylorh]

My experience is similar to yours. I shoot mostly for pleasure, 25-50 rounds a session. I shoot a smoothbore .560 . If I shoot dry patches I can shoot 7-9 rounds before it gets gunked up. But, if I use T/C natural lube, I can shoot the whole session without swabing the barrel. And each ball slides down the shoot just as easy as the first. Now I don't know whether or not I'd get better accuracy if I swabbed between shots, because I haven't tried it yet. But, it seems that if I swabed between shots I might be forcing fouling up into firing channel between the barrel and the nipple. What do you think? Please continue with your experiences.
Taylor in Texas

 

[roundball]

My experience is similar to yours. I shoot mostly for pleasure, 25-50 rounds a session. I shoot a smoothbore .560 . If I shoot dry patches I can shoot 7-9 rounds before it gets gunked up. But, if I use T/C natural lube, I can shoot the whole session without swabing the barrel. And each ball slides down the shoot just as easy as the first. Now I don't know whether or not I'd get better accuracy if I swabbed between shots, because I haven't tried it yet. But, it seems that if I swabed between shots I might be forcing fouling up into firing channel between the barrel and the nipple. What do you think? Please continue with your experiences.
Taylor in Texas

We're together on this...NL1000 (and others I'm sure) basically maintains the bore at the equivelant of a single shot's worth of fouling...my accuracy doesn't change from the 1st to the 50th shot

 

[tzvia]

The first time I shot a bp rifle (Pedersoli Tryon) was the first time I swabbed between shots. It was also the last. Thought it was the thing to do, call it the beginning of the learning curve. Well all the crud/borebutter got pushed down on that patch and the next round went POP, not BOOM. Second thing on that learning curve, removing a stuck ball and cleaning out the powder! :cursing: I now never swab BETWEEN shots. If I swab, it's after I load a prb so the stuff that does get pushed down sits on top of a ball and gets shot out. I figure it's no more dangerous than pushing that prb down in the first place, and of course I keep the muzzle pointing away from everything and anything of any value. As for hot embers-I put the rod down the bore and leave the cap on the nipple for a minute to get as much air out of the bore as possible, the wood rod of course is marked with an 'empty' indicator so I can be sure the ball really did go downrange as well.

I sometimes wonder how people swab between shots without pushing the crud down and blocking nipplehole/vent, but I don't feel like experimenting at the range to find out!

Lois

 

[roundball]

I sometimes wonder how people swab between shots without pushing the crud down and blocking nipplehole/vent, but I don't feel like experimenting at the range to find out!
Lois

Part of that answer is that for folks who use rifles with a patent breech design, it's not a problem...stuff stops well up above the vent (or nipple channel) ie: TC uses a patent breech design in their line of traditional muzzleloaders.

 

[taylorh]

Thanks for your thoughts Roundball. :v
Reguards,
Taylor in Texas

 

[Pittsburghunter]

Sighting in I clean between every shot because that first shot at game will be with a clean bore and I wish to duplicate that. Now as far as shooting roundballs even with sighting in I go 3-4 shots because the bore just doesn't seem to foul as much and I think you may of hit the nail on the head saying the patch cleans the bore some. Why not? It is a patch with lube on it forced through the rifling.

Makes sense to me.

Now shooting high power loads is different I clean with one wet (T/C #13 or something similar) and a couple dry patches betreen every load not only to make sure the bore is clean but to keep the breech clean of any "crud ring" that could cause a bullet not to be seated firmly on the charge. Sabots which are unlubed are hard to seat in dirty bores.

Hope I helped.

 

[flaming canvas]

Nope. I use copious amounts of Natural Lube 1, (spit) and have no problems with build up. The fouling gets pushed down on top of the powder charge and is discharged with the ball. Most I ever shot was 84 rounds before I cleaned it. Last one loaded just as easily as the first.

Roger

 

[taylorh]

Thats what I call REAL natural! :rotf:

 

[riarcher]

For many, many tears I've swabed rifles between shots. Without a swab my POA would change and by the 3rd shot it wouldbe all I could do to seat a ball.
Had a few shotguns that I wasn't too over anxious with and just swabbed avery 2nd shot, "just because".
Got me a Bess at .751 bore, .715 ball, and .018 ticking and #fg. Absolutely a terrible combination. All my patchers have been BB to this time.
Bess evolved to .751 bore, .715 ball, .026 Denum, and 2Fg. (heavier 110 gr. range). I heat the patches up in covered boiling water and really melt the BB into the patch. I've reused the patches up to 7 times without adding any add'l BB before signes of faiure. And I never clean this Bess between shots anymore. At the end of the day it's like I MAY HAVE shot 1 round. :hmm:
I started thinking. My .45 w/3Fg and .440 or .445 can only go 2 shots with the .018 ticking and BB. :hmm:
Tried some .429 balls, the .026 denum and saturated them with BB and "VIOLA!" shooting over 30 rounds without swabbing and relatively clean bore. Slightly tighter groups too with 10 grs. less powder. :grin:
I'm sold on the "small balls / thick-heavily lubed patch" idea.