in a different post i talked about a CVA plainsman 50 cal rifle. well i did not get that . what i did buy used was a CVA sharpshooter 50 cal uses # caps. when i got it home i started to clean it up good. thats when all heck broke loose. the bore was rusted up some so i kept spraying PB blaster in it then used a bore brush like mad. sprayed some patches with the pb.till it came out cleaner then more pb with the brush more soaked pb blaster patches kept doing this about 10 times. so far so good then i had some of T/C # 13 bore cleaner thats where i almost lost it. soaked a patch in the #13 bushed it down son of a gun stuck all the way down. ok got a coat hanger to try to fish the patch out. needless to say that did not work. so off to the gun shop got a parch puller and a bullet puller also . so got it out with the puller. scrubbed it some more with the pb blaster more bp soaked patches. thought there might be some crud left in the bore. so patches are comming out kind of clean. so i like a fool try the #13 again same think stuck down the bore. yep patch was wet. went to pull like heck i pulled the end off the cleaning rod. see where this is going ? so now i have a stuck patch and jag stuck. after cussing for a while i thought oh great now what? so had my phone handy to call 911. when i took out the nipple put just a bit of powder in it put the nipple back on put a cap on fired ar mt recliner. yea i'm in the house.fired patch and jag came out hit the chair. so like a moron i try to use the #13 again. this time i will not use the wood ram rod i will use my unbreakable Knight aluminum ram rod. guess what the do brake .grrrrrrrrrr. pulled the end off the rod just like the wood rod. so like a fool did the powder behind the nipple again. this time the patch , jag, ram rod are stuck down the bore. just great right ? so i did the powder thing again to blow out the rod, patch, jag out. ok pop it fires. all good right ? WRONG ! now i can't find the ram rod or jag. cant find them ant place .how hard would you think it would be to find a 30" ram rod fired at a recliner 10 foot away in one room? pretty darn hard. still can not hind it. no it's not in the bore. so how many idiots does it take to find a ram rod in a room ? i never used the #13 stuff before that normal? or do i still have crud at the bottom of the bore that keeps hanging up on ? the patches come right out when i use the patches soaked in the pb blaster. or throw away the # 13 stuff and just use soap and water i'm going to use triple 7 FFFG. hope your day went better than mine i'm new to the side lock muzzle loaders. i have a inline that i have used some. i like the side locks more than the in lines.