patch help please

[ian45662]

I need help with my patches. I recovered 3 and I dont think they look to good but I dont know how to fix the problem. They were used in a new 45 cal 42 inch green mountain barrel with 65 grains of 3F and a 440 ball. They are pillow ticking with a thickness of .018 do I need to run steel wool down the barrel?

 

[roundball]

A wad over the powder charge to act as a firewall, although not normally needed on a target load of only 65grns, would be a good diagnostic step to see what happended to the patches then...lacking wads for a quick test, you could just seat a pair of well lubed patches down on the powder first, then seat a patched ball normally.
(if you use different color or different material patches for the firewall, it would make it easier to find the one that was around the patched ball)

IMO, a 65grn target load of 3F should not be enough to cause those problems to a well lubed pillow ticking patch...so a question would be: Were the patches well lubed?

The new barrel might well benefit by a couple hundred strokes of #0 or #1 steel wool on a brush.

And just as an aside, although it's hard to tell in the photos, the patches almost seem borderline too small...are they for a .40cal by any chance?

 

[Grizzled Roberts]

The key word is NEW Barrel. You possibly have rough edges on the lands. Make a Tight patch of 4/ought steel wool on your cleaning jag. Oli the steel wool well and run it up and down your bore
15 to 20 times. The go back to the range and try it again. I have cleaned up this problem a couple of times in new barrels doing this just once. I must agree with Roundball, it looks like your patches should be slightly larger in diameter.
How hard is this load to push down? Do you have to short start it?

 

[paulvallandigham]

65 grains is a hot load in a .45, IMHO. You are up in the 2000 fps range of muzzle velocity. You are going to burn holes in patches, and burn through them with that load without using a filler, or an OP Wad over the powder. The patch needs to have much more lube than yours appear to have. I also recommend running a heavily lubed cleaning patch down the barrel to grease it AFTER you seat the PRB on the powder charge. This seems to help keep the patch around the ball in better shape. I believe that the grease in the bore helps feed lube into the patch as lube is lost from the backside of the patch. We have found a slight increase in veloicity when the bore is lubed as recommended, but a lower SDV, which helps accuracy. Mostly, what we find is that the patches no longer are burned, torn, or have holes.

You might check the muzzle of the gun to see if a couple of those front edges to your lands are not carrying minute burrs. That may be causing the holes in the patch that we see here. To find out which lands are involved, use a magic marker to mark the front side of the patches, and load the patch with the mark pointing to your front sight each time you shoot. Then, when you recover a spent patch, you can index the patch to the front sight, and then located the suspect land. You might have to do some polishing on that crown to get rid of this problem.

 

[ian45662]

Those patches are spit lubed and are cut at the muzzle from a big peice of cloth. I also failed to mention that one of those patches( although I cant remember which one it is) was on top of a felt wad. I though it may be getting burnt but it was still being cut up with the wad.

 

[roundball]

Those patches are spit lubed and are cut at the muzzle from a big peice of cloth. I also failed to mention that one of those patches( although I cant remember which one it is) was on top of a felt wad. I though it may be getting burnt but it was still being cut up with the wad.

Then you've got your diagnostics right there...sounds like sharp lands.

Note: When my GM .58cal barrel was new, I had some similar issues, less severe than yours...that turned out to only be that the very ends of the lands were sharp and were cutting the patches right at short start time...yours may be right there as well.

And of course, another whole approach to this might be, especially if you're getting decent enough accuracy, is to just continue shooting it and enjoy...mine cleared up after short starting a hundred balls or so.

PS:
This is obviously your call...if you're cutting at the muzzle from strips, a wider stip might not be a bad idea

 

[paulvallandigham]

Okay: You obviously have sharp edges on a couple of lands, and you need to polish the crown. I used the butt end of a file handle( wood) to back some emery cloth( fine) an polished the muzzle. The file handle was small enough to fit down into the barrel a bit,
and with the fine emery cloth, I was able to quickly knock off the sharp edges. I did this at the range, so I could polish a bit, then load and shoot a round, check the patching, then polish some more. It did not take much time before the patches came out without the holes in it.

I do not think a spit patch is adequate if you are using those hot burning ( high ignition temperture) powders. I used only 50 grains of FFFg Goex powder in my .45 when I was shooting that caliber, and as long as I used .010" or thicker patches with spit, they did not tear or burn. However, if I went down to .005", the patches tore all over the place. So, I know I was walking a fine line there. With a good patch lube, like wonderlube, or Stumpy's Moose snot, the patches can take a hotter load.

When I was shooting a .45, OP wads were just beginning to be discussed, but could not be easily found to buy. I sold the gun about the time I found some of the Ox Yoke wool lubed wads for sale at Friendship. I told the buyer of my gun and recommended them to her. I have since worked with my brother in working up loads in his new .45, and he started out with Walter's Fiber Wads in the gun. He shoots both Goex and Swiss made black powder, in FFFg grades, And his 38 inch barrel can shoot 70 grains of powder efficiently. He normally does not exceed 60 grains, but we did try 65 grain of Goex FFFg. For short range targets he reduces his powder charge down to about 50 grains, I believe. He tears one hole in the center of his targets shooting from any kind of rest. He also lubes the barrel after seating the PRB down on the powder. I believe he is still using Wonderlube.

 

[swquiro]

Ian,
You have a number of recommendations here and maybe they all would help the problem. When I first started to shoot my new .45 with a GM barrel my patches looked identical to yours, some maybe worse, and accuracy was in the basement. I ran 000 or 0000(cant remember which)steel wool over a brush down the bore at least a 100 times. Turned that barrel right around. Recovered patches looked good after that and the rifle has been a tack driver ever since.

 

[ian45662]

do I put the steel wool on a cleaning jag?

 

[roundball]

do I put the steel wool on a cleaning jag?

I've always wrapped it around a cleaning brush...use an old one because it's almost impossible to get the steel wool off of it when your done.
If you look closely at a pad of steel wool you see that it is actually wrapped in layers itself...you can carefully unwrap a section, cut it off, then wrap it tightly around a brush.

 

[Stumpkiller]

They were used in a new 45 cal 42 inch green mountain barrel with 65 grains of 3F and a 440 ball.

Fire 200 more patched balls and call me in the morning. I would not hit a new barrel with ANYTHING abrasive until it has had a chance to shoot in naturally. If there's still a problem tearing patches then try the steel wool approach. Why use up the life of a new barrel by wearing away the accuracy prematurely if it is otherwise just a problem of new, crisp rifling?

I use J-B Paste (which does not remove steel) to clean a new barrel very well of oils from the machining and rust preventative factory or gunsmith coatings. Use as much of that as you like.

 

[Kentuckywindage]

I shoot 60 and 70 grains Pyrodex p out of a 32" Douglas barrel and they come out like new. You got something in that barrel thats tearing them up like that. I'd steel wool it. 40-60 strokes and give it a try.
What do you use as a patch lube?

I melt bore butter into a little jar and then put my patches into that and let it soak up and then squeeze out the excess lube.

 

[uncrichie]

Check the size of your OP wad. Someone here suggested (I think RoundBall)using the next bore size up from your bore. I use .54 OP wads in my .50. It really gets into the grooves for better protection of the patch. My $.02.