Patch lube questions and observations

[bchannell]

Went to the range today and had a great day. 'Course any day shooting your flintlock can't be bad! Tried a some lubes I'd read about here, and had some questions. First up was my concoction of beeswax and olive oil, shot great groups, but left hard crusty stuff in barrel, making reloads hard, but cleaned out easy enough. In fact all the lubes I tried shot great groups.

Then tried some Young Country Lube 103, some say this is nothing but chap stick, less fouling, but my son-in-law was trying it, so I'm not sure, but he said it cleaned up easy.

Then came Goop hand cleaner, easy loading, with almost no fouling left in the barrel and easy clean-up. But patches dried out fast, almost faster than I could use them. I'm wondering if they still had some lube quality even dry, but this seems to be a lube you want to use one patch at a time.

Now my question is, should you wipe between every shot with concoctions like beeswax/oo, so as to avoid the crust?

I want to try staight olive oil to see how it does. The Goop sure keeps things clean, including your hands.

Ok, any suggestions would be appreciated, new ideas, anything. I know this has been beat to death, but I'm still trying to learn.

 

[rabjr]

I put lubes in two groups, there are those best suited to range work, where you can shoot mulitiple shots without swabbing if you want to. And theres those best suited as a hunting lube. Those generally aren't well suited to shooting without swabbing between shots.

Your beeswax/olive oil is a good hunting lube, you could try just straight olive oil at the range and see how that is. If it were me I would render the fat of the next deer you shoot, if you hunt and I would replace the beeswax with deer tallow. I use a bear oil/deer tallow mix that works great for me. However if one does not have bear oil, you can substitute it with olive oil. Also try different ratio's, make sure it's just right and not to stiff, or to watery. This of course is for a hunting lube. A little more on the soft side would be better for range work.

 

[Blizzard of '93]

I second the Goop or Go-Jo white tub hand cleaner it's what I use. I carry some pre-lubed patches in a tin so they don't dry much but they still have a greasy feel after drying awhile. plus it's good stuff to wipe bore with too. on a patch.
I've tryed maybe 2 dozen lubes and hand cleaner is tops for me.

 

[bennypapa]

I used Moose snot or bore butter for a long time. It was suggested to try alcohol and Murphy's oil soap. Since I cleaned with this mix I gave it a try and my group size shrunk to half what it was. FWIW this was in a T/C renegade .50 cal with 1:48" twist, .018 ticking and 55 grains fffg. Last time I shot it off the bench at 50 yards, all the holes almost touched. Group was less than 2". Best that gun had ever shot. 3 of the holes would have measured a 3/4" group.

FYI

 

[William O.]

I mix beeswax and olive oil so my lube doesn't get runny in warm/hot weather, adding more OO to the mix as temps increase and vice versa but I don't get any crusty buildup as you describe. Normally I'll wipe between every shot with an alcohol soaked cleaning patch when I'm at the range just out of habit although I could go longer. See how straight OO does. Your shooting patch doesn't have to be dripping either, just enough to enhance the gas seal and keep the fouling soft is all you need.

 

[boom]

Beeswax and crisco and a little V oil i found that
it works good for my rifles. :thumbsup:

 

[nchawkeye]

I'd also try Moose Snot, or add some Murphy's Oil Soap to your bees wax/olive oil mix...This might fix your cleaning problems...

 

[ohio ramrod]

I have used bees wax and lard for warm weather shooting, and pure lard for cold weather shooting ever since they outlawed the sale of sperm whale oil. I swab between shoots with a spit patch in warm weather and a alcohol soaked patch in freezing weather. Some people report good luck with murphy's oil soap as a lube as well. It is my personal opinion that any non petrolium oil will work if you play around and get a proper concentration .I have tried olive oil, peanut oil, castor oil, corn oil, canola oil, crisco, lard, and even butter with basicly little difference.Back in the sixties I even tried STP, WD40, and Three in one oil, all with bad resultsThe STP was VERY BAD.

 

[macca]

Hi,
out here we cant access a lot of your exotic materials (moose snot etc) and Im not going out to milk a kangaroo either. :haha:
I use 1 part slip 2000 (carbon cutter for auto weapons) and 10 parts water. My loading procedure - pour powder (60gn 5FA) sit 54 cal ball on patch cloth just sprayed with slip/water mix- short start cut cloth then push to seat with long rod with cleaning patch wetted with slip/water combination. Ball seats just the same from first to last shot. Works for me - last 2 comps 96 offhand at 50metre round target. :wink:
Cheers

 

[paulvallandigham]

The recipe for " Moose snot" can be found under Member Resources here on the index page to this forum. The ingredients are NOT a mystery. Murphy's Oil soap may not be available in your country, but the rest of the materials are ubiquitous. You can substitute other Liquid soaps for the Murphy's, and still have a good lube.

Stumpy's mixes were his effort to come up with an inexpensive lube he could make out of materials he already had in his home. I believe he succeeded very well. Part of the fun of shooting Traditional Black Powder guns is to try to do so as cheaply as possible.

That means casting balls from lead obtained either free, or for as little cost as possible. That means using patches and cleaning patches from rags or other fabrics already on hand, when possible. It means buying your powder in a bulk order to save money, and for percussion guns, buying caps also at the lowest volume sale price you can find. Flints can be hand made, if you have the talent, and skill, and a local source of flint, or bought in quantity to lower the costs.

I once bought 500 flints directly from Tom Fuller, and got a " dealer" price on the order. Several members of my gun club pooled our money to make that happen, and we all benefited from the much lower price. :thumbsup:

 

[macca]

Hi,
Ours is a fairly traditional club, my 54 is a leman made by green river rifle works (australian version). It has fixed sights front an back. I use 5FA (Wanno firecracker powder) works great and is cheap. Buy my caps by the thousand, source my patch and cleaning material(kids jammie flannel) from the local Spotlight discount fabric storeThe slip 2000 was left over from when I owned a gunshop (and its the best patch lube Ive seen). The top shooter in the club is very traditional - makes his own guns, fixed sights, loads on his foot and spit lubes his patches.
Cheers :wink:

 

[paulvallandigham]

I believe it was Winston Churchill who, in a speech to the US Congress, described our two countries as " Divided by a common language.". I suspect much the same can be said about America, and Australia. Some of the items you describe are unknown to me by those names. We have sources for Wano powder, but I have not heard of Wano 5A, nor do I have any way of relating its granular sizing to Existing American powders.

I fear you actually believed that Stumpy's Moose Snot was a product involving some part of a real live MOOSE! If you check the formula, you will join me in a good laugh.

Spit patches are fine when you expect to fire the load within minutes of running a spit-lubed patch down the barrel. This works fine on club ranges at club shoots, but is a poor choice when hunting from a stand.

I put a rust ring right where the PRB seated on the powder in my barrel using a spit patch one day while deer hunting. It took lots of scrubbing to remove the oxide, and there are still pits in the lands I can feel with my cleaning jag and patches at that spot.

I now use a commercial lube made with oil, and wax for hunting, and often for club target shooting, too. I lube the patches the night before so they have a long time for the lube to infiltrate all the fibers in the patching.

:thumbsup: :haha: :hatsoff:

 

[rafterob]

The recipe for " Moose snot" can be found under Member Resources here on the index page to this forum.

OOPS! I had a hell of a tussle with a moose back up in my home state of Minnesota trying to fill my little container with moose snot, shoulda read the fine print first :redface:

 

[hanshi]

Okay, I just learned something new. It's "Moose Snot", not "Moose Knot" :hmm: . And Mink Oil isn't the result of squeezing those bitey, toothy little monsters. :idunno: And curly maple actually comes from a more or less straight tree :redface: . I guess, then, that trying a can of Goex 2f instead of my usual 3f doesn't make the 2f a "substitute powder" :wink: . Language can either explain or confuse :cursing: .

 

[macca]

Hi,
you should try milking a kangaroo :haha:. Wano comes in fg,ffg,fffg,p,pp,ppp. The P series is similar but not as clean as Swiss. 5FA is commercial firecracker powder. I was using ppp and switched to 5fa ($20 a kilo less) and the results have not changed. Very few people hunt with traditional BP weapons and you will find very few inline firearms in the country (I owned a gun shop for 3 years and never sold one).Our BP shooting is all at the range so water based patch lubes are fine.
Cheers :wink:

 

[Billnpatti]

I have a favorite load for when I am shooting targets. it is too much trouble when shooting a woods walk or any other time you are shooting from your bag. Here's what I put down the bore of my .50 cal caplock Hatfield that makes it happy on the range. First, I put 50 grains of Goex fffG down the bore followed by a leather wad that is lubed with straight Ballistol. On top of the wad, I put a volume of Puff-Lon that is equil in voume to 20 gr. of black powder. On top of this, I load my patched round ball. My patch is 100% cotton drill that is lubed with straight Ballistol. Yeah, I know, that is a lot of stuff to be stuffing down youre bore but my shot to shot MV (1311 fps) is amazingly consistant with a sd of only 7 fps. My groups off a bench at 40 yards were about 1 inch for a 5 shot group. That's with primative open sights. I do wonder how well I could do if I had a scope on it to reduce any error caused by my tired old eyes.

So, that's what I do with that one rifle. I have several and like children, each is a bit different with it's own preferences. So far, each has performed better with the leather wad and Puff-lon than they do without them.

If you have any interest in Puff-Lon, they have a website. Just Google "Puff-Lon". You can also use something like cornmeal or Cream of Wheat on top of the leather wad. Both will work just fine but neither has the added lubricating properties of the Puff-Lon. :thumbsup:

Just some thoughts on the subject by an old fart. :haha:

 

[curnla]

Spit when at the range and any kind of animal fat when trekking (bear, deer, cow, sperm whale). These worked 200 years ago and they work now.