Question: Old Time Lead Removal

[Spikebuck]

Now-a-days we have good products to get lead fouling out of barrels from shot or REAL bullets.

What did they use way back when?

 

[Loyalist Dave]

I don't get a lead problem from patched, round ball. :idunno:

Anybody with a CW musket shootin' minnies care to chime in. ?

LD

 

[hawkeye2]

I've been shooting minies for 27 years and my wife has been shooting them for 20 or more and I have never found any lead in the barrels of any of the guns including a pitted original '61. We have used at least 5 different lubes over that time.
The original GI lube was beeswax and tallow and the barrels were well finished inside. I doubt leading was an issue with Civil War era military arms.

 

[SAJones]

Rumours, of course, but what I heard is they take the barrels out of the stock, heat it to melt the lead, then tap it out (assunming the barrel is unloaded). I don't think that would be an ideal way, could warp those old barrels.

 

[Trench]

Try shooting a few patched balls through the rifle. Nothing cleans the bore like a hot, supersonic "cleaning" patch.

I've noticed that sometimes the grooves of my rifles will take on a brown rust stain if I didn't clean it well enough. I've got to use a scotchbright pad wrapped around my jag to polish it back up.....or.....I just take it to the range, do some shooting, and it's all nice and bright again after a normal cleaning.

 

[wattlebuster]

I figure lots of elbow grease :hatsoff:

 

[TFoley]

Now-a-days we have good products to get lead fouling out of barrels from shot or REAL bullets.

What did they use way back when?

Back in the old days, when H&S was not much of an issue, leaded-up rifles were cleaned by filling the barrels with Mercury and allowing them to stand for a couple of days, then pouring it out on the ground.

All the lapped-in lead would be absorbed into the mercury, leaving a brightly-clean bore.

tac

 

[CoyoteJoe]

I've been shooting minies for 27 years and my wife has been shooting them for 20 or more and I have never found any lead in the barrels of any of the guns including a pitted original '61. We have used at least 5 different lubes over that time.
The original GI lube was beeswax and tallow and the barrels were well finished inside. I doubt leading was an issue with Civil War era military arms. [/quote
I seem to recall that Federal soldiers were issued "cleaning bullets" with a zink washer at the base to scrape fouling from the bore. I think ever 10th bullet was a cleaning bullet.

 

[hawkeye2]

Those were the Williams bullets and were intended to clean powder fouling from the bore. You are right as the recommendation was to fire one every ten shots. Their effectiveness was questionable and they weren't popular with the troops (difficult to load?). I have an unfired Type II or III, not sure which, that was dug at the site of the battle of Stephenson, VA.

 

[nkbj]

:thumbsup: on shooting patches to clean a barrel. Paper patched minies for cleaners are really good too.

To prevent leading I try to have an adequate quantity of lube equal in quality to the application.

 

[RedFeather]

I have a couple of those Williams wipers. IIRC, they have a thin disk held in place by a small piece that extends up into the hollow base. About as thick as a Necco wafer or two and close to bullet diameter. Don't see how well they would shoot out fouling. More like scrape it down the bore. Probably a better way for a contractor to scrape a few more bucks out of Uncle Sam.

 

[desi23]

From the sources I've read over the years the Williams bullets were intended to remove both lead and gunpowder fouling from the bore. The zinc washer was slightly coned so that it would expand with the minnie when fired and scrape the crud out of the bore in passing up the barrel.

How well they really worked I don't know but they were bought and issued during the war so someone must have been impressed by them (or got a kickback!).

 

[RedFeather]

Just looked over a couple that I have in a frame. The base appears flat. A couple of bullets have only the stub. I guess the base broke off, etc? Most of the Williams bullets must have been unfired and from dropped ammo. I could shoot one but that would likely be inconclusive. :wink:

 

[nkbj]

Can't help but wonder if the scraper bullet was just the best they came up with for general issue, seeing as they were going with the rifle tech they had. How well did it work in practice? Sure there are reports of multiple skirt rings in the bore and multiple minies in the bores. But did the scraper skirt ring tech work when properly applied? And how often were the tasks presented by the tech just beyond the overwhelmed person?

Did the generals fight the last war?

 

[Dphar]

Now-a-days we have good products to get lead fouling out of barrels from shot or REAL bullets.

What did they use way back when?

"Naked" bullets were almost never used by Civilians in the ML era in America so leading was not a problem. In the first place the rifling forms were wrong for a GG or even PP bullet.
1814 Common Rifle

Original Hawken

This is a Connestoga Rifle Works (Leman) flintlock dated on the lock 1840. It is apparently unfired. This is NOT "naked" bullet rifling.

The Minie rifles have very shallow wide grooves, bullet rifling even though the Minie was used with 72" twist since it flies like a dart.

Another reason is that people used to TRAVEL with loaded guns. The typical way to carry a rifle horse back was in a "sling" or "loop" at the pommel with the muzzle down and at least a 45 degree angle. Do this with a "naked" bullet and its unlikely it will stay loaded for any amount of time. This is why the US military never have a Minie ball Cavalry Carbine that got past the testing stage... The smooth bore carbine would ALSO unload itself in a few miles. So the various breechloading arms of the period were the preferred Cavalry long arm during the Civil War.

While some naked bullet were used, apparently post Civil War, these were target guns for the most part.
The pre-American Civil War "bullet" was the cloth patched Picket and by the Civil War the PP cylindrical slug. But neither of these is particularly useful in general for a hunter. The RB is superior in the 19th C. context since the rifle could be carried without fear of its spontaneously unloading or the projectile forming a bore obstruction.
Naked bullets have been known to move off the powder in modern times as well...

Dan

 

[M. De Land]

Yup, learned that the hard way in my second cap lock using maxi balls. Worked up bore while hunting and ringed the barrel eight inches from the muzzle. MD