• Friends, our 2nd Amendment rights are always under attack and the NRA has been a constant for decades in helping fight that fight.

    We have partnered with the NRA to offer you a discount on membership and Muzzleloading Forum gets a small percentage too of each membership, so you are supporting both the NRA and us.

    Use this link to sign up please; https://membership.nra.org/recruiters/join/XR045103

Rain down the barrel?

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
There are small black rubber muzzle-covering "balloons" (sorta) that fit over your muzzle to keep water out but pose no risk of a bulged barrel supposedly. Never used them, but they would be fine for rifles. Now, shotguns might be another matter, don't know. A shotgun barrel is much more prone to bulging/bursting than a rifle. Again, I don't know.

Given enough water standing in a barrel upright, eventually enough moisture might cause problems. Certainly loading a charge in a wet barrel will contaminate your powder. Best keep the muzzle pointed down in a rain. Covers for hammer/frizzen/drum/etc. are available or easily made. Water's not a friend of black powder (except when cleaning).
The PBY Catalina's in the Pacific used those balloon like things over their machine guns' muzzles.
 
How about a tompion? Our flintlock season is after Christmas so snow is possible. I don't hunt in the rain but if it is a mist or fog, I insert a wood toothpick into the touch hole and set the frizzen down on it. If something show, pull out the toothpick and prime. It adds time but keeps the powder dry and the gun fires.
 
Tampion/Tompion I carved out of some maple I had lying around for my .62 smooth rifle. I also like to keep it in the barrel at our club shoots as an extra safety measure, especially while I’m away from it during down time and kids are around.

IMG_2024-11-07-072000.jpeg


IMG_0999.jpeg


IMG_1002.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Back
Top