T/C Hawken breech plug?

[pepperbelly]

I have been reading references to removing the breech plug to clean.
Does my T/C Hawken have a removeable breech plug?
Would that help to clean the rifle after shooting?
Any downside to taking it out?
I haven't contacted T/C yet to get a manual for the rifle, but I will.
Jim

 

[Rebel]

NO, do not remove the breechplug from your T/C. Not re4quired or reccomended.

 

[Zonie]

NO. The TC Hawken breech plug is not designed to be removed. In fact, I have heard of people ruining their barrel trying to remove it.

IMO, the sure fire way to keep the breech clean is to use the advantage of the hooked breech your gun has to remove the barrel for cleaning it.
After removing the barrel, run a cleaning patch soaked with your favorite brand of cleaner (Dawn, Simple Green, Hoppes Black powder, Murphys Oil Soap....) up and down the bore a few times. Add a little water to the patch and repeat the up and down the bore routine.
Remove the nipple (with a nipple wrench) and lower the breech end of the barrel into a bucket of water.
Wet a cleaning patch with water and run it down the bore with a suitable jag on a cleaning rod. Pull it back up and it will suck water into the bore thru the breech plug.
I like to remove the breech from the bucket at this stage and then firmly force the patch/jag down the bore with a hard stroke. (This keeps the water in the bucket cleaner. It has also been known to dampen the spirits of neighbors cats who thought they were out of range).
A few up strokes and hard down strokes will blast away any fouling in the patent breech and the connecting hole between it and the nipple and the bore.
Change the patch and pressure flush it again, changing patches every few strokes until the patch comes out clean.
Some like to use a bore brush during this stage, but that is up to you.

Run some dry patches down the bore to dry it.

At this stage, I like to place the breech over the burner on my wifes gas stove to boil all of the hidden water out of the threads and passageways.

Lube the bore with a good gun oil like Sheath or Rem Oil.
Clean the nipple, oil the threads and reinstall it and your thru.

 

[pepperbelly]

I usually use a spear point jag with my patches, but I also push them through from the receiver on bolt rifles.
What jag do I need, the old style where the patch is pushed through the jag or something specific to muzzleloaders?
After cleaning I have read that some like to use denatured alcohol to dry the bore. I have some I use to help degrease before cold blue touchups. Is it necessary? Will compressed air blown through the nipple help?
My wife won't let me use her stove. Will a heat gun help?
Jim

 

[madstone]

Zonie,
If you've got the wife this far (using the gas stove) you might push to use the family tub for cleaning the barrel? Experience will tell how hot to set the temp on the hotwater heater and if you lock the door and sing badly you can get by with this if you clean the ring! Scalding hot soapy water followed by an even hotter rinse will get it all clean and ready for oil.

I guess a fellow could use lots of bubbles and use a graphite rod so the good wife would never see the cleverly immersed barrel and cleaning apparatus? If the lock don't work!

 

[madstone]

Pepperbelly,
First, don't touch that breechplug. TC's are tough and it isn't necessary, anyway.
The heat gun will work fine if you can get hot air to all the newly cleaned parts. Else, rust.
Try more groveling and begging with the wife! It seldom works, but sometimes they feel sorry for you and other opportunities arise.
I am retired, wife works, still, so I do this while she isn't at home! She can, after all these years, smell BP, hide, horn, antler or leather and knows something has happened, but lacks proof! Be vague, evasive, etc.
The spearpoint jag is made for a one-way push through a ctg gun's barrel. It is designed to push only. And hold the patch centered. ML jags actually do their best cleaning on the reverse pull. The patch "bunches up" and will wipe the bore. That's the old theory anyway.

 

[pepperbelly]

So muzzleloader jags are different from the rest.
There is what may be a jag in the patch box in the stock. I'll look tomorrow more closely.
Jim

 

[Rebel]

Hey Musket Man , Zonie, Stumpkiller, Claude ro somebody. Can oneo fyou post a pic of a cleaning jag for him. I can't figure out how to do it.

 

[Stumpkiller]

What's that? Oh, oh. The Stumpylight is trained on the clouds. A citizen needs me.

The one on the right above is the modern T/C. My older versions have several of the ridges being smaller on the front to extend all the way down into the patent breech. Don't know if they changed the breech, or just their jags.


These below are from Track of the Wolf. The longer jag gives you more ramrod to grip. This can save a hunt if a wiping patch hangs up.

Does this "jag" your memory?

I poke a hole in my cleaning patches and thread the jag on through the hole. This way they NEVER come off in the bore as they occasionally do if just draped over the jag. If that happens you need a patch worm or a ball puller to fish it out.

Ball Pullers & Patch Worm

 

[Charles/NM]

I cringed when I read that advice in The American Rifleman a couple of months ago. The writers there and their 'experts' don't know squat about real muzzle loaders. I tried to remove the plug from my old T/C Hawken years ago with no success and I have the original T/C action wrench. Thought I was going to twist the barrel. Gave up and left it in place. Leave it in place!!!

 

[Stumpkiller]

I have one of those block wrenches for the breech plug. Used it once maybe 22 years ago and not since. Took all my skills and strength, a bench vise, three feet of pipe and a metal parallel clamp to remove the plug to retrieve a brush that had seperated from the @#&$%! threaded base. :curse: I did not mar the barrel or plug, but I was VERY careful in padding everything (with IBM cards as I remember - LOL. Show of hands:who remembers IBM cards?).

 

[Rebel]

Thank ya kindly sir. You are a gentleman and a scholar. :what: I said that? :: Ya done a good job.

 

[roundball]

I sure do...and miss the plain ones...best doggone note cards to have laying around that there ever was...IBM retiree here...started with them in the Field Engineering Division back in 1968

 

[RussB]

"I poke a hole in my cleaning patches and thread the jag on through the hole. This way they NEVER come off in the bore as they occasionally do if just draped over the jag".

Stumpkiller....Would you be so kind as to elaborate just a bit on your cleaning method? :master:

For the life of me I can't picture this....Is the jag being used to support the patch against the walls? Or is the rod /jag fixture above the patch supporting it, and the jag just holding the patch on??
What happens when you pull back and the jag has to pass between a "doubled" patch?? :nono:

I guess what I'm trying to picture is where you poke that hole in the patch. Is it in a corner, in the center, or 2 pokes on 2 opposite corners?
Sounds like sumpin I might wanta do, if'n I ever figure it out. :hmm:


Thanks, Russ

 

[Stumpkiller]

Lets see if I can verbillate this more better.

First off, my cleaning patches are 2-1/2" square or rectangular strips of cotton tick.

So, you take an awl and poke a hole 1/4" in from either edge of any corner. I REALLY did a stupid thing to my left finger with a clip-point knife :redface:, now I use awl or push against a tree. The threaded end of the jag is pushed through that hole. The jag is then threaded onto the ramrod. The cleaning patch, now flopping from the base of the jag, is folded over the jag and pushed down into the muzzle.

My process:

Shoot gun. Pull cleaning patch off stack (I thread 16 on a doubled length of yarn so they're in a little "book" type stack) and stick on tongue. Fish jag out of bag (I either have a flap of leather in my bags with a big hole on one end and a small hole on the other, or a tiny sheath to hold the jag for easy finding). Pull patch off tongue. Supress gag reflex. Thread jag through hole in corner of patch. Thread jag onto ramrod. Flop patch over muzzle and press into bore with jag. Down, up, down up. Remove jag & patch and put jag back in flap holder. Grip ramrod with finger of hand holding gun and begin loading sequence.

After every dozen shots and at the end of the day I wipe with moose milk. For this variation, I hook the patch on as above and then pull out my little 1 oz glass bottle. Pull the cork, lay the patch on the mouth of the bottle and press it down with my finger tip. Tip the bottle sideways while maintaining finger pressure and slide the bottle around under the patch, giving it an even soaking without spilling a drop of lube. :winking: Tip the bottle back up and recork. Down, up, down, up, down up.

More than you ever wanted to know about bore wiping.

 

[RussB]

"More than you ever wanted to know about bore wiping".

Nope, not at all.
I "think" you just made a convert!
Gotta try it myself first though. For me, pulling a stuck stick (rod) is on about the same level as a root canal. :shocking:
Ain't no better way to stick a stick then double pump it on the way "back out".....it never seems to happen on the way down.
Once you get a real tight patch and a jag stuck good, and I mean stuck real good, where conventional wisdom seems to no longer apply, you get very leary on trying something new. :hmm:

I have several different size "2 horn devils" that works pretty good in pulling just the patch, but a patch and a stick, both stuck, calls for copious amounts of foul language, and lots of Old Crow. :curse:

Thanks, Russ

Oops! sorry! I should have started a new thread. It seemed to just "blend", and I overlooked the opportunity. Sorry :master:

 

[pepperbelly]

Thanks Stumpy!
I do have a cleaning jag. It looks like the one in the first pic, left top row. One less thing to buy.
I will save and print out the description of your cleaning technique.
I am trying to learn all I can about loading, cleaning during shooting and after shooting. I want it to be as natural as when I shoot one of my Mausers, or my Garand.
When cleaning between shots do you get the patch wet, or just damp? I read something, somewhere, saying to get it wet so it will clean the bore instead of just packing the fouling.
I also may have misremembered what the previous owner said. I thought he said he had removed the breech plug and reinstalled using anti-seize. Could he have actually have removed the nipple, instead of the breech plug? He mentioned doing this during this rifle's one and only cleaning. He did say he followeed instructions, using the method that draws soapy water into the barrel using the jag.
Does removing the nipple sound more likely than him pulling the breech plug?
Thanks,
Jim

 

[Zonie]

As others have pointed out, if he was really removing the REAL breechplug, he would still have small veins popped out on his forehead.
He must have been refering to the nipple as being a "breech plug".

 

[pepperbelly]

Thanks Zonie, that has to be it. I can't see this guy working that hard. Do you use anti-seize lube on the nipple?
I gotta start paying closer attention!
Jim

 

[Maynerd62411]

Someone on another site mentioned a "breech brush" , some time ago. I found one in a shop a couple of years ago. It is a .36 cal. with the bronze bristles straight out, like a little round paint brush. The idea is to reach into the smaller area at the breech. It had a guide on it to center out in a .50 cal. Eventually it mushroomed out and corroded quite a bit. I can't find another one , anywhere. It was made by CVA, but they don't have it on their site or in the catalog at the gun shop. Any ideas where to find one? :hmm: