CLP or Kroil for bore cleaning/preserving

Gibbs

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May 25, 2018
Location
Fennville, MI USA
I was curious as to why muzzle loaders, like the 1853 Enfield, could not be cleaned in the barrel with CLP or Kroil? Kroil I believe is one of the best preservatives and penetrants I've ever come across. CLP does an excellent job at rust prevention.

Right now I am using hot water, dish soap, and a bore squeege to draw soapy water into the breech end from the removed nipple, as the breech sits in a small tub of soapy water. I use a nylon bore brush and swab with patches when done and then coat it with my black powder bullet lubricant... smells like wintergreen (think Pepto Bismo).

Looks like in the field shooting, a nice squirt of CPL or Kroil and patch would make further loading a bit easier and also help protect from pitting until thoroughly cleaned.
 
The products of black powder combustion, like the products of combustion in corrosive modern primers, are powerfully hydroscopic, and do not disolve in oil. They do disolve in water. That is why you clean black powder firearms with water or a cleaning solution that contains water, and why WWII and Korean War period GI bore cleaner contained water. If you don't use water, enough material from the black powder or primers remains in the barrel -- even if the bore looks clean -- that the bore will rust under a coat of oil.

CLP is a really good preservative, and I use it in the bores of my black powder firearms between matches, but only if the bore is carefully cleaned with a water based cleaner before hand.

Regards,
Don Dixon
 
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I have 2 different bullet lubricants I use; SPG, which seems to have a base of bees wax and Wonder Lube 1000 PLUS patch and ball lube. The Wonder Lube smells of wintergreen and don't know it's makeup but it is softer and more "liquid" than the SPG. Wax, specifically bees wax, is not affected by soap. Get it in your cooking pan and soap and hot water won't get it out... but alcohol will. Alcohol will dissolve wax. Gives me the idea to try some of my Purcell hand sanitizer when out on my backyard shooting range after firing a number of bullets with wax based lube. Purcell is 70% alcohol and as such should work on both the burned black powder residue AND the wax from the bullets. I've tried 90% EtOH on cleaning patches after cleaning with soap and water and YOU WOULD BE SURPRISED at the amount of extra residue I get out of the bore using high proof alcohol.
 
From the Ballistol web site: "Since Ballistol emulsifies with water, mix one part Ballistol and two parts water to make one of the best black powder solvents available." You still need H2O, and a lot of people like diluted Ballistol.

Regarding bee's wax, water won't cut it, but water and soap will. One of the commonly used black powder cleaners is a mix of 1/3 alcohol, 1/3 hydrogen peroxide, and 1/3 Murphy's Oil Soap. It has a lot of water in it, and it cleans like a champ. But, hydrogen peroxide is a powerful oxidizer, and if you let it set in the barrel it forms acids from the sulphur and nitrate residues in the barrel and will etch the barrel.

Regards,
Don Dixon
 
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If you don't use water, enough material from the black powder or primers remains in the barrel -- even if the bore looks clean -- that the bore will rust under a coat of oil.

I wonder about that statement. To make rust you need oxygen, hence iron oxide, and steels contain iron. However, you also need O2 *Oxygen to create "rust" and that is the purpose of a coating of oil, to provide lubricity, and provide an oxygen barrier to protect the steel.

I understand Pyrodex, by it's very nature and makeup is even MORE prone to causing corrosion than regular black powder.
 
A little research landed me here: https://www.chuckhawks.com/hbn_dry_lubricant.html and I do have powdered HBN Hexagonal boron nitride. I have coated my AR-15 and AR-10 rifle bullets with it and have excellent results from the chronograph tests, as well as a nice feeling that there is something better than molly coated bullets out there. With the AR-15 / AR-10 I had to roughen the copper jacket a bit to get some adhesion since those bullets are shiny and slick as made in production. With my cast Minnie' balls, coating should be a breeze. Coating before and after sizing should be very useful to help seal up the metals of the bore.
 
I wonder about that statement. To make rust you need oxygen,

See below:

"Corrosive Ammunition:
"What exactly is corrosive ammunition? Many shooters today have heard of corrosive ammunition but probably have never seen or shot any. The word corrosive conjures a mental image of acids or other evil substances that want to dissolve your rifle. Thankfully, in this case the offending corrosive agent is only salt; Potassium Chloride.

"This salt doesn't come from the gunpowder in the ammunition. Rather, it comes from the primer [or from black powder in our case]. The salt is the result of potassium chlorate (The priming agent) decomposing into KCL (Potassium chloride) a salt. As a general rule ammunition made after 1954 will not be corrosive. There are exceptions, of course.

"So how does this salt cause rust in my rifle? KCL by itself does not cause rust. It's hygroscopic; meaning it takes up water and holds it. That water reacts with the steel(iron) producing a very small electrical current that breaks the water into hydrogen and oxygen. The free oxygen goes after the iron producing rust. The KCL adds more ions to the solution which increases the current flow and the rusting process.

"Because the process generates oxygen, putting a coating of oil over the problem does not stop the rusting process. It may slow it slightly, but it doesn't eliminate it. The only way to prevent rust is to remove the KCL. To do that we want to dissolve the salt in a solution and wash it out of the rifle. The chart below shows which solvents are the most effective at dissolving KCL. The obvious winner is plain water. The hotter the better."

Gibbs. You ask a question, and then are resistant to any opinions but your own. It's your gun. Do with it what you will/clean it however you wish. Just don't ask questions you don't want anwsers to.
 
No, question is answered fully. Even though you can clean the rifle with CLP, as example, it does not do a good enough job of elimination the salts from primers and residue of the sulfurs. Water, hot water, is used to dilute as much as possible the potassium and other salts. After the majority of the potassium salts are removed, then oil, and specifically those that promote anti corrosion properties, could be applied to the bore to help reduce further oxidation of bare metal. There should be minimal trace amounts then left, yes?

If you used regular oil before shooting then they are not effective at protecting the bore from residues from the primers and black powder? And the bullet lube is always seemed to be made from Crisco or such and not petroleum products. Which I always thought the petroleum products were superior to fats, both vegetable and animal, at metal protection.

I would also think if one could squeeze enough HBN into the pores of the steel bore of the barrel that that in itself would produce a barrier against small residual remnant salts left over from cleaning with water.
 
Best cleaner I've found yet for shooting real black powder is plain Windex followed by a couple dry patches, then a wet patch with Rem oil or an equivalent. Don't over complicate this. Put a couple good squirts down the bore till you see it running out the cone. Wet a patch with Windex, wipe bore. Repeat wet patch a couple times, then dry patches till they come out clean and dry. Now oily patch. Easy peasy. Don't forget to pull the cone and give it the Windex treatment too. Dry the cone, put a very light dab of grease on the thread and reinstall. Wipe rest of gun down with Ballistol cloth and finished.

Ballistol works well too but in my experience, Windex seems to cut black powder fouling better. Either will work.
 
Alcohol works very well and it evaporates eliminating worry about moisture in the barrel and when I get home scalding water followed by patches then oily patches. I know people who use peroxide, others nothing more than scalding water followed by patches then gun oily patch.

The one thing I know is that modern petroleum based cleaning products just make a mess.
 
Best cleaner I've found yet for shooting real black powder is plain Windex followed by a couple dry patches, then a wet patch with Rem oil or an equivalent. Don't over complicate this. Put a couple good squirts down the bore till you see it running out the cone. Wet a patch with Windex, wipe bore. Repeat wet patch a couple times, then dry patches till they come out clean and dry. Now oily patch. Easy peasy. Don't forget to pull the cone and give it the Windex treatment too. Dry the cone, put a very light dab of grease on the thread and reinstall. Wipe rest of gun down with Ballistol cloth and finished.

Ballistol works well too but in my experience, Windex seems to cut black powder fouling better. Either will work.
Can't get much easier than that! Thanks!
 
When you shoot as much of the holy black as we do in the North South Skirmish Association, you look for ways to simplify cleaning. :D

Kroil- great stuff, probably the best penetrating oil I've found to date. For stuck cones, especially in a revolver, I plug the cone, set cylinder with mouth up, put several drops of Kroil in the offending cylinder. Cone comes right out after a day or so with little effort.
 
Alcohol works very well and it evaporates eliminating worry about moisture in the barrel and when I get home scalding water followed by patches then oily patches.

Using some sort of oil, petroleum based, AFTER the initial cleaning of BP and primer residue seems to be the normal. "Oil" being applied after it is clean

The one thing I know is that modern petroleum based cleaning products just make a mess.
Apparently because of the nature of BP, then Hoppe's #9 and others just won't cut it. Plain old hot water, alcohol swabs, Windex is the best. Makes me think of those "moist towelettes" or alcohol wipes you can get, might be handy in the bag.
 
Something I was reading " Mercury fulminate caps & primers came first, and were not necessarily corrosive.
The mercury residue did cause brass failure in the early cartridge ammo.

That was followed by Potassium chlorate primers, primarily for longer case life.
They were the ones that are corrosive.
They leave a residue of potassium chloride salt in the bore after a cartridge is fired.
These hygroscopic salt crystals will hold moisture from a humid atmosphere and cause rusting.

That was followed by lead styphnate primers & caps that are not corrosive. "

I use Schuetzen caps made in Spain, and then there is RWS made in Germany, probably the best of the best.
RWS uses a compound called Sinoxid for it's ignition of musket caps This link does list RWS musket caps as non corrosive. https://shop.apacherifleworks.com/products/accessories-rws-588-723364052095-2191
 
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Using some sort of oil, petroleum based, AFTER the initial cleaning of BP and primer residue seems to be the normal. "Oil" being applied after it is clean


Apparently because of the nature of BP, then Hoppe's #9 and others just won't cut it. Plain old hot water, alcohol swabs, Windex is the best. Makes me think of those "moist towelettes" or alcohol wipes you can get, might be handy in the bag.
I've used alcohol swabs as patches before but find that a squirt bottle filled with alcohol works better. I've used a variety of he wonder cleaners but have found that none are better than alcohol and hot water.
 
RWS percussion caps do not contain any substance that causes rusting or residue. How did I come by this? At this link: https://forum.cartridgecollectors.org/t/rws-sinoxide-primers-pamphlet-1959/25710
They were on the scene in Germany since probably even before 1959. I'm thinking that CCI percussion caps are using the same ingredient, Sinoxid, today. Non corrosive. Schuetzen, however, use a different compound, not Sinoxid.
 
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