sounds like a good scrubbin! and well needed. for a while alot of guys i talked to and read posts of said a bore brush wasnt needed unless shooting sabots. i didnt use one for a while, then i finally said balony...im goingto brush it out and run boiling water through it. scrubbed the heck out of it and like you was surprised. although you can get preeeetty clean with just a patch i think a brush is the smart way to go. and i can also get mine into my "chamber"..cant remember what its called..but the veeeery bottom of the bore where the charge sits. i noticed jags dont go down that far and i can get a brush down that far. i dont know why or whats up with that..like theres something that stops my jags. but my brush scrubs that nice. it is rough on brushes to push it down there but i think its worth it to get it clean. i can sleep easier at night knowing i got the whole bore muzzle to breech cleaned. i now always clean like that. boiling water with a brush...then some patches with solvent(#13..or i picked up rusty duck DIRT cheap and i like that too now) then pull it out and start drying it...seems to work for me..i STILL use bore butter and have no reason to stop. I fire my gun as often as i can so it doesnt sit TOO long. though it sat this year from mid january till about a month ago with a charge in it! i somehow FORGOT to uncharge it when i came home from the last hunt. pulled the ball and cleaned it and was pleasantly surprised it was clean. i put the bore butter in while the metal is still piping hot from the boiling water but DRY and run alcohol patches then mroe dry just to make sure its dry. im pretttty particular about cleaning my flinter. i about died when i realized i forgot to uncharge it. but no rust so i guess it was ok. theres still guys that wont put a brush into their bores. i dont know why but they are out there. i will have to try a 54 cal brush in my 50cal. see if they will last better...or worse...