hello everyone, great site.question. in where your powder in barrel ends up you cant, i believe ,get a cleaning patch to clean. we were always told to get brake cleaner at wal-mart in spray can and take touch hole liner out and spray into there to clean this area. my question is, i have not been putting any protectant in there as i am afraid of contamianating the powder later. does this area need protection and if so, what do you do to get in thereor use. thanks

I don't know.
My flintlock has a removeable breech plug.
I can look in both ends of the barrel.

sproulman

I have often thought about the same thing... One thing I do after cleaning is to make sure the breech plug and the breech area in general is DRY. I use compressed air to blow the moisture dry, either going out in the shop and using the compressor or a simple can of compressed air. another thing I will do is take a lubticated patch and put it on a patch pulling jag feed that down into the breech hole and spin it around in there to give me that lubricated protection. If you are not using real BP you can put a patch on your normal patch jag push it down to contact with the breech plug them spray a lubricant into the breech plug - either way you do get some protection.. is it necessary I really do not know - my biggest concern is I want to get it dry.

Good luck in your search...

i have the TC HAWKINS .50CAL.onlymuzzle end you can get in on them, i believe. everyone at club sprays car brake cleaner with plastic pipe on into the touch hole to clean it. i did not know cleaning jag would get down into there. next question, should anyprotectant be in there. i cant see pushing bore butter into that area as it may contaminate the powder.

On my T/C Hawkins Flintlock.. I pull the barrel from the stock first and foremost. I also pull the vent liner every time I clean the rifle. This of course makes for a larger hole. After the VERY hot soap and water bath with lots of hard fast pumping action, I put a bore brush on the ramrod and wrap a patch around that. I saturate that witha good black powder solvent. I then brush the barrel only about five strokes. This is to make sure nothing is building in the rifling.

After that I use either brake cleaner or alcohol and spray down the barrel and through the vent liner. I then patch all of that out of the barrel. After that a few dry patches to make sure there is no moisture in the barrel. After that I take a fuzzy pipe cleaner and clean out the vent liner hole. You can reach all the way into the breech of the barrel with this.

And then I put some Birchwood Casey Sheath on a patch (saturated)and swab the entire barrel. After that I clean the lock on both sides, as I remove that also. I then spray a light coat of silicon spray on the back side of the lock, and wipe that all off. After replacing the lock and wiping the under belly of the barrel with the Birchwood Casey Sheath, I reassemble the rifle and wipe all the parts I did not get so far, with the Sheath.

I have never had a problem with rust, ignition problems from the Sheath, or any thing.. so far. I do swab the barrel out with alcohol before loading, and wipe the frizzen, pan and flint off though also...

I agree with you and you idea of not wanting too much bore butter in that area, but to each their own. Lots of folks use it and have no problems with it....

sproulman

What I was/am suggesting is not a cleaning jag - it is a wire patch puller - it is small enough to go in the smaller breech cavity. If you attach a patch to that you can guide it down into the breech cavity and apply a layer of protectant that way.

Since you are a flintlock user, and I have know experiance there, I am assuming you are using real BP. All the years we have been told do not mixpetrol products withBP - I would then guess you use Bore Butter. I would suggest that you you might get some WonderLube patches to use in the breech plug if that area concerns you. WonderLube, an all natural product,drys and leaves a film coating and in the breech area that would help seal that area from the air.A lot of BP users even use it as a bore swab.

I agree, I would not put bore butter down into the breech cavity.

Just curious, most of us that use a precussion cap of some sort pop a couple of caps before we load for the real shot, do flint users do the same or are you just loading and shooting?

I think Cayugad mentiond a aerosol dry lube, is there something along that line that might help through the vent liner? Being a sub powder user a coating of oil in the breech hasn't bothered me because I knew I was going to shoot it out discharging caps.

Most important - in my mind - get it dry...

a lot of people are not using bore butter anymore, i am going to stay with it.only problem i have is here in pa. weather gets to 10 above at times. that bore butter in barrel and on your maxi-balls gets almost impossible to load.i used to use roundball with bore butter and break ramrods in winter trying to seat them .stuff is nasty in cold weather.only way to get it to work in cold is with alcohol.we swab barrel. roundball says he keeps his patchs /ball in shirt pocket in winter. i will try that but shooting at range we had to put them in truck with heater on.

i tried that patch puller and it worked fine.i got down into that area where powder sits.guess what came out, BORE BUTTER. i dont want that sitting in there.i guess i will clean that area now.i think i will not put anything in there as of now unless someone has a reason too.i believe i can get one of those birchwood sheath little rags in there to.but, is it necessary. i like your idea on patch puller, it worked great.

put a little lube (your choice) on a q-tip and run through the drum or touch hole and then use a .22 cleaning rod and patch to get down in the breech. Also be very careful with the brake cleaner I use it every day at work and one time at home it took the blue off one of my rugers, sorry I cant remember what brand but It's not that expensive to buy hoppes bore scrubber or similar it's made for guns and its just like brakleen.Just my opinion. D.

takes blue off, i did not know that.i used it for years on my tc hawkins.everyone at our shooting club here uses it to clean their bores of muzzleloaders. thanks.