Cleaning / Swabbing question...
 

So... being the newbee BP shooter that I am I have a question. When swabbing with your breech plug still in, either between each shot or between 3-5 shots... arent you just pushing all/some of the fouling down against the breech plug and enhancing the chance of clogging up the flash hole?

Yup! That's the beauty of using BH 209. No swabbing.

Yes you are. But you're at the range and not in a huntng situation. And you are testing loads for accuracy. So you want each shot to be on a clean, or mostly clean barrel. The swabbing removes most of the fouling so you have similar pressure between shots.
If by chance you do get a blocked flash hole you should have a thin wire to run through it anyway. Or at least your tools to remove the breech plug.

The only time I've found that to be a problem Alex, is swabbing with too wet a patch.

I've gone fifty shots with my sidelocks swabbing between every shot with a patch very lightly dampened with 91% Isopropyl alcohol with no problem. I have had the nipple clog from the top by cap fouling though. But it takes quite a few shots to do that.

thanks guys

For an inline rifle, there will always be some of the fouling pushed down, near the breech plug. That is one reason you don't want a WET swab, because you don't want to pour dry powder into the wet foul. But a slightly damp patch is meant to remove the majority of the foul, not all of it. It only makes each shot as near to the same as the next, so you get shot to shot consistency. But then if you really wanted perfection, you'd remove the breech plug, swab the barrel almost clean, then put it back. I suppose with these new quick release plugs, that is a possibility, but I have not heard of someone going to that extreme yet.

Gosh! I have never even considered it because I have never had any kind of problem with hunting or the range.

I use a damp windex patch at the range and a real spit patch hunting if necessary. The bigger problem exsits if the patch is to damp and leaves mositure in the barrel.

It has been my experiance that very little if any fouling actually get deposited down on to the breech plug. Most if not all of it is picked up by the damp patch. You can test this easily by just removing your breech plug, stand the gun on some paper and push a moist patch down through, doubt very much you will see anything fall out but the patch will be plenty dirty.

I say this but I must tell you most of my experiance is with T7 powder which does burn a little cleaner than real BP or any of the Pyros...

Another example might be a bullet that Doc White created that actually cleaned the bore as it was pushed down. Did not seem to create an ignition problem using them either.

Good question...

I was always from the school of needing a clean bore to be consistent. The problem was a clean bore never seemed to be as consistent as a bore with a couple of shots on it. I'm talking about using BH 209 now.

So, this season I plan to take a couple of shots, load the gun, and leave it that way for the whole season. It really rubs me the wrong way to leave the gun dirty, but I feel it's safe with BH. Accuracy on the first shot is more important.

I totally agree with you Muley... I never shot on a clean if the shot counts, I shoot on what I call a semi-clean bore... My normal routine is to shoot 3-5 shoots prior to hunting season to check POI, patch with windex after each, shot as normal, load up and take another shot. The bore never really gets cleaned till the end of the season, unless I were to get it really wet. Another thing I do wrong is, there are many things as I leave the gun loaded all season, but after shooting my 3-5 shots patching with windex and when the bore is totally dry I will run a very lightly oiled, and I mean lightly oiled, Montana X-Treme Bore Conditioner patch - to get a little bore protection back in the bore.

This works for me, but I am shooting T7, not sure you could get away with this with BP or the Pyros. Shooting BH I would do the same, except no patching between shots, but since BH is slightly corrosive, I woulds still run the light patch of Montana X-Treme to protect the bore...

Maybe I can get an elk on the first day. ;)