cleaning

[XWrench3]

this is about my 4th or 5th post in a week, can you tell it is muzzleloader deer season? anyway, i ended up remounting my scope so i could get a better veiw with all of my c-c-c-cold weather gear on. so i went out today to sight it back in. all went well, rather slow, but well. it was so c-c-c-cold out, i decided to leave it at m.o.tuna can (3" circle) @100 yards. anyway, had to do the dad thing for several hours when i retuned home, which is no big deal. so i go about my normal cleaning routine, take it apart, fill the sink 1/2 full of hot soapy water, etc.etc.etc. i wonder how serious i need to be about makeing absoulotly certain than every single nook and cranny has not only been cleaned, but thouroghly cleaned, dried, oiled (or bore butter in the barrel). the only part i do not take apart is the scope mount, and the trigger mechanism (because i have no idea how that goes together), so i spray the he** out of that with Rusty Duck and then stp&oil mixed. i know that i will have to wipe the bore out before i load, which may be tommorow, or in a couple of days at the latest. for long term storage (end of season until warm weather), i coat the living daylights out of the barrel bore with bore butter, and stp the rest. it takes me something like 3 hours to go through the whole process. am i going through way to much work for in season cleaning? i remember when i bought my knight m/l it had a video about cleaning, and it said in there that the whole cleaning process should take no more than 15 minutes. the only way i could do it in 15 minutes would be to scrub the bore out, and throw the rest in a 55 gallon drum of oil ! :groner::holysheep

[Alan]

For real BP, on a gun seeing more or less constant use,
I pull the nipple,
do the barrel swab thing w/ a bucket of hot water,
shoot some canned air in the nipple hole,
dry the barrel,
wipe out the nipple w/ pipe cleaners,
apply bore butter to the threads and put it back in,
run a bore butter patch down the barrel
wipe down all outside surfaces that got fouling, and
then give the outside a light coating of olive oil.

It almost takes longer to type than it does to do.

[XWrench3]

mine is an inline (cva optima) that has a dull nickle finish to it. the main thing i am paranoid about is rust or corrosion. i have no idea if the inside of the barrel is nickle plated or bare steel. it is bright and shiney, but so are all of my rifles. and my mid fifties eyes do not work as well as they once did. i know i go over board on a lot of it, but i want no part of a rusty rifle, especially in the bore. if it wouldn't take me an additional hour to reclean out, i would use grease inside the barrel to keep it from rusting. but from what i have read, b.p. and substitutes do not get along so well with petroleum chemicals. i can not bring myself to leave bare steel (inside of the barrel) with no protection. if there was something that i could put on it and just put the powder in there, and still have all of the powder burn, i would do that. even hunting i worry about rust in the bore. but i know that there is nothing i can do, except keep the gun cold, so it does not sweat. this summer, i am going to play around with running a very lightly coated patch of bore butter down the barrel after the gun is loaded to see what happens. of course, i will drop the charge back a bunch to start. which brings me to another question, how do you tell if the pressures are to high with an inline b.p. gun? i know how to tell with cartridge guns, but this is not like that. and i really want no part of a hospital stay.

[Shooter]

Hot water and Murphy's Oil soap. Remove nipple for final cleaning of the year. Bore Butter or olive oil. Don't use olive oil on the lock,as it will gum, but it works great in the bore.

[smoked turkey]

Does anyone have experience with the Hoppies No. 9 for black powder? I confess to using regular No. 9 in the bore for storage. I always run several patches through it prior to shooting. I have been thinking I need to use something different for the bore during storage so this is a timely topic for me. I have on occasion used bore butter but don't do it religiously. Just curious what most use.

[HORNET]

XWrench, instead of trying to grease the bore after loading, you could put a finger cot (or something) over the end of the barrel to keep the rain & snow out so it doesn't rust. Small balloons would work, I've currently got the finger cut off a latex glove over the end of the barrel on my in-line. I think the grease would be too variable as to amount and viscosity with temperature changes.
I've tried the Hoppe's #9 PLUS black powder cleaner, but hot soapy water seems to work better. I'm using actual 3F black powder. It may work better with some of the substitutes.