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Thread: some tips that may help.

  1. #21
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    viscosity affects accuracy no matter if it's winter or not.
    the key i have found is to have the same lube viscosity year round.
    i use atf in the winter,and leave it out in the summer. [simple right?]
    it took me three years and about 50 lbs of 4895 to come up with that big revelation.

  2. #22
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    I have some unfounded faith that someday I will discover the components to make a boolit lube that will function from below freezing to 120 degrees and survive a summer day in a closed vehicle in Texas. Oh, and it will provide the same accuracy and consistency of the best lubes I use now. Beeswax ain't gonna do it, though.

    Gear

  3. #23
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    I have pretty well come to the conclusion that it will be easier to find a place to live with a consistent year round temp than to find a lube that works well over a 60 to 100 degree range.
    I just don't like the idea of needing 2 different lubes but I am about to the point of deciding it is just a fact of life.
    I may just go with a summer formula as I shoot far less in the winter. Most of my hunting is at short ranges so a cold barrel flyer isn't likely to cause me much trouble.

    gear and Run- since you guys have obviously had lube issues in the cold I need to ask a question. I have found that this issue is a bigger problem, accuracy wise in a cold barrel, with smaller diameter and lighter weight bullets. My 32-20 is far worse than my 45-70. I haven't really looked at handguns enough to be able to say. Any thought from you two?

  4. #24
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    What is the stuff they use in engine oil to maintain viscosity?
    Once, I had a Datsun that used oil like mad so I put 40 weight in it. Then it got cold one night and when I went to start the thing at work, it quit right now!
    I found the aluminum gear on the camshaft to the distributor had sheared away.
    If you shoot aluminum boolits and hard lube, they might break!

  5. #25
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    james's oil analogy is about right.
    we don't make multi visc lubes,i have tried to find a lube that maintained the same hardness in cold and hot.
    they kinda felt about the same sitting in the cold and the warm but they weren't.
    the lube just didn't have the flex or the ability to go liquid and make that seal when cold.
    the lube in the bbl was stiff too.
    357 max had the cold bbl first shot flyer when hunting and he worked out his micro wax specifically for that.
    i don't think it would hold up over a 20 shot string at 80*'s though.
    it seems when we try to fix one problem you lose at the other end.
    a temp stable carrier/lube combo is the issue.
    i sent ian a p.m. last night about this.
    when target shooting i just burn one no big deal, but that isn't an option for hunting.
    white lith is, so far, one of the better temp stable ingredients i have found, and so is atf in our temp range.
    the carrier is the issue right now for me,maybe a silicone would work [i dunno haven't researched it]
    i do know silicones were tried by harris in the 50's but he wasn't satisfied [or didn't try them fully] as he suddenly shifted to his 50-50 mix and lauded it's praises like they were a sponsor of his race team.
    i have fought with this for quite a while now and the best answer i still have is to soften my lube for the winter and hope it doesn't fail when it gets warm.

  6. #26
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    Quote Originally Posted by runfiverun View Post
    james's oil analogy is about right. I agree. There's a LOT of R&D and money tied up in additives that make oil thick when hot and thin when cool. When I was in automotive school this came up, and the prof gave a really good lecture on the chemistry behind what makes that happen, and why heat eventually breaks the stuff down in an engine and the viscosity/temp range changes. I've also seen charts showing different brands and advertised weights vs. actual independent lab tests, I can assure you that 5W-30 isn't 30 weight at 200 degrees, maybe 18 weight.
    we don't make multi visc lubes,i have tried to find a lube that maintained the same hardness in cold and hot. Me too, that's a tough nut to crack.
    they kinda felt about the same sitting in the cold and the warm but they weren't.
    the lube just didn't have the flex or the ability to go liquid and make that seal when cold.
    the lube in the bbl was stiff too. Just when you think you have it figured out, you go shooting and professor Gun says SORRY, please try again!
    357 max had the cold bbl first shot flyer when hunting and he worked out his micro wax specifically for that.
    i don't think it would hold up over a 20 shot string at 80*'s though. It will not, but it does what he designed it for beautifully. He lives near Canada, I live near Mexico, not much weather overlap between our two locations.
    it seems when we try to fix one problem you lose at the other end. Always a trade-off.
    a temp stable carrier/lube combo is the issue.
    i sent ian a p.m. last night about this.
    when target shooting i just burn one no big deal, but that isn't an option for hunting.
    white lith is, so far, one of the better temp stable ingredients i have found, and so is atf in our temp range. Synthetic two-stroke oil seems to be another one with those characteristics.
    the carrier is the issue right now for me,maybe a silicone would work [i dunno haven't researched it]
    i do know silicones were tried by harris in the 50's but he wasn't satisfied [or didn't try them fully] as he suddenly shifted to his 50-50 mix and lauded it's praises like they were a sponsor of his race team. I wanted to dink with silicones, but the thing is they're weird. Felix and I discussed this at length a few years ago, and he was initially worried about "sandy barrel syndrome" where under enough temperature and pressure the oils might revert to silica. The other thing is that silicone "grease" is a silicone base oil that's fluid but thickened with fumed silica. Not sure fumed silica would hurt a gunbarrel (they use it to thicken milkshakes), but that's not the tack I was looking to take for a thickener/base. Plus, silicone is a lousy metal-to-metal lubricant. I decided not to try it.
    i have fought with this for quite a while now and the best answer i still have is to soften my lube for the winter and hope it doesn't fail when it gets warm.
    For a while I went down the solids path. I tried a temp-stable synthetic automotive grease and mixed it with ultra-fine baker's flour, sanding dust, whole wheat flour, talc, graphite, Metamucil, and even BPI shot buffer trying to make a temp-stable lube/stop-leak for my boolits. Only the graphite and BPI prevented leading, and didn't give me any real accuracy. I think the other solids made so much friction that the boolit just started rubbing off in the bore.

    Joe had a pretty decent beeswax/ivory/castor oil lube that I've tried, but it's so dang hard that you have to hope it sticks to the boolit all the way to the target, and at a certain point it doesn't. But you have to realize I'm using it out of the context he designed it for. He made it to do one thing, I just took the formula and tried it randomly. I never was a fan of hard lubes.

    I'm convinced that really fine paper fibers, a hard synthetic wax, and synthetic two-cycle oil mixed to a putty-like consistency would be the bee's knees, but I haven't figures out how to pulp paper with oil. If you do it with water there's no way to keep the fibers separated while they dry. The object would be to have a ballistic stop-leak, temperature-consistent film lubricant, and carrier that would leave the boolit instantly and completely as each groove depressurized at the muzzle crown.

    Or maybe Mobil1 5W-40 Mercedes diesel engine oil will prove to be the secret.

    Gear

  7. #27
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    Something else I just remembered, I was digging around the internet a while back trying to gain a better understanding of how EP metal-soap greases work, and found a formula for determining the speed rating of a grease so you can get the right stuff for your bearings. Best I could figure, even the thinnest, slipperiest, model racecar lubes are only rated for about 10% the speed of a rifle boolit in metal-to-metal contact speed. After running boolit speed and various HS shaft speeds through my calculator, I figured that most modern, multi-viscosity engine oils will lubricate plain bearings to a surface speed of only about 90 linear feet per second, and that was at 10,000 RPM! So, anybody still think a boolit lube really works like a traditional lube? If it did, things would be much more straightforward.

    Gear

  8. #28
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    Quote "I'm convinced that really fine paper fibers, a hard synthetic wax, and synthetic two-cycle oil mixed to a putty-like consistency would be the bee's knees, but I haven't figures out how to pulp paper with oil. If you do it with water there's no way to keep the fibers separated while they dry. "

    Electrick blender??
    R.D.M.

  9. #29
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    another thing that might pan out too is ethylene or other glycol solids.
    it can be formed into solids,and would be better than the silicone would.
    it's quite stable over temp ranges we would deal with, sometimes i think that in looking for things that will swing cold to hot we look at too broad of a range.
    if we could narrow things down to 0 to 100 instead of -40 to 400 it might help.
    running on both edges would be infrequent and the other ingredients would broaden the range as a byproduct.

  10. #30
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    Here's another one I've been pondering for some time:

    PRODUCT NAME : Hydrogenated Castor Oil
    CAS NUMBER : 8001-78-3

    PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
    Appearance : Flakes, white to straw yellow.
    Identity A (Melting Point) : 85 to 88ºC
    Hydroxyl Value : 154 to 162
    Iodine Value : ≤ 5
    Saponification Value : 176 to 182
    Heavy Metals : ≤ 0,001%
    Free Fatty Acids : Máx. 11,0 mL to Sodium Hydroxide 0,1N
    Identity B – Hydroxyl Value : 145 to 165

    Identity C (Composition of Fatty Acids)
    Palmitic Acid ≤ 2,0%
    Stearic Acid – 7,0 to 14,0%
    Araquinidic Acid ≤ 1,0%
    Acid 12-Oxostearic ≤ 5,0%
    Acid 12-Hydroxystearic – 78,0 to 91,0%
    Any other Fatty Acid ≤3,0%
    Acid Value : ≤ 4,0
    Iodine Value : ≤ 5,0
    Alkaline Impurities : Max. 0,2 mL HCl 0,01M
    Nickel : ≤ 5 ppm

    What do you think about this stuff?

    Gear

  11. #31
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    beat me to it, i was gonna try making something like it with some rubbing alcohol and castor oil.
    [origionally i was gonna try glycerin till i talked to felix about that]
    i have used rubbing alcohol to take the tack out of carnuba red thinking it was acting on the alcohol esters in the beeswax.
    randy rat thought it was modifying the fats in the carnuba.
    leading me down the path of thinking again about alcohols and fats....


    that's a lot of glide,i am not sure of it alone, or as the lubricant.
    what kind of carrier are you thinking?
    that and beeswax are pretty close in melt temp.
    [my initial reaction was to use a lith stearate as a visc modifier with that stuff straight, but ...no]
    a synthetic/or another fat might be better [temp stable]
    and the water content is going to be something to deal with also.

    i wonder if it could be duplicated [ish]with some castor oil,ivory,and carnuba
    the castor heated just to the smoking.
    ivory added and stirred.
    then the carnuba at melt temp. [or jpw straight]
    then some alcohol added to bind everything into a solid letting the alcohol bubble off......

    i still wonder about a carrier though, that truly could be the issue.

    HELP..........

  12. #32
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    I don't know if polyethlene glycols are the way to go. They tend to have a brittle nature compared to things like beeswax. Having made more than a few suppositories with the stuff I just don't know if it has the properties needed as a carrier. I did try some once, many years ago, as a lube for minis in a rifle musket with black. It wouldn't stay on the projectiles for anything. Maybe some lanolin would have helped.

    From what you guys are saying it seems the issues are more with the carrier than with the lubricants themselves. The carrier needs to be hard, or soft, enough to handle the temps. What we almost need is something that is harder at 100 degrees than it is at 30.

    Each of you has mentioned modification of lubes for a particular temp range. I wonder if you have tried a "compromise" lube to expand the useful range?

    Gear, when the MML gave problems in the heat of your summer what kinds of problems did you have? Was it just a runny mess? Poor accuracy? Leading? Just want to have an idea what you look out for.

  13. #33
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    Just thought of another question. When a lube does poorly in either low or high temps is it because of trouble with the lube on the bullet or the lube remaining in the barrel from previous shots?
    I always assumed the cold weather , cold barrel problem was more due to lube from previous shots in the barrel being thick enough to create problems. Makes me wonder of dry patching the bore before that first shot would make a difference.

  14. #34
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    Brad, blowing through the bore slowly about ten times and patching out the condensation has helped me with cold-barrel flyers, but only if done right before shooting.

    I don't know if it's the bore condition (lube film), the lube in the grooves, or the way the lube acts after the boolit has cleared the muzzle that makes the difference, but I believe it's all a factor. MML didn't lead when it was hot or when the barrel was hot, but it starts throwing wild flyers and I literally had lube dripping off of my muzzle after 10 shots. I think that was mostly bore condition throwing classic "purge flyers". If I patched out every shot it worked fine at 98 degrees.

    Standard Felix lube, according to the recipe, is my compromise lube. It doesn't seem to have much of a practical limit in the upper ranges of shooting temps, and it's tough to make it fail in a hot barrel on a hot day through long strings provided you fill the minimum number of grooves, sometimes only one. I "torture tested" FWFL one time last summer, firing 40 rounds from cross-sticks out of my 336 .30-30 with a stiff dose of 748 behind a 311041. The temp was hovering around 106 ambient, 115 heat index, and ohmygod in the direct sun. I shot ten from the bench and decided I was going to die if I stayed out any longer. The brass needed a trim so I let the other 40 fly to see how the lube did. The first shot from the bench was as good as the last from the sticks, the stuff never let me down even though the barrel got so hot it burned me through the foregrip. The only problem with it is it throws cold barrel shots a bit low usually below about 50 degrees, and a bit of vaseline, reduction of carnauba, and switch to stearic acid from Ivory (sodium stearate) makes it shoot great to freezing. If it's below freezing I'm not hunting, period. I detest cold.

    Gear

  15. #35
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    Quote Originally Posted by runfiverun View Post
    beat me to it, i was gonna try making something like it with some rubbing alcohol and castor oil.
    [origionally i was gonna try glycerin till i talked to felix about that]
    i have used rubbing alcohol to take the tack out of carnuba red thinking it was acting on the alcohol esters in the beeswax.
    randy rat thought it was modifying the fats in the carnuba.
    leading me down the path of thinking again about alcohols and fats....


    that's a lot of glide,i am not sure of it alone, or as the lubricant.
    what kind of carrier are you thinking?
    that and beeswax are pretty close in melt temp.
    [my initial reaction was to use a lith stearate as a visc modifier with that stuff straight, but ...no]
    a synthetic/or another fat might be better [temp stable]
    and the water content is going to be something to deal with also.

    i wonder if it could be duplicated [ish]with some castor oil,ivory,and carnuba
    the castor heated just to the smoking.
    ivory added and stirred.
    then the carnuba at melt temp. [or jpw straight]
    then some alcohol added to bind everything into a solid letting the alcohol bubble off......

    i still wonder about a carrier though, that truly could be the issue.

    HELP..........
    I was thinking beeswax as a carrier, too, just not too sure about the proportions. Soy "wax" has been tried by others as a lube base, and I think Sagacious had pretty good luck with it for one, but it turns to liquid at something like 105 degrees. He added something to it, perhaps castor oil or beeswax, I'll have to go digging again. Wish he still posted here. Will messed with soy wax too, but I don't know how far he got with it. Sagacious believed that the future of lube development would center around using hydrogenated fatty oils because they were their own carrier, needing little additive to make them work except something to make them firmer at higher temps.

    I need to get my hands on some of this castor wax and play with it to see what it needs. People have been using it for years in boolit lube, although unbeknownst to them, when they add crayons to their lube for color! Might need a carrier, might not. It might need some beeswax to make it pliable.

    Sorry your thread has derailed into a lube discussion, but at least it's an interesting one!

    Gear

  16. #36
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    Ok, here's a really good one: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...&highlight=soy

    Felix mentioned Vybar, I can't believe I forgot about that one. It's a binder the candle makers use for free-standing candles, and I have a sneaky suspicion it might be found in some of the White Label formulas.

    There are more threads...

    Gear

  17. #37
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    one of my best lubes so far has been a blend of two sides.
    multiple carriers, b-wax,soy wax,parrafin. 60-40-10
    moly,alox,and lith stearate. 20-20-60 but only 50% of the carrier total
    lanolin,and carnuba both under 5% of the total and less than 1% atf.
    it's a hard soft back and forth.
    the moly has to be added when the lube is not melted to keep it in suspension or it falls out.
    it flows in the lubrisizer with very small amonts of heat and only about 40-50 lbs of air pressure.
    it has a tack and a glide to it when smashed between the fingers.
    and has a consistency of silly putty.
    it is super accurate in the cold with no surprise flyers, but i still don't put the first cold bbl shot in the group, it would be minute of rabbit head easily but isn't in a half inch 100 yd group.
    this so far has been my best all around all temp lube.

  18. #38
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    What I'm getting from the reading is that soy wax is good stuff by itself, although it has a low melting point. Carnauba was mentioned to make it harder, but not raise the melt point significantly. I'm wondering if soy and castor wax might make a good blend.

    Gear

  19. #39
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    the thread wandering is one of the things i expect them to do.
    it might get back to tips and such. [ehh or not]
    i think this is probably entertaining,and educational it has made me do some deeper thinking into an area that is the magic of cast.
    one of the big areas in the furthering of accuracy and velocity.
    and it sure plays a part in my way of thinking.

    think about it, lube is the softest part of the boolit.
    it's flexing and flowing and sealing and lubing all at once.....

    now if i could figure out what's happening to the alloy going down the bbl.

  20. #40
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    One reason paper patching is so appealing to me is it removes all of the mystery of alloys and lubes from the equation and leaves one with the mechanics of fit, barrel harmonics, and powder selection, same as "jaxketed" stuff. When my head starts to hurt I grab the paper cutter and start rolling.

    It's funny how paper jackets need some lube, but it doesn't matter what you use. JPW, 45-45-10, vaseline, beeswax/vaseline, Felix lube, or whatever's in the sizer does the trick.

    Gear

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