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Ballistol and original 1873


Trigger Mike

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I bought a 1873 Winchester that has some barrell issues, mostly pitting and dark bore. I ran several patches of straight Ballistol and it seemed to really clean up the barrell to not be so dark. I was actually pleased with the results. I then read the instructions ( :lol: ) and noticed it says for blackpowder to mix with water. I am afraid that water will get into the pitts of the barrell and make them worse. I also figure the water is there to neutralize the salts. Add water or no? Is there something better I should use? I intend to season with Ballistol. I used to only use Bore Butter but it is water based so I hesitate to use it on an original. love the rifle btw. it is a little stiff so I may take it to a CAS Joe West who fixes them to be like they were originally to smooth out.

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Mike,

 

I've used Ballistol and water for many years to clean guns. I have shot and waited as much as three weeks before cleaning with no ill effects. This was after all my guns were seasoned with ballistol. I would not hestitate to clean that old '73 with it. Joe can tell you more, he is very knowledgable on the subject. Tell him hi from me when you see him. I mix the water ballistol about 25% ballistol and 75% water. I know they say 10 to 90 but I go a little more ballistol.

 

Blue Wolf

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You may have only just got a good start on that Barrel.

 

I doubt that the ballistol got much more that the first layer of fouling out.

 

I recently bought a 1894 Springfield Krag. It took many soakings of Hoppes/Kroil mixture to get the barrel bright. As long as a patch comes out with Color you are not there yet. If you are patient and do many soakings & cleaning you will have a successful shooter. Then you can condition the barrel with Ballistol

 

After that bore is squeeky clean, you need to slug the bore. This will tell you what size bullet to use.

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Ballistol will not remove copper fouling.

 

Howdy

 

I agree. Ballistol is great stuff, but if you have copper or lead down in the bore it will not touch it. If the dark spots you see are lead or copper, there are much better things on the market to remove them.

 

You are making a couple of errors in terminology. Water does not neutralize anything. Neutralizing refers to bringing the pH to 7, the neutral point. All water does is dilute. If you have salts in the bore, water will dissolve them, and then they can be rinsed away. But it does not neutralize anything.

 

Putting Ballistol into the bore certainly will not hurt anything. As a matter of fact, with a pitted old bore Ballistol is an excellent treatment for Black Powder. Nothing to do with neutralizing or anything else like that. If there is BP fouling lurking down in the pits of the barrel, any oil, Ballistol included, will saturate the fouling so it can no longer suck moisture out of the air. Think of the fouling as a sponge which has been saturated with water. It cannot absorb any more.

 

When ever I shoot Black Powder through the pitted old bores of several of my old rifles, I always follow up cleaning with running some straight Ballistol down into the bore. I no longer worry about scrubbing every last molecule of BP fouling out of the bore. Any BP fouling still lurking in the thousands of pits in the bore gets coated with oil and cannot create any rust.

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Howdy

 

I agree. Ballistol is great stuff, but if you have copper or lead down in the bore it will not touch it. If the dark spots you see are lead or copper, there are much better things on the market to remove them.

 

You are making a couple of errors in terminology. Water does not neutralize anything. Neutralizing refers to bringing the pH to 7, the neutral point. All water does is dilute. If you have salts in the bore, water will dissolve them, and then they can be rinsed away. But it does not neutralize anything.

 

Putting Ballistol into the bore certainly will not hurt anything. As a matter of fact, with a pitted old bore Ballistol is an excellent treatment for Black Powder. Nothing to do with neutralizing or anything else like that. If there is BP fouling lurking down in the pits of the barrel, any oil, Ballistol included, will saturate the fouling so it can no longer suck moisture out of the air. Think of the fouling as a sponge which has been saturated with water. It cannot absorb any more.

 

When ever I shoot Black Powder through the pitted old bores of several of my old rifles, I always follow up cleaning with running some straight Ballistol down into the bore. I no longer worry about scrubbing every last molecule of BP fouling out of the bore. Any BP fouling still lurking in the thousands of pits in the bore gets coated with oil and cannot create any rust.

 

thanks to all. I was afraid to use Hoppes since it fired BP, and thought ballistol would be better. I usually use boiling water in my muskets and cap and ball pistols but do not have a funnel flexible and small enough to get into the receiver to the chamber and did not want to put the water down the muzzle. The hot water also heats the barrell making seasoning more effective.

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