A little rust in the barrel a day after cleaning.

[DeoreDX]

Shot my rifle for the first time yesterday. Lots of fun. Stinks to high heaven but fun. My question is about how clean I need the rifle to be after shooting and evidence of a little bit of flash rusting the day after.

I used the rain gutter through I made for boil/bluing my barrel as a cleaning trough. Filled with hot tap water and a couple of drops of dish soap and let it sit. Pumped a cleaning jag up and down the barrel with the drum under water and it pumped out all sorts of nastiness out of the barrel. Rinsed it under hot tap water and continued running patches until they came away 99% clean, never got a patch that looked 100% clean. Ran a diluted ammonia dampened patch and rinsed with hot water then ran dry patches down the barrel. Patches started coming away slightly reddish with signs of flash rusting. So after that was CLP damped patches, 3-4 until there was no more signs of flash rusting on the patches.

This morning I ran a dry patch down the barrel to see if it was still rusting and it came away a little reddish. Being my first BP rifle I'm not sure to what standard I need to have this rifle cleaned. Do I need to break it down again and give it a second more thorough cleaning session? Just keep running CLP patches down the bore until the rusting stops? Any problems with my cleaning method? Would love to hear some expert opinions.

As an addendum I didn't do anything with the lock and trigger assembly besides wiping down with an oil soaked rag. Do I need to clean those out good too?

 

[crockett]

Are you sure that it is rust? If you protect the barrel with oil, you need to swab out the oil with rubbing alcohol before shooting. If you don't - then the heat of shooting the gun turns the oil into a sort of brown tar that takes forever and a day to get out.

 

[DeoreDX]

Thought it might have been rust. Before my first shoot I only swabbed it out with a dry patch not any sort of cleaner so I might be looking at burned oil tar not rust? I was just going by the color which was rusty looking. The CLP is like a light pine color. Didn't see that on my last swabs last night. Was there this morning.

 

[Spikebuck]

I would not break apart the gun and do a full cleaning again. Just run one cleaning patch down, then another oil patch. Check again in a week.

Personally, I check the day after cleaning and then a week after. If a little rust color comes out, I run a lube patch down.

I may have missed it, but did not see if you had a flint or percussion lock. I always pull the lock off on flint for a thorough cleaning (not disassembled)when doing the barrel. Percussion, I just make sure I have the area all around the nipple thoroughly cleaned, and remove and clean the nipple and flash channel, but only remove the lock about 1 time per year as they don't seem to get filthy like a flint lock does.

 

[Flint62Smoothie]

Personally I just use room temperature water, as have had too much flash rusting when using hot water. I also don't "chase" white patches either, as long as I know I have properly killed or removed all corrosive salts from the BP combustion.

If I see a patch like you showed, for my cleaning regimen and products I use ... I'd know it came from the storage oil and/or the Birchwood-Casey 'Barricade' preservative product.

As such ... I don't worry about it ...

 

[Boomerang]

I don't think that is rust. I think it is discolored/oxidized oil. After I clean mine, I spray the inside down with wd-40 and wipe the bore with a soaked wd-40 patch to displace any moisture. I then use Barricade on a patch to coat the bore and use that same patch to wipe down the outside.

 

[DeoreDX]

Looks like everyone uses the B.C. Barricade. Guess I'll invest in a can of the stuff and try it out.

 

[hanshi]

I'm in the same boat paddling together with Spikebuck. Remove the lock to clean but you don't have to remove anything else. Tap water is fine; doesn't have to be hot.

 

[Auldgoat]

Ammonia is an oxidizer. If memory serves me correctly.

 

[Black Hand]

Ran a diluted ammonia dampened patch...

Why...?

 

[Col. Batguano]

I got flash rusting from hot water too. I no longer use it. Lukewarm water for me and a little dish soap is all I use, and then the barrier oil.

 

[Zonie]

Ammonia is a weak base but when mixed with water it becomes ammonium, a weak acid.

In either case, I don't see any good reason to be putting it into a cleaned barrel.
If it is in its acidic form it could cause mild surface rust to form.

 

[nkbj]

I'm still wondering how much the naturally occurring iron and minerals in our water has to do with it. Not to mention water softeners.

 

[DeoreDX]

Long time ago when I bought my first Mosin Nagant and a box of corrosive ammo the old timer behind the gun store counter told me to run a damp ammonia patch down the barrel after I shot the corrosive ammo and it would neutralize the acids formed by the corrosive ammo. Then rinse it out really well with hot water. Sounds like the Amonia thing was just an old wives tail and the hot water was really doing all the work.

 

[PeteDavis]

That kind of rust is invasive and over years will pit your bore-which is something I am surprised no one is mentioning. Look at any BP gun at a gun show. I wonder about a little JB paste to really clean the micro-pits left by machining that capture fouling. Clean, clean, clean!

 

[eggwelder]

I use Dutch Schoultz`s waterless cleaning system. works for me

 

[BigBoreBLR]

Wipe down the surface of the lock with a moist rag.

Water dilutes sulphuric acid. A weak base could be helpful, but likely not needed.

Alot of the residue in a muzzleloader that lefts behind after cleaning the the patch lube. Blackpowder dissolves very easily.

Patch lubricant mixed up with blackpowder residue remains on the barrel surfaces. That stuff takes more work to clean.

Dutch Shoultz system uses a water soluble lubricant, so it's easier to get it out of the barrel.

Also, swabbing between shots keeps the residue down when it comes time to clean it at the end of the day.

Look at ballistol.

 

[don hepler]

Let me touch on a couple things, that were not covered, or I missed.

Some types of rifling, are more difficult to clean than others. Round bottom rifling, is a good example.

I make sure the cleaning patch fits the barrel. I either make the jag smaller or use different patch materials to accomplish this. Just adding a tiny rimfire patch behind a regular patch, will tighten it up.

If most people on this sight, had access to a bore scope, they would find out how well their cleaning routine was. I was shocked when I looked down the barrels, that I have. Shallow rifling guns, like some of the TC's, looked very clean, while deep rifling guns, showed crud and rust, remaining.

Small flashlights that fit in the bore, will show you enough, to give you an idea.

Clean and oil the gun, then check it for a couple days, then check it next week, then next month. I use Rem-Oil, and I keep cleaning records. However, I have several rifles and pistols, so it is a job, just keeping an eye out for any issues.