Breech face fouling trouble

[M. De Land]

@M. De Land, there's a couple of things happening here. Your rifle is telling you that the touch hole and likely the internal cone is being blocked by fouling. What it is not telling you is the composition of the fouling. Is the fouling moist? Is the fouling crusty?

Your scraping of the breech face removed fouling from the bore but not from the internal cone.

The thorough cleaning of the bore and touch hole might help but the cleaning must include cleaning of the touch hole.

In a related thought, I do believe that @rich pierce is on to an interesting observation. With the touch hole much above 0.100 the breech face, a wiping jag will carry fouling into the touch hole and scrape some fouling bac into the internal cone. Not a lot but it will build up to become a block.

Picking moist fouling will do little good as the fouling will collapse back and block the touch hole. I am assuming you are using a solid pick to open the touch hole. Look for the largest of the dental flossing brushes or the airbrush set from Harbor Freight. The smallest brush fits through my touch hole and does a good job of cleaning the internal cone.

Airbrush Cleaning Brushes. 5 Pc. (harborfreight.com)

By around the 20th shot fouling will be building up and require a lot of touch hole and breech face maintenance to keep the flash channel open. When I use the smallest airbrush tip to open the cone, I will poke a few grains of 4f into the touch hole. Because the touch hole liner is internally coned, you won't have a fuse effect, but you will have a jet of flame blasting into the main charge. When my touch hole gets blocked, that's what I do.

I did not put an internal cone on my liner for the express reasons of not vectoring pressure outward and not catching fouling. If I'm interpreting this issue right the trouble seems to be that the fouling builds up in layers on the flat face of the breech plug until it reaches a level to cover over the flash hole. When I picked it clear the fouling would yield to the pick intrusion and felt like a charged chamber of black powder.
I don't think the distance of the vent ahead of the flat breech plug face is the problem because all of my percussion rifles I've made have the nipple vent much farther ahead of the breech face than does this flint gun and I don't have the same trouble with them.
I think this is actually a good thing in the long run as my inkling is we are about to learn something about how flint guns operate that could prove interesting.

 

[BJHabermehl]

It’s funny I seldom ever have the trouble with a fouling cake on the breech face. When I do it’s usually at a youth field day type event where we are doing a ton of shooting. And not allways then. In my case I believe it is more related to temperature and humidity. BJH

 

[M. De Land]

It’s funny I seldom ever have the trouble with a fouling cake on the breech face. When I do it’s usually at a youth field day type event where we are doing a ton of shooting. And not allways then. In my case I believe it is more related to temperature and humidity. BJH

You may be right for your application but we were on an indoor range and the heat and humidity are controlled.

 

[kyron4]

My nephew's rifle did that at a Fort TY match years ago. Scaping did not clear it. Finally we sent a patch grabber the 2 piece curled steel wires it drug up two patches that were against the breech face. Scoured the breech face with a copper breech brush and it was again shiny. Never did find out how the patches ended up there.

Sounds like sabotage !

 

[Grenadier1758]

@M. De Land, are you wiping between shots? I don't recall if that has been mentioned. What is known is that fouling builds up on the breech face and after 25 shots, the fouling layers are above the touch hole entry to the bore and the flash channel is blocked. Scraping the bore off does not eliminate the failure to fires. Even then picking the touch hole does not prevent a failure to fire. So there must still be some fouling left at the breech that is not getting removed. This would be a fun experiment to use an endoscope to take a look at the breech and touch hole after 25 shots to see what that layering of fouling looks like at the breech.

There is some humidity, even in an indoor range during the dry time of winter. In any event, you know that the fouling is building up in layers. You are shooting the match in relays and there are more than two relays. How many shots in a relay and what is your present maintenance procedure between relays? I am going to assume that you are cleaning the pan, wiping the face of the frizzen, wiping off the flint and maintaining the edge. Probably wiping the bore to remove fouling from the grooves. This is the time for a scrape of the breech followed by a wipe of the bore with an alcohol wipe and a cleaning of the touch hole. You need to remove the fouling from the breech as well as maintain the flint and the lock.

 

[EC121]

To see how fast the fouling is building up try dropping the rod with no patch every couple of shots or so to see if the jag pings off the breechplug .

 

[oldwood]

This post may sound dumb, but anything done to keep a flat face firing is good. I use a standard wipe load shoot process , with occasional brush app. to keep the bore loadable. I use minimum grease lubed patches as well ,but , every third or so shot , once the fouling is wiped from the bore or brushed ,I have a small pc. of wood to bounce the muzzle on instead of concrete , or dirt , etc.. You would be amazed at the fouling that comes out of the bore. W/o doing this , all that carbon is still in the face of the breech around the touch hole. Everything done helps keep the ignition good. Flat face scraper helps , too. It only takes a second to dump out the carbon. All this b/s is especially true shooting bigger calibers , like .58 and up. ...........oldwood

 

[Flint62Smoothie]

Based on all above, I believe it is the combination of not internally coning the touch hole liner and that the TH is well ahead of the breech.

... and we still don't know if he's swabbing between shots or every few shots ... which would exacerbate things.

 

[rafterob]

I have been shooting my flintlock for 4 years now and have had this happen only once in that time. I think it is strictly a matter of atmospheric conditions that promote a heavier fouling.

 

[M. De Land]

Based on all above, I believe it is the combination of not internally coning the touch hole liner and that the TH is well ahead of the breech.

... and we still don't know if he's swabbing between shots or every few shots ... which would exacerbate things.

I wasn't swabbing between shots and the heavy tight patches were keeping the bore pretty clean from the way it felt at loading. My guess is I'm pushing all the fouling ahead of the tight patched ball on top of each fresh load and the accumulated fouling with each shot is building up and caking it on the breech face. It takes about 25 shots to build up enough to block the vent. The advice to scrape and perhaps end brush regularly may fix the problem. I'll find out next month at the match.
I would think the vent being farther away from the breech face would be a plus in it not being blocked by breech plug face build up instead of a negative. I did not want the vent liner thread to cut into the breech face/inner barrel ledge. It just clears this intersection which puts the actual vent about .150-.200 ahead of the breech face. As stated before I also have another rifle, a .45 cal percussion under hammer, that has the nipple vent much farther ahead of the breech face and it doesn't foul out like the flint gun does.

 

[Rock Home Isle]

I was having problems with a build up of residue on the face of my breach-plug last summer. Hot Muggy Summer Days...once fall hit and temperatures dropped, the problem went away.

 

[Grenadier1758]

Many the time I have been told that the best time to be solving problems is before they happen. Keeping the bore and touch hole clear is just one of those best practices.

 

[hanshi]

FWIW, I occasionally end up with a crud ring in a rifle but rarely much in the way of fouling buildup on the breech plug face. If the crud ring ever gets noticed at the range a damp or wet patch dissolves it in seconds. I seldom use a scraper; but when I do I use it to twist around a wet patch pushed all the way onto the breech plug. If any crud is there it is easily removed. Clogging of the touch hole is another thing entirely. Using a pick to clear it seems to work most of the time. I found swabbing between shots tends to push fouling down to the liner only to block it. Prb seated with heavy patches does a good job of keeping fouling to a minimum.

 

[Brokennock]

I wasn't swabbing between shots and the heavy tight patches were keeping the bore pretty clean from the way it felt at loading. My guess is I'm pushing all the fouling ahead of the tight patched ball on top of each fresh load and the accumulated fouling with each shot is building up and caking it on the breech face. It takes about 25 shots to build up enough to block the vent. The advice to scrape and perhaps end brush regularly may fix the problem. I'll find out next month at the match.
I would think the vent being farther away from the breech face would be a plus in it not being blocked by breech plug face build up instead of a negative. I did not want the vent liner thread to cut into the breech face/inner barrel ledge. It just clears this intersection which puts the actual vent about .150-.200 ahead of the breech face. As stated before I also have another rifle, a .45 cal percussion under hammer, that has the nipple vent much farther ahead of the breech face and it doesn't foul out like the flint gun does.

I have had issues with my breach face being hard to get as clean as I would like on occasion, but nothing like you are describing.
The only loading issue I've had, in the past, was a ring of crud developing roughly where the powder meets the patched ball or wad (depending on what I am shooting). Based on that ring, which I have seen many others mention in several topics, out of curiosity is there a way to estimate how far from the breach face your powder charge ends, where it meets the patched ball?

 

[M. De Land]

I have had issues with my breach face being hard to get as clean as I would like on occasion, but nothing like you are describing.
The only loading issue I've had, in the past, was a ring of crud developing roughly where the powder meets the patched ball or wad (depending on what I am shooting). Based on that ring, which I have seen many others mention in several topics, out of curiosity is there a way to estimate how far from the breach face your powder charge ends, where it meets the patched ball?

I could measure it with the loading rod before and after loading.
One more thing I just thought of that I was doing but didn't mention before is leaving a pick (piece of soft iron wire of vent diameter) in the rent hole when charging to keep it clear. I don't really see how that could cause the problem but perhaps.
Odd how my flint match pistol ( a Yazel ) never has such issues nor a .45 Kentucky. I'll get it sorted out eventually and post back.

 

[smo]

I use a one piece solid (non rotating) rod and a flat jag. I run a moist spit patch about every 3-5 shots then pick the touch hole prior too priming the pan. Just too make sure it’s open…

I push the flat jag all the way to the plugs flat face.Then rotate the rod clockwise..
While this will not remove all the fouling from the plugs face, it keeps it from building up as bad.

I my experience humidity plays a big roll as well as the number of shoots fired.

Sometimes more than one patch may be required during wiping … and always pick the touch hole after priming… again.

It’s a pita, but it works for me.

 

[bldtrailer]

This may have been covered but a bore size jag will push fouling into the breach area . If you use a jag one size smaller (45 for a 50 or 40 for a 45)with a damp/wet patch ,it rides over the fouling on the way in , then turn your rod to the right (righty tighty) it expands the patch and as you pull out the rod/patch it pulls the fouling out. You still need to clear the touch hole after but seems to work for me.

 

[oldwood]

Bldtrailer........I have done something like your suggestion for years. To make it even better , I use damp 2" x 2" medical gauze with even more fiber to pull the ash out. Works like crazy. U must still use a wire almost the size of the flint touch hole to clear the touch hole best. Gotta push the remaining ash goo away to make a flash channel , then if you can feel the crunch of the load in the breach area , put fresh FFFFg or whatever in the touch hole , angle the rifle , bump the gun to get the priming into the cleared touch hole flash channel , should fire , ok..........oldwood

 

[Robby]

I'd think about the possibility of moving my touch hole liner back some, dish out and polish the breech plug face.

I just happen to be working on one right now.
Robby

 

[Scota@4570]

My Flintlocks all have flat breech faces and white lightning liners. They all accumulate fouling on the breech face. Therefore I clean then after every use with a brass scraper to remove all of the fouling. None of them build up enough fouling to cause problems in one day of shooting.

I no longer own a patent breech flintlock (hatfield) because it was problematical to clean and was not reliable.

People used to notch plugs commonly. I would never-ever notch a breech plug. How would it be cleaned??? It will make the rifle less reliable, all else being the same. It is a fouling trap in the plug threads. Over time the breech plug threads will rust severely. The modern best practice is to make a seal between the plug and barrel. Notching moves the liner or flash hole back to make the pan fence line up with the back of the barrel. OK??? I'll take reliability, longevity, and ease of cleaning over a slight aesthetic gain.