Flash in the pan while hunting

[Tom Compton]

if there is room under the flash hole, allow prime to go up to the barrel but not above the flash hole.

TC

 

[hanshi]

The flash hole should be 1/16" at a minimum; all mine had to be drilled out to 1/16". If that doesn't work go to 5/64'. And yes, pick the flash hole to make sure it isn't obstructed. If these two don't work and you're using real black powder, There are other issues to be addressed.

 

[LRB]

I never pick the vent, unless it has misfired, and that is rare as long as my flint is sharp. My gun has a large siler lock in it. My vent is 1/16", but my liner is bored out to bring the powder to about .030 from the prime. I fill the pan to about 2/3's. A friend had the flash in the pan problem for a couple of years or so. He recently stopped picking his vent, which I altered for him, and he seldom has a problem now. I don't buy the idea of creating a channel in the powder to get good ignition. In my experience, it seems to hinder ignition, but there are many different things in play here. Many possibilities.

 

[Mike Brooks]

Mike,

I have thought of doing what you suggest (I always do that with my centerfires), but was concerned about bore rusting in a muzzleloader. Have you had any problems with rusting as a result of leaving the gun uncleaned for such a long period?

Nope, no rust. I usually use some sort of thick patch lube like wonder lube so it lubes the bore as the ball is shoved down the barrel. I have gone probably as long as a week or two with a gun loaded like that with no problems. I haven't found BP residue to be that corrosive as long as it doesn't get wet.
I would think that alcohol down the bore would encourage quite a bit of rust.

 

[Walks with fire]

Get rid of the bore butter. Denatured alcohol is for cleaning oil and fouling out. Oil your gun before you put it away and check it several times per offseason if you only use it for hunting. Bore Butter is junk and does not season a barrel. Don't even use the stuff for patch lube.

Try this test. Shoot your rifle with bore butter patches for a session. Afterwards clean it with hot soap and water until the drying patch comes out white. Now let it sit for an hour or so to return to room temperature. Run a dry white patch down there now and I bet it doesn't come out white again. It will have a brown colored gunk on it from that bore butter seaping out of the pores of the metel in the bore.

 

[CZMark]

Thanks for the reply, Mike. I may try a fowling shot this deer season.

I'm aware of the effects alcohol can have on steel during prolonged contact. I am careful to get it dried out quickly after using it. I have used it for years to remove oil from the bore before shooting, and to remove moisture from the bore after cleaning and haven't had a problem with rust.

 

[Dphar]

Thanks for the reply, Mike. I may try a fowling shot this deer season.

I'm aware of the effects alcohol can have on steel during prolonged contact. I am careful to get it dried out quickly after using it. I have used it for years to remove oil from the bore before shooting, and to remove moisture from the bore after cleaning and haven't had a problem with rust.

Alcohol invariably contains water to some extent.

I grew up in NE Iowa and I would not dream of shooting a fouling shot now before going hunting. The fouling sucks up water like a sponge from the air and will wet the priming unless the pan and frizzen are clean.
Fouling in the vent will do the same thing.
I load a dry clean bore and can leave it that way for weeks without having any ignition problems.
Where I live I suppose I could shoot a fouling shot with little fear with low humidity. But above 30% rh BP fouling turns corrosive and will attack steel when it absorbs moisture from the air. Whiteish fouling is dry and basically harmless to steel, black fouling is wet and the water and the fouling components will attack the steel.

But as is often stated "your mileage may vary".

Dan

 

[Zonie]

If a person lives in a very humid area and is not going to be taking a shot for quite a while, Dan is right.

When I did the "Is It Soup Yet?" tests to see how fouling and humidity could mess up the priming in a flintlock, the bare, unfouled test did not cause a problem.

The fouled test soaked up the humidity and wetted the priming powder to the point that it wouldn't fire even though the lock was throwing a lot of sparks.

 

[mloader40]

When you store your flintlock always rack it with the muzzle down, that will prevent any oils from contaminating the breach. Clean the firearm very well and dry carefully. If is cold outside keep the flrelock outside and load just before you hunt, fill the pan just level with primer powder. Do not wipe the pan with anything moist before priming. These are a few tricks I have learned over the years, I hope that this helps.
BPWRL

 

[tg]

I don't know that I would condem Bore Butter, many folks have used it for years with excellant results,particularly for patch lube. and I am not refering to any type of seasoning effect.

 

[paulvallandigham]

That Brown colored substance is NOT bore butter, but rather flash rust. Don't leave a cleaned bare bore sitting in a humid home, without oiling the bore lightly. You don't have to soak the bore in oil- a mistake too many shooters make. Just a lightly oiled cleaning patch to coat the lands and grooves, and then store the gun with the muzzle down. You can stand the gun on its muzzle, or you can simply use a gun rack where the muzzle is lower than the breech of the gun. Any excess oil will flow out the muzzle, rather than stay in the breech area, where it tends to " congeal", and dry into a thick greasy like substance.

The recommended use of alcohol in cleaning a bore out before hunting, is based on the need to get ALL the oil out of the barrel, and not expect that the prior cleaning effort did NOT leave too much oil in the bore. Flush with alcohol, and dry, but then follow with a very lightly oiled patch down the barrel to coat it again for transportation to the range or field. At the range or field, a dry patch down the bore will remove this light coat of oil and you are ready to load powder.

Steel has very little in the way of Pores to be infiltrated by any substance, much less bore butter. Foreign substances tend to just cake on top of the surface. A good bore brush run down the barrel of a gun that has been in storage more than a month since its last cleaning will break loose any wax, or congealed oil. The Alcohol flush then will dissolve, and remove it.

I see problems all the time when people have guns with Patent breeches, but don't realize what it is, have no brush or jag small enough to clean out the powder chamber in the breech plug, , much less have any idea what size of jag, or brush will fit in the chamber. Then, they have never removed the clean out screw, and looked at that flash channel. I have found lots of crud in these channels, along with burrs, and casting debris. I have talked to other BP gunsmiths, and they report finding the same things. ( God is Not picking on me, or the people I know with these kinds of guns.)

When patent breech guns are set up properly, and the shooters knows what he has to do to shoot them, they are fine guns. But, most owners of these guns have NO CLUE what they have, or how to make the gun work. Its quite evident from the frequency of questions we see here on the forum from new members who report having the same problems with patent breech guns.

Compared to a more traditional, Flat faced breech plug Flintlock, these can be a real PITA, but they can give( and do give) good service once the shooter understands what he has and how to make it shoot. Part of that knowledge relates to cleaning and maintenance.

Most of the new guys at my local BP gun club don't know that you should clean and flush out the barrel from whatever you left in it the last time you shot the gun. They shoot a shot or two, and then the gun hiccups. Then they begin cussing as they can't get it to fire. Than with luck, one of our range officers takes a look, and calls one of our older members over to help the new guy clear his gun, and get it shooting again. The new guys are thankful for the kind help, and more so for the education they get on cleaning and " Prepping" the gun for the next shoot.

Failure to Prep remains the single biggest reasons guns fail to fire the first time the trigger is pulled, IMHO. It doesn't matter whether the gun is a flintlock, percussion, or one of those unmentionable zip guns. It doesn't matter if the lock is a patent breech, drum and nipple. or traditional flintlock( altho its pretty hard to screw up a traditional flintlock so it won't fire- I have seen it done however.)

I have to admit to having a perverse glee when a friend called me one deer season a few years ago, to ask what could cause his Unmentionable to fail to fire. I suggested, after listening to how the gun had been in his safe since last season, and that his son simply removed the gun from the safe, and poured powder down it, without prepping it, that he pull the breech and see what is there. I told him I suspected that the breech would have oil in it, as it had been stored with the butt down. He called back later, and told me I was correct. The oil was there and had fouled the powder charge. he cleaned the gun, and cleared it. Then fired some of those shotgun primers, loaded and test fired the gun. It fired normally at that. I reminded him that all MLers needed to be prepped, by flushing with alcohol, and cleaning out oil from the bore before the gun was ready to be loaded. He thought the Isopropyl alcohol flush was a very good idea, and promised to " sin no more!" :shocked2: :grin: :thumbsup:

 

[dick rankin]

Well, this is all very interesting but seems highly contradictory. Some say to use a coned TH liner so the powder can be as close to the powder in the pan as possible. Then some say they pick the TH to create a chamber which would keep the powder farther away from the pan. Some say throw the bore butter away some say it's great stuff. Some say to oil the barrel but the wonderlube folks say to never use oil in the barrel. Funny if it's no good it's sure been around for quite awhile. Some say to clean with alcohol some say not to. If the wonderlube folks know what they're talking about wouldn't the alcohol remove the "seasoned" effect from it's use? Some say fill the pan some say wet the bottom, fill it and dump out all that won't stick. Some say pile the primer away from the TH some say pile it up against the TH (which has now been proven to be best). Some say use a coned TH liner to the inside yet the Caywood folks say it's best if it's coned from the outside. Some say the TH should be one size some say larger or smaller is best. Seems like no matter what works for one doesn't work for another and vice versa. Pretty hard for a person to really ever figure out what is best except for just alot of shooting and figuring out what is best for our own gun!

 

[Zonie]

I think your last sentence is the most important thing you've learned.

These guns each have their own personality and each one of them has its own likes.

The thing with forums is that most of our members have had pretty good luck with their guns and their shooting. They are happy to pass along what worked for them and Claude and we moderators are happy that they have a place to do it.

As for Wonderlube, there is little doubt that the idea of "seasoning your barrel" was an advertising gimmick thought up by the Thompson Center folks to sell their product.
Modern steel, unlike cast iron has such a fine grain structure that oils cannot sink very far into it.

As for picking the vent (which many do not do) the idea is not to push the powder away from the pan.
The idea is to create a slight inward cone that exposes more grains of powder to the pans flash
of the pan.
Think of it this way: A .062 diameter vent hole has a surface area of 0.003 of an inch.
This is the total area of powder that the flash must ignite.

If a wire pokes a .040 diameter into the powder thru that .062 diameter vent hole about 1/8 inch deep the remaining cavity once the wire was removed would have a surface area of .015 or about 5 times the area of a unpicked hole.

I could go on with some of your observations but then I would just be giving some of my own thoughts and I'm sure they would conflict with someone elses. :rotf:

 

[paulvallandigham]

Its often NOT WHAT you do when loading and cleaning a MLER, but HOW you do it. Its pretty hard to learn these things reading a book, or posts on this forum. I have had lots of shooters express awe- and even shock- when they actually see me prepare my flintlock to fire, because they were trying to do the same thing, but doing it incorrectly.

Yes, I use a coned liner, to bring the powder closer to the TH. However, I also pick the main charge, by running a pick through the TH into the main charge, turning it 90 degrees, and then back, and pull it back out. That does NOT remove all the powder from the Cone of the liner, but it does open a hole at the TH so that my flame and heat reach more granules.

Now, if, on the other hand, I use a square-sided pick, and really dug around to scrape all the powder away from the sides of that cone, and pull it out, then I would have defeated the purpose of having a coned liner- NO?

You don't SEASON any steel barrel. I use bore butter's predecessor( Young Country 101 lube) as a patch lube, and I use it on the exterior of my barrel and metal parts to protect them from fingerprints.I use oil in the barrel for long term storage, because it simply works better than Bore Butter. I clean BOTH out of the gun with Soap and Water, but will use Alcohol to flush the barrel out after long storage, to dissolve, and remove any grease or congealed OIL from the back of the barrel.

I recommend the Alcohol Flush Treatment for all Patent Breech style guns, because of the tiny flash channels that they have, and the tiny hole from the flash channel into the powder chamber. For reliable firing of these guns, cleaning ALL oils and drying these areas completely is essential. Alcohol will dissolve and flush out the oils, and then evaporate any water that might be in those areas from condensation. But, once the gun is Prepared to fire with the Alcohol Flush, you can shoot it and load it, and lube it with oils, and it will be fine.

Just don't push too MUCH oil down that barrel, so that some of it going through the powder chamber, and into that flash channel. If that happens, you are going to have it foul powder, and stick in the flash channel. In my experience, firing off a couple of percussion caps just won't clear the oil adequately, and instead leaves partially burned oil and priming residue in the channel.
Flush all these things out with alcohol, again. For Flintlocks made from Patent Breech guns, you simply can't burn out the oil in that flash channel. Flush it out with alcohol, again.

As to loading any flash pan, the geometry of the pan and touch hole control What will WORK BEST. You are understanding only part of the recommendations made here.

I currently am shooting two different flintlocks. My rifle has the TH located in the " setting sun " position- half above and half below a line across the top of the pan. My Fowler has the TH located Above the line. With my rifle, I load about half the pan with powder, bank it away from the TH, but leave powder IN THE BOTTOM OF THE PAN right up to and UNDER the TH for fastest ignition. In my Fowler, I can load the pan full, for fastest ignition. The main point about loading powder in a flash pan is to NOT cover that TH.

The Outside cone folks are used to THs that are located low in relation to that top edge of the pan. An outside coned liner works with a SUNDOWN location, or any lower location for the TH. On Patent Breech guns, an outside cone works because it gets the powder closer to that small hole from the flash channel into the powder chamber. An inside coned liner, like my "White Lightning, sold by Chambers" is not going to offer much improvement for these patent breech flintlocks, UNLESS the flash channel is drilled larger, OR, the powder chamber is removed by using an end mill cutter to enlarge it to the bore diameter of the gun. Enlarging the flash channel makes it easier for more powder to work into the flash channel from the powder chamber, so that it will come right out and into the coned liner, just like it does on a more traditional, Flat faced breech flintlock. Removing the powder chamber with an end mill cutter will move the main charge, Entirely closer to the TH, and its liner, because you remove most of that small flash channel with the cutter.

All these things become obvious once you have the gun in hand, and have an experienced shooter, or BP Gunsmith, take the gun apart, so you can see the relationship of the parts to one another.

Now, when you begin trying to get the same results out of flintlock with a SUBSTITUTE POWDER, rather than black powder, you will find experienced shooters telling you to get away from them-- Or, they will be last seen running into the night screaming. :shocked2: :rotf: USE ONLY BLACK POWDER IN FLINTLOCKS. :thumbsup:

If you have a specific gun to talk about, feel free to send me a PT, and I can give you information of use for that particular gun. Yes, there are no SINGLE method, or RULE to follow with every kind of flintlock you may come across today. You can learn to live with it. :grin:

 

[Stumpkiller]

Well, this is all very interesting but seems highly contradictory. Some say to use a coned TH liner so the powder can be as close to the powder in the pan as possible. Then some say they pick the TH to create a chamber which would keep the powder farther away from the pan. Some say throw the bore butter away some say it's great stuff. Some say to oil the barrel but the wonderlube folks say to never use oil in the barrel. Funny if it's no good it's sure been around for quite awhile. Some say to clean with alcohol some say not to. If the wonderlube folks know what they're talking about wouldn't the alcohol remove the "seasoned" effect from it's use? Some say fill the pan some say wet the bottom, fill it and dump out all that won't stick. Some say pile the primer away from the TH some say pile it up against the TH (which has now been proven to be best). Some say use a coned TH liner to the inside yet the Caywood folks say it's best if it's coned from the outside. Some say the TH should be one size some say larger or smaller is best. Seems like no matter what works for one doesn't work for another and vice versa. Pretty hard for a person to really ever figure out what is best except for just alot of shooting and figuring out what is best for our own gun!

And that, as they say, is what makes the horserace.

If there was one best way we'd have settled on it after 400 years of muzzleloading; don'tcha'think?

We all have different firearms, loading materials and techniques, geographic locations with variations like humidity and temperature. The only right answer is the one that works best for you.

 

[ebiggs1]

I can tell you from experience, no one had a more frustrating start to flintlocks then me. I tried every one of the things these fellows suggested. I was to the point of giving up but one day it all worked! And I am glad some guys gave me the encouragement to keep trying. That is what I will tell you, keep trying. I think we try too hard when the simplest method works best.

 

[[email protected]]

I was at the range today trying to sight my new flint. Had multiple flashes in the pan. The previous three times shooting in various locations, maybe one or two flashes. What caused it this time and not the others? I don't know. Ran a spit patch every couple of shots (did this previously as well), picked, grinned. The joys of a flint. :wink: Like others have said previously. Whatever works.

 

[paulvallandigham]

If you clean even with a spit patch between shots, you need to follow that with a dry cleaning patch to remove the moisture at the back of the barrel. Otherwise, it fouls the powder back there, making it unlikely that it will ignite. ( MISFIRE)

STOP being in a hurry to load and shoot the gun. Take your time and do it right. Cleaning between each shot is the best way to be CONSISTENT in how you load the gun each time. Consistency leads to smaller groups. But, unless you live in a very arid climate, above freezing( 32 degrees F), That moisture from your spit patch may not evaporate as one might hope. Take it out with a dry patch. Feel the "dry patch" when it comes out of the barrel. I suspect it will feel a bit damp to your touch.

If you are shooting a "Nock-Style " breeched gun, with a powder chamber, and a flash channel, you have to INSURE that there is NO oil or moisture down in the small hole between the chamber and the channel, NOR in the channel itself. In loading those kinds of guns, USUALLY when you push the PRB the barrel, air is driven into the powder charge, and some of the powder goes through that small hole to the flash channel, and then over to the TH( vent). That puts powder closer to the flash pan, so that ignition is aided, and nearly instantaneous.

Some shooters will smack the side of their gun barrels opposite the TH, with the butt of their hands One-Three times, to make sure that powder gets into the flash channel and moves towards the TH. You may have to adopt such a procedure to insure reliable ignition.

With traditional flat-faced breech plug guns, where the face of the breech is just behind the TH, You may be compressing the powder charge too much, when you seat the PRB. In that case, depending on the size of the TH, you can have a misfire from damp powder being next to the TH,and keeping the heat and flame from entering the powder charge in the barrel and igniting other, drier granules of powder.

The fix is to both dry the barrel with a dry cleaning patch after removing your spit patch, and then using a vent pick to open a hole into the powder charge through the vent hole. You don't want to remove powder near the vent, but simply push it aside so that the heat from the pan will enter the barrel and ignite more granules.

My gun has the traditional flat faced breech plug, and I use a White Lightning Vent Liner. I use a pick every time I load, and because of the inside CONE to the liner, there is plenty of powder below, above, and on both sides of the cone, near the TH. Ignition is very fast. More important to me, its very reliable.

Here in Illinois, Unless its below freezing during a hunt( BRRRRRRrrrrrrr!) the relative humidity is enough that we generally expect condensation inside a hot barrel that has just been fired. MY spit patch has a MINIMUM OF SPIT- more to allow the fabric to stretch than to actually wet the bore. That patch comes out ALWAYS very Wet, from the condensation in the barrel. My dry cleaning patch is what removes the rest of the " wet" in the barrel, so I don't foul the powder charge I dump down the barrel for my next shot.( I use alcohol on my cleaning patches when its below freezing, as the alcohol evaporates quickly in the very cold, dry air. CAUTION: If you have fog over the ground, even if its slightly below freezing, that is a relatively HIGH HUMIDITY level, and you need to switch to alcohol, and drying patches, from using spit patches. BTDT-OUCH!

In July and August, when its both HOT and HUMID here( yeah- you really can sit in a corn field and what the stalks grow)I use TWO dry patches down the barrel( skip the spit on that first one) to dry out the barrel.( I also learned my lesson, and take a bottle of alcohol in my range box "Just in case" it gets to "soupy" in the barrel. I test the flash pan with spit patches. If they turn the residue to soup, I switch to patches and alcohol for cleaning the flash pan, AND the barrel).

I have fouled the powder on my shotgun and had a hard time getting that load to fire out until I pulled the nipple, and put priming powder under the nipple. My fault. I should have made the adjustment in my loading technique, just because I was standing in that heat pouring sweat off my forehead!( duh!) :shocked2: After I cleaned out the barrels, and dried them, as described above, I fired most of the rounds for the shooting match I was doing, and had NO misfires again. :hatsoff:

 

[ebiggs1]

I have found that the simplest things work best. I don’t do a lot of special things to my TC Hawken flintlock. I do load with the lock on the down ward side. I don’t think it especially helps though. I use their Bore Butter and pillow ticking patches (.015). I use 2f in the bore and 4f in the pan. I use Tom Fuller flints with leather wraps. Lead did not work for me. I shot 90+ times over two weekends with no misses of any kind. I run a Bore Butter patch down the barrel every ten shots or so and toughly cleaned the rifle after each shooting session (day). I have been working on getting consistent ignition more than accuracy although these guns are very accurate. This old man can keep ten shots on an 8” paper plate at 50 yards and that means if I can do it anyone can. That should be good enough for deer hunting.

This is what I believe was my problem(s) when I started. I had very old powder and most, if not all, of the problems disappeared when got my fresh shipment. Second, I got Tom Fuller flints (a must). And lastly, I corrected a miss aligned flash hole but there again I don’t think that really was a problem. But I did it anyway. I do believe new locks need to be broken in because this guns shoots great now. Go into a dark room and snap it lots and see if you are getting good sparks.

 

[ebiggs1]

I am going to post a thread of an unscientific test I did last weekend. It is interesting to say the least. I got interested in it after reading some articles on black powder shooting with extraordinarily scientific testing done.