Wet vs Dry lube, and best of either for hot, humid climate.

[Sandpounder3/7]

What’s the pros and cons of a dry vs wet lubricant for patches and conicals, and what do y’all use? Does the situation dictate? Will one work in any situation whether summer or dead of winter? I’m down in East Texas not from the Coast of the Gulf of Mexico. It’s hot most of the year(no duh, it’s Texas) and up till November. During November it gets pretty cold, and sometimes freezing, till about March-April. I plan on hunting the modern firearm season into muzzleloader season with my hawken(it is legal to hunt with a muzzleloader during the modern firearm season in Texas), so I will be in both hot and cold weather with the rifle. Knowing which lube is going to work best would be helpful. Look forward to hearing everyone’s experience!

 

[William Hagewood]

My guns like a wet Lube for hot and humid weather, usually Mr. Flintlock’s or Hoppes 9+. Trapper’s Mink Oil for cold temps

 

[HSmithTX]

Shoot with wet lube, unless it's below freezing, which we don't do in SE TX LOL. I hunt with mink oil, because my rifle might be loaded for a week or more. Mink oil shoots great, but it doesn't soften fouling well and in some barrels will require patch wiping between shots like my Investarms 54. Wet lube is hands down better for shooting. Spit, windshield washer fluid, etc.

 

[Nuthatch]

I'm in Central CA. We have plenty of hot weather during the season but it's very dry. Winters are where we get our humidity. My go-to is beeswax/bear grease for hunting. The second or third shot can be tough to load because it's not water-based. But that's fine for hunting. It's easy enough to put some spit on a patch to soften the fouling if I need to take a follow-up shot.

My main reason for using beeswax/bear grease lube is for fire risk. I ran some garage-level tests on different patch lubes by hitting them with a blow torch for 5 full seconds. The beeswax/bear grease was the most resistant to smoldering. Water-based lubes were great too but I wasn't comfortable with them sitting on the powder charge for a week, potentially leeching out the nitrates or injecting humidity into the breech, and the edges above the ball would certainly be dry by the time I would be taking a shot. I don't want to send a smoldering patch into dry grass. The grease itself runs thin at warmer temps so the beeswax helps give it more of a paste consistency. At cooler temps, it's certainly thicker but still workable.

In reading your post, though, I'm not sure what you mean by a dry lubricant. The only dry lube I know if is graphite but I've never heard of somebody using that for MLs. Care to fill me in?

 

[Sandpounder3/7]

I'm in Central CA. We have plenty of hot weather during the season but it's very dry. Winters are where we get our humidity. My go-to is beeswax/bear grease for hunting. The second or third shot can be tough to load because it's not water-based. But that's fine for hunting. It's easy enough to put some spit on a patch to soften the fouling if I need to take a follow-up shot.

My main reason for using beeswax/bear grease lube is for fire risk. I ran some garage-level tests on different patch lubes by hitting them with a blow torch for 5 full seconds. The beeswax/bear grease was the most resistant to smoldering. Water-based lubes were great too but I wasn't comfortable with them sitting on the powder charge for a week, potentially leeching out the nitrates or injecting humidity into the breech, and the edges above the ball would certainly be dry by the time I would be taking a shot. I don't want to send a smoldering patch into dry grass. The grease itself runs thin at warmer temps so the beeswax helps give it more of a paste consistency. At cooler temps, it's certainly thicker but still workable.

In reading your post, though, I'm not sure what you mean by a dry lubricant. The only dry lube I know if is graphite but I've never heard of somebody using that for MLs. Care to fill me in?

By dry I meant something like a soft wax mix. Like what paper cartridges are dipped into. Probably not the best description to use.

 

[Nuthatch]

By dry I meant something like a soft wax mix. Like what paper cartridges are dipped into. Probably not the best description to use.

Gotcha. Thanks. In that case, it sounds like I'm using a "dry" lube with the beeswax/bear grease.

 

[Yewbender]

I use plain ole spit for all my plinking and woods walks with no issues as long as the temp is 27deg and rising. If not i use TOTW mink tallow or Frontieers Bear Paws anti rust and patch lube. I will at times use them in warmer weather and they work great.

 

[NorthFork]

It's VERY simple for me. Spit patch for target and TOTW mink oil (really a tallow) for hunting. END OF. STORY.

 

[ETipp]

I switched over to Tracks Mink Oil. So far I have used it in high 80's temps with high humidity. No problem thus far. It will be a while before I can put it through the test in colder temps. Fortunately for this part of the country, it doesn't get all that cold. However, I'm not one to change my setup if its working well.