I am wondering if anyone can help me with the best bullet lube for cap and ball revolvers. 44. cal
bullet lube
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- Last Post 28 May 2017
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thanx Jim, i have been told of using that and have been leary of that very thing
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The main reason for using Crisco is to prevent chain fires, when you touch off a cylinder and the spark sets off another. The crisco is a cheap preventative measure. After you seat all the rounds, fill the rest of the cylinder with crisco. It's alot cheaper than other lubes and works just fine. After you're done shooting, everything cleans up easy.
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Messy, really messy, The overpressure supposedly can light off the other chambers. Personally I haven't heard of injuries or it actually happening. However, I do like a little extra excitement in my waning years. I usually skip it. -Charlie
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miracleman2001, It's hard to give an absolute answer to the question of black powder lube because there are so many available and that includes white Crisco. I'm going to suggest you look for ~.45cal. (or .36cal.?) lubed overpowder wads for your revolver. They are soaked in lube and are placed between the powder charge and ball, which is then seated. There's little or no mess involved and they do indeed keep powder fouling in the bbl. in check. Btw, you may want to get a copy of the November 2009 issue of “Muzzle Blasts” (National Muzzle Loading Rifle Assoc.) and read the section, “Stump the Experts" (pp. 41 - 44) by the Bevel Brothers. They thoroughly examine the issue of chain fires and how to prevent them.
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The secret is to find a lube that is soft enough to apply but firm enough to stand the flash of the other 4 cylinders going off. You don't want the firing of the first 4 rounds to wash/burn/melt away all the lube on the last cylinder if you see what I mean.
Cheers from New Zealand
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How about that Bore Butter. Any of you guys ever used it? Somehow, I have a tube of it in with my various chemicals/lubricants.
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Bore Butter and its clone, Wonder Lube are excellent, but expensive BP lubes. The felt wads I mentioned are impregnated with it. Also, according to the fairly rigorous (and repeatable) tests performed by the Bevel Bro's., chain fires are more likely to occur because of poorly fitting percussion caps. I.e., they're more likely to originate at the rear of the cylinder, not the front.
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miracleman I have made Emmert lube and then added more corn oil to make it softer in cold weather works great and easy to make in hot weather straight Emmert works ok just have to experiment with how much you need to soften up to use in your application.
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I am also wondering about lubes, but but specifically for colder weather. I like pure tallow in the summer and Bore Butter in the winter, but Bore Butter is indeed expensive. Besides, I like to make my own stuff for black powder shooting (except for the powder). I thought of making the tallow suitable for winter by adding jojoba oil. Crisco might also be a good winter lube. I have not tried Emmert lube, but the beeswax would make it stiffer. Considering all this and the experience of various contributors, what do you folk suggest?
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I made some Emmerts a few weeks ago. 60/40 crisco/BW with 3 tbls of vegetable oil (all I had at the time). It's stiff enough but slimey too. About the same consistency of TC bore butter, just maybe a taste less slick. TC BB is really slick.
Trying to go shoot on Wednesday in the desert (to test both lube and guns). It will be cold so lube will be stiff. So far the house has been up to almost 80 degrees and the lube has not changed shape in the jar it's in.
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I used to shoot a lot of speed competition with a 44 Colt army replica and used Crisco. Also used 11 caps and never had a chain fire as the caps were pinched on. We would put up four blocks of wood and use a stop watch to time how fast they could be knocked off a support like bowling pin shoots. Used Crisco for bullseye shooting also with good results. Bore butter and other wax lubes are rather spendy.
Mnshooter
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Here is another bullet lube question. I have cast some .32 cal bullets that I have loaded as .32 S&W Long and also .32 ACP. I am thinking of loading some up in .32 S&W cases with black powder. The bullets aren't lubed yet. What if I just did the crisco thing on the front of each chamber, just like it was cap and ball? I'm thinking of firing these through an old break-top. Would the crisco lube the bullet well, or just be one more thing to clean up afterwords.
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Considering everything I would guess the Crisco would work in that manner. You could try using a BP lube on the bullets like Lyman Gold or SPG. If you are interested in lubes Paul matthews book on BPC shooting ahs some recipes. A common lube for some is a form of tallow which can be hard, cut with olive oil. The old Top breaks were not target pistols.
Mnshooter
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Using Chap-Stick is the same as using Bore Butter. Friend of mine runs a bead of HOppe's #9 Plus around each ball and gets 2” accuracy at 25 yards. I used to use Crisco in my Uberti Colt - it was good for 1 1/2” (cylinder throats bored to .454” & chamfered & I use .457” balls. The barrel has a .451/.452” groove diameter.
Measuring the cylinder throats and the groove diameter then making the throats about .002” larger than groove diameter is the single most important modification you can do for accuracy in a cap and ball (or modern) handgun.
This has wroked for us with every cap and ball handgun we've had the pleasure of using. All 4 of them, including the 1860 .36 Navy and a Walker Colt rep. shot under 2” at 25 yards with the max charge of powder for the gun - full load.
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A little c&b story, slight digression, and some lube stuff: Yesterday I shot in a match at the Lincoln Rifle and Pistol Club in Lincoln, Ca. It was percussion revolver silhouettes at 25 and 50 meters. If you like cap and ball revolvers you gotta try it, it's a ball! Being my first time at this match, I showed up with a ROA, adj. sights. Everyone else there was shooting replicas, just about everything you could think of. I tied for last! These boys have been perfecting their game and were not handicapped at all using the original type sights. Before the match I joined in the pre match bs sessions and checked out everybody's rig. Almost all used some mixture of Crisco over the ball, some with hardeners like beeswax and parrafin and one guy using some lithium based goop. My lube grease is Bore Butter mixed 50/50 with butter flavored Crisco, does the job and adds a nice smell to the already pleasant odor of bp burning. My standard load is 30 gr. fff, 1 cc(Lee dipper) corn meal, .457 rb, topped with grease. It does shoot high, even with the sights all the way down(tied for last place). At the end of the sil. match there was a reenactment match, Hickock vs. Tuft (sp?). 75 yds., closest to center wins. I lost a little $ on that one. Most of the repros shot well, or were well shot, including a Walker that was very accurate and fun to watch. I have to get me a repro, I'd really like to find a Colt new manufacture, whatever they call them. Had many chances to buy one when they came out, now I wish I did.
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Miracleman.. I see you have been given a bunch of info on lube for your cap and ball .44,all good. here is my contribution. I was shopping in one of the many dollar stores and found a tube of creamy petroleum jelly. The price is right,one dollar for a seven oz. tube. The dispenser is about a quarter in. wide and fits all chamber mouths. It works great in my Ruger Old Army.
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Miracleman - I suggest that anyone shooting a cap and ball revolver go online to John Fuhring's "Shooting the Black Powder Revolver". He provides a lot of information on lubes, or as he calls them fouling sanctifiers. I have been shooting a 36 cal Navy using his grease behind the bullet method and find it does just what he claims. Cove
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What I have used for years with BP in both cartridge guns and cap & ball revolvers and rifle-muskets is what Frank Marshall always called Confederate Army Lube.This is simply a 50-50 mixture of beeswax and lard, which has a nice consistency for pan lubing and can be applied to revolver cylinders with a cake decorator. In cold weather down to freezing double the lard. Below freezing use 3:1 lard-beeswax. I have always used the Goya brand of Manteca, which is unsalted, filtered, refined lard used in Mexican cooking. This way you don't have to worry about after-rusting from residual salt in the lard.
Using olive oil and beeswax works nicely too, about in about a 1 ratio.
73 de KE4SKY In Home Mix We Trust From the Home of Ed's Red in "Almost Heaven" West Virginia
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My brother had a Ruger old army and didn't believe that a chainfire could occur. I had advised him to use crisco to prevent a chainfire. He called and said that he had fired the gun with all chambers loaded. He now believes. Three chambers fired when he pulled the trigger. No enjury to him or damage to the Ruger but it made a believer of him!
Elmo
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