I have two T/C Encore owners manuals in front of me. One manual has a picture of a cast iron frying pan with a "seasoning" tutorial analogous to the muzzleloader bbl. The other manual doesn't mention "seasoning" at all.

Do you believe that non petroleum based lubricants need to be used in a brand new inline muzzleloader to "season" the bbl,or is it a myth brought about by traditional muzzleloader break in procedures?

Pre lub after serious cleaning . use 100 wonder lub or equivalent the pores will take the lub in them and your barrel will shoot faster and cleaner and will be better for future rust problems , I lub all my rifles including non black powder , after shooting do it again after cleaning.

1000 , One Thousand

Don't laugh, but I use wheel bearing grease with lithium.

My hunting bullets are the Lee REAL 320 grain bullets. First I lube them with liquid Alox, then when loading I roll them in a slight amount of grease, put a smear on a plastic lid and roll them like you do with a case lube pad. It works just fine and my bore stays nice and shiny.

I'm sure there are better proprietary mixtures but my point it is not mandatory to use them.

I am real new to muzzle loading, but I use bore butter, as the Maxi-Balls I use are already lubed with it, so everything is consistant.

quote:

Do you believe that non petroleum based lubricants need to be used in a brand new inline muzzleloader to "season" the bbl,or is it a myth brought about by traditional muzzleloader break in procedures?

NO...Rem Oil for everything new and old alike.

Small Fish the point is season all barrels !You can use what ever you like ! I use 1000 wonder lub .

Petrolium based lubes or oil makes brutal fouling in the bore just after 1 shot. Stick with bore butter or WL 1000 and the like.

Dwarvenchef, I think this is an old wives tale. I have used petroleum based lubes for many many years and have never seen this dreaded baked on varnish. Way back when all we had was either grease or crisco.

And hey, I just realized that Turner Kirkland never ever cautioned against using petroleum greases, and he deserves a lot of credit for keeping the blackpowder scene healthy in past years. If he had ever found grease being a problem you can bet it would have been in the pages of the Dixie catalog somewhere.

Mark, I don't think it's an old wives tale. I remember the crisco days, too, and experimented with petroleum jelly (which required cleaning after only one or two shots) and also KY jelly, which was a little better, but not as good as crisco (sometimes as many as 10 shots). I like both Bore Butter and WL1000, (and loved the old Maxi Lube), and I have noticed significantly less fouling using them with both bp and Pyrodex. I can usually get off between 20-25 Maxi Balls out of my .54 with either before I have to do something about it. More if it's hot and dry, though my shoulder is getting tender after 30 or so. If it's really humid or rainy sometimes less. Humidity seems to be a controlling factor, not temperature.
I'm always open to convincing suggestions, however. It may be that I have just not tried the right one(s). What petroleum based lubes do you use and recommend I test out? When using them, how often do you have to clean during a range session to keep the loading from becoming difficult? Do they have an adverse effect on the bp or Pyrodex charge if they sit unfired for a two week hunting season? I ask because I have seen a friend leave an unfired charge of Pyrodex with a Maxi Lubed bullet on top of it in his rifle over the winter, fired on the first try the following summer. (Boy did we give him a hard time about it, too. He lucked out in that the bore of his rifle was undamaged - I think because he hadn't fired it before that loading so the barrel wasn't fouled by the corrosive Pyrodex. But it fired on the first cap.) I also remember several misfires that were apparently caused by the petroleum jelly lube we were using oozing its way out of the grease grooves and into the bp charge beneath it over the course of only a week. That's what it looked like when we pulled them. Maxi Lube put an end to those problems once and for all, and the newer products work even better.

I use the Lee REAL bullet, in 320 grain 50 caliber. What I do is lube the bullets with liquid alox and let them dry, then dip them (just a touch actually) in wheel bearing grease and roll them on the lid of the grease tub so it is only in the grooves. Then load. I use BP, I got a can of American Pioneer Powder but haven't used any of it yet.

You can shoot at least a couple dozen times with this, even though you'll have to be assertive seating the bullets but not really really bad.

I've never had a problem shooting them after a few days, the grease does not liquify like vaseline does.

Not to say you should stop using what works for you, but when someone new comes along they should be aware there are quite a few options they can do.

The only "problem" I ever heard about using petroleum-based lubes was that petroleum-based lubes can infiltrate black powder/Pyrodex and cause misfires. Or cause misfires due to poor ignition if it seeps into the nipple.

Bore Butter (or WonderLube 1000) does not, to my knowledge, break down black/Pyrodex. I think it does an outstanding job.

Bdhuntr,
It dosen't matter what a lube or protectant is made of...if it is wet or moist and there is enough of it, it will interfere with ignition.

I don't know if I agree with that statement. When I used to shoot sabotted bullets (I shoot Powerbelts now), I would smear Bore Butter into the concave base to keep fouling loose. In an unfired barrel, I left loads in the rifle for weeks and they fired perfectly when called on.

Maybe if left in extreme heat and the Bore Butter melted into a liquid things would have turned out differently. But under normal conditions I have never experienced misfires due to BB or Wonderlube 1000.

quote:

I don't know if I agree with that statement

What statement?

If the statement you are unsure about is mine, I will clairify.
It doesn't matter what a lube is made of, be it water, corn oil, petroleum, whatever... it can interfere with ignition. I guess I should have added to my statement 'if the moisture is in the right place'. ie. effecting ignition or the materal being ignited.

I too use lubes on both conicals and as you mention under a Powerbelt to keep the fouling soft...and it works well I might add.

For now though back to the orginal question posted by small fish

quote:

Do you believe that non petroleum based lubricants need to be used in a brand new inline muzzleloader to "season" the bbl

And to that I still say...No.