Saving a Muzzleloader

[shannerdrake]

About 15 years ago I gifted a CVA 45cal inline to a friend of mine. He later become my brother in law which is a pretty cool story. To make a long story short, he ended up gifting it back to me. To be frank, it is a train wreck. I'm not sure he cleaned it since I took him out and showed him how to shoot it 15 years ago. The ramrod also appears to have been chewed on by a dog or a perhaps a very large cat.

The outside if not terribly rusted and the breech plug is stainless so it's in pretty good shape. However, the bore is a wreck. Earlier in life, I did my fare share of restoring tractors, cars, and Jeeps that were all very rusty. However, I've never saved or restored a bore.

I have been debating soaking the thing with oil and going at it with a box of full bore brushes. I've also debated wrapping an undersized brush in steel wool. I've also thought about a mop style cleaning head and loading it with polishing compound. I've also planned on rigging up my drill to spin the cleaning rods to help with the time.

Let me know your thoughts/stories/comments/recommendations/etc.!

 

[mplane72]

I'm no smith and don't have any real experience with s situation like this but I think I would soak it a bit and then clean it up as best you can with out going crazy and then shoot it. What comes next would depend on how it shoots and how the bore looks.

 

[Sasquatchewan]

I'd soak the thing in oil, bore brush the crap out of it. Keep cleaning until patches come out clean and assess damage. If it was fired and never cleaned, there will be some heavy pitting inside the bore. It could still shoot great or it could shoot like chit, you won't know until you clean it and shoot it.

 

[Ben Lamb]

I just cleaned my FIL's muzzleloader. Bore was pretty rusty & hadn't been cleaned in 15-20 years. Same thing. Used Hoppe's and scrubbed the crap out of it and got to where the patches were clean & a bore light down the muzzle confirmed it was ok. Gun still shot right to it's sights.

If it's really bad, take the stock off and hit the gun with PB Blaster inside and out.

 

[Jim/Wa]

You can run pieces of copper scrub pads up and down the bore. Make sure they’re actually copper or brass and not copper coated steel pads. They do a really nice job cleaning out the bore including hard to get at rifling deposits. After that, you can give the bore a good look over to see if it’s salvageable.