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I was talking with a friend that has an Winchester 1886 replica, and is shooting black powder loads through it. He is an experienced BP shooter in general, and mentioned that it has to be cleaned fairly frequently. We got to wondering….. did Winchester originally publish any owner’s manual/cleaning regimen documentation back in the day, or was it assumed folks that bought their rifles knew what they were doing?
John,
I have not ever stumbled across anything specific that was published by Winchester. I suspect that because black powder had been the sole substance used since before our Colonial days, Winchester did not feel that it was necessary to publish helpful tips.
Bert
WACA Historian & Board of Director Member #6571L
Only statement I found in a ’93 cat was “After using the rifle, before putting it away, it should always be well cleaned & oiled inside & out.” Obviously, the use of water, preferably hot & soapy, was assumed to be common knowledge among shooters, & before smokeless came along, special bore cleaners weren’t known or needed. As we know, the condition of many bores today proves these directions weren’t always heeded.
In the “Rules for the Management” of the various BP service arms published by the Ordnance Dept., there’s a full page of cleaning instructions, which became even more detailed after smokeless–much more troublesome to clean–was adopted.
In July 1891 Winchester starting selling Winchester “Gun Grease”. Then later on sometime around the 1906-1907 timeframe Winchester started selling “Gun Preparations”. Which consisted of their brand of gun cleaning products. Winchester Crystal Cleaner was for removing Copper & Nickel fouling. Winchester Rust Remover for removing rust from the bores. Winchester Gun Grease for coating any polished metal to prevent it from rusting and preserve luster and finish. Winchester “Gun and Machine Oil” for lubricating the lock mechanism of rifles, shotguns, and revolvers.
Then later around 1920 or so they started using the term “Metal Preparations” and adding “Utility Oil” and “Leather Dressing” at some point.
They continued to sell Gun Oil, Crystal Cleaner, Gun Grease, and Rust Remover well into the 1950s and I believe beyond. I’ve never tried to find the end date for when they stopped. Gun Grease and Gun Oil was sold for a long time.
I have only seen the brochures / instructions for the Gun Preparations. The Metal Preparations instruction sheets came in an envelope / hang tag that went with the guns. I have never found any very early instruction sheets for Gun Grease, only advertisements mentioning them.
If you have the Bound 12 Volume set the front and back covers are not included in the bound set. The back covers are the first to mention gun preparations.
Sincerely,
Maverick
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Maverick said Then later on sometime around the 1906-1907 timeframe Winchester started selling “Gun Preparations”. Which consisted of their brand of gun cleaning products. Winchester Crystal Cleaner was for removing Copper & Nickel fouling.
This was a response to the mysterious bore-pitting problems shooters began reporting soon after smokeless came into general use. Smokeless, it was believed, liberated shooters from cleaning with water–all that was supposedly needed was a chemically-formulated “nitro-solvent,” such as Crystal or Hoppe’s #9. Yet using such cleaners alone resulted in bore damage within days, as countless letters & articles in shooting pubs of the day document. They didn’t suspect the true cause of the corrosion was chlorate primers, because they’d been used so long with BP without the kind of rapid pitting caused by smokeless.
When use of smokeless came about they had to change the priming compound. The old Berdan mixture was not hot enough. So in 1895 Winchester came up with the addition of antimony sulphite, which they called the black mixture. This new mixture was in a way more corrosive than the Berdan mixture. Their black mixture is a mixture of fulminate of mercury which supplied the sensitive explosive which went off on friction, the antimony supplied the added fuel and cholrate of potash supplied the necessary oxygen. This antimony mixture could not be handled wet for the reason that the moisture caused a slight amount of sulphuric acid to form, which was detrimental to the mixture; therefore the antimony mixture had to be mixed and loaded into the primers dry, both of which exploded very easily and when it did explode, it was terribly destructive.
So upon being fired, this new black mixture primer left behind a residue from the priming compound, that when coming into contact with an amount of moisture developed a small amount of sulphuric acid. This caused the pitting of most of these barrels. Then the Crystal cleaner was the solution that helped remove any excess moisture. But it did not prevent rust from forming. So not properly oiling the barrel after using such a solution caused rust to form. So these issues compounding with each other caused problems, until they developed the Staynless primers. This is especially true for more humid parts of the country. Which is why most dryer dessert type parts of the country the firearms found from there will generally have better condition bores.
Sincerely,
Maverick
WACA #8783 - Checkout my Reloading Tool Survey!
https://winchestercollector.org/forum/winchester-research-surveys/winchester-reloading-tool-survey/
Maverick said This is especially true for more humid parts of the country. Which is why most dryer dessert type parts of the country the firearms found from there will generally have better condition bores.
This fact threw investigators off track for several years, until experiments at Frankford Arsenal (during the time Col Whelen was Commandant) proved that humidity had to reach at least 50% before the salts deposited by potasium chlorate in the primer were activated, finally identifying the true cause of the pitting. The “acid theory” is one of several false leads discussed in Hatcher’s Notebook in the chapter on bore corrosion. It’s the most thorough review of the research undertaken in these yrs to discover the cause of this problem, & other shortcomings of primers in use at the time, such as short storage life. The eventual development of non-corrosive, non-mercuric, priming compounds, was, like smokeless powder itself, a European discovery.
clarence said The “acid theory” is one of several false leads discussed in Hatcher’s Notebook in the chapter on bore corrosion.
I need to re-read Hatcher’s Notebook, its been a while. That said, majority of information regarding priming I mentioned in my previous post comes from Henry Brewer. He became head of the Winchester priming department after the death of Henry Burns and was with WRACo for many years even after WWII. Mr. Burns died while making priming compound. Apparently Mr. Burns died due to a complication from the burns received and him not being able to heal properly due to being a unknown lifelong diabetic. Burns had been with Winchester since the early days of the priming department.
Mr. Brewer must have bought the “acid theory” hook line and sinker. As late as 1944 he was recalling it being of issue through correspondence with Edwin Pugsley at that time.
Sincerely,
Maverick
WACA #8783 - Checkout my Reloading Tool Survey!
https://winchestercollector.org/forum/winchester-research-surveys/winchester-reloading-tool-survey/
I need to re-read Hatcher’s Notebook, its been a while. Maverick said
There’s a LOT there. Esp “Acid Gas Diffusion,” p 347 of the ’47 ed. Winchester’s research was important, & at the beginning of WW I, Ordnance adopted a Winchester corrosive primer as standard for the service, because some lots of ammo using Frankford primers misfired in testing, & with wartime production stepping up, there wasn’t time to investigate the cause. Ordnance experimented with non-corrosive primers in the ’20s, but determined that those available at that time didn’t meet the Army’s long-term storage requirements, so corrosive ammo remained in service through the Korean War; which is why GI bore cleaner was water-based.
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