Axel grease

deeksofdoom

Has anyone here ever used axel grease to grease the bolts of their rifles? Isit alright to use?

tac foley

deeksofdoom wrote: »

Has anyone here ever used axel grease to grease the bolts of their rifles? Isit alright to use?

After almost sixty years of shooting [beginning at age 6] I've never greased but one kind rifle bolt. The Swiss historically used and still use stuff called 'Waffenfett' for all their small arms. The modern version for semi and fully automatic firearms is called 'Automatenfett'. Since I have one of each of their older long arms, and shoot over in Switzerland with them, I've done what they do since I began going there in 1977.

For your gun a very light wipe over with an oily patch is usually enough.

Axle grease is for axles.

My $0.02.

tac

bazza888

grease attracts dirt that will stick in it,i wouldnt use it!

deerhunter1

deeksofdoom wrote: »

Has anyone here ever used axel grease to grease the bolts of their rifles? Isit alright to use?

A bit on the heavy side, plenty of lighter stuff out there, why grease a bolt

Grizzly 45

Only time you would be using any kind of "grease" on a gun would be if you were going to store it for long term,in apossibly rather damp enviroment.IE in a wooden box in an arms depot or store.
Mostly they use stuff called "Cosmoline".Which AFIK is a petrolum jelly .Its nasty heavy gooy stuff and a job to clean off guns.
So if you did need it I guess vaseline would do just as well.

johngalway

Why do you want to grease it Deeks?

Only ever give mine a rub of a lightly oiled rag.

deeksofdoom

Its just for a little lubrication, the bolt isn't stiff or anything. I was oiling the bolt with some hoppes oil, I tried some axel grease on it yesterday and the action just seemed a lot smoother. I had looked it up on the internet earlier and axel grease was recommended.

http://www.carolinashootersforum.com/showthread.php?t=42768

Here they are using grease on an M1 Garand
http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/archive/index.php/t-408719.html

I don't think greasing the bolt would do any harm and since I've greased the bolt on my CZ527 it just feels a smoother as opposed to when I used oil.
As for grease being a dirt magnet I don't think thats going to be a problem here in this climate, there is no dust and its wet mostly, the only time I have the rifle out is for a few hours in the night time once a week. The only thing its going to get is wet.

I was looking for proper gun grease with a while and any shop I called into didn't have it, so my father had a tub of Castrol LM grease at home in his shed so I've used that.

I got ejg to Pillar bed and float the action on my rifle during the summer and he had lightly greased the bolt for me at the time, if you are reading this ejg would you let me know what type of grease you were using, please?

Double Barrel

Deeks,
I have a small can of Imperial Sizing Die Wax that I use sparingly on the bolt. It was developed for precision reloaders who resize brass.
http://www.midwayuk.com/apps/eproductpage.exe/showproduct?SaleItemID=519525

http://www.redding-reloading.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=79:imperial-lubricants

Definitely use a good lube (little dab) on the lugs, Mobil One or other synthetic.
Using a lube is not going to turn an action into a slick piece of machinery on it's own, it takes other work.

Stovepipe

Deeks, you may not think that dirt gets into the action but it surely does, every time you take it out into the field, more than you might imagine.Why do you think soldiers (and good shooters) clean their weapons so often? Lightly oiling is the best way.

regards
Stovepipe

deeksofdoom

Stovepipe wrote: »

Deeks, you may not think that dirt gets into the action but it surely does, every time you take it out into the field, more than you might imagine.Why do you think soldiers (and good shooters) clean their weapons so often? Lightly oiling is the best way.

regards
Stovepipe

Soldiers & good shooters are you joking me! soldiers fire their rifles a couple of times a year at best, have you ever seen the state of some of the weapons held in stores around the country, every one that I ever picked up had rust on it.

The rifle is cleaned meticulously and oiled every time its used and now it even gets a bit of grease on the bolt too!

Stovepipe

Hi Deeks,
True, but I did say soldiers in general, not Irish ones in particular. All I can say is that in 14 years service, FCA and PDF, I never saw enough rust that made a difference and anytime we took our weapons into the field, we cleaned them regularly, whether we fired them or not. I found that Irish DF weapons were more likely to fail from being banged around the drill square or dumped in the back of Land Rovers than from lack of cleaning.I have also seen plenty of badly maintained private firearms, so it isn't just idle soldiers at fault.
With regard to grease, different types do different jobs and some greases are not suitable for firearms because they are either too thick and will clog small drillings and passages or they will react with plastic gun furniture or they will act as an unofficial grinding paste or permanently soil slings and gun bags or destroy optics or will react negatively to heat.

regards
Stovepipe

tac foley

Good answer, Mr Stovepipe.

Needless to say, the Swiss habit of using a special grease - Waffenfett - on THEIR firearms for the last 125 years has resulted in like-new barrels for those of us who shoot these older guns. All my Swiss guns operate like new.

tac

johngalway

Grease would be a bad idea for my guns, I do some shooting in sandy spots :eek: Often blows about.

Different strokes for different folks I 'spose

shaft666

Deeks, I use a product called Militec-1, it's a synthetic weapons lubricant and is specifically designed for desert type situations where you need lubrication that wont attract sand, dust etc. It's a dry lubricant and is applied to the bolt in a thin film, then heated by either firing the weapon or placing somewhere hot( I put mine on the range). This is repeated 3 times after which you wipe the bolt dry. You'll be left with a very smoothly operating but dry bolt

meathstevie

Nearly sounds like a teflon kind of effect

shaft666

meathstevie wrote: »

Nearly sounds like a teflon kind of effect

More info about it here;

http://www.fingalsports.com/militec-1.html

pedroeibar1

Axel grease is for axels, gun grease is for guns, sparingly, on the lugs.
There are different grades of grease, each designed for a purpose, e.g. grease for a boat's propshaft is different to the grease you would use on a tracked machine. Pressure, temperature, environment, ignition point levels all have an impact on its efficiency (or lack of).

As for Militec, any gun on which a silicon based lube has been used will have to be specially cleaned should it need to be re-blued.
Rs
P.

ejg

Steel on steel without lube isn't great.....try it with your car engine...
Steel on steel with sand inbetween isn't great either.
Compromise with a dry teflon lube. Interflon has a very good spray that contains
ultra fine teflon dispersed in a quick drying liquid. Great for firing pins. We used that
spay in an injection moulding tool where no oil was allowed, 10000 cycles a day were
no problem.

In Ireland, I think grease and oils on guns are ok, not much chance of dust where I shoot, grease keeps mud and water out of some parts. I use a heavy teflon filled grease for the threads in moderators, sometimes on the lugs of the bolt and use a teflon oil on the bolt.
Good thing about the Teflon product is that one can cycle say a bolt several times and then wipe away almost everything and one still has lube properties of the Teflon stuck in the pores of the steel. From what I have tested Interflon seems to have the best teflon lube products. They have an agent in Ireland. Pity I don't get a percentage.....
edi

gunhappy_ie

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

Axel grease is for axels, gun grease is for guns, sparingly, on the lugs.
There are different grades of grease, each designed for a purpose, e.g. grease for a boat's propshaft is different to the grease you would use on a tracked machine. Pressure, temperature, environment, ignition point levels all have an impact on its efficiency (or lack of).

As for Militec, any gun on which a silicon based lube has been used will have to be specially cleaned should it need to be re-blued.
Rs
P.

Nothing special is needed to remove Militec, just acetone. Militec also comes in a high pressure/high temp grease. Ive uses both on semi autos for years. Ive also used in engines/gearboxes and Diffs.

ejg wrote: »

Steel on steel without lube isn't great.....try it with your car engine...
Steel on steel with sand inbetween isn't great either.
Compromise with a dry teflon lube. Interflon has a very good spray that contains
ultra fine teflon dispersed in a quick drying liquid. Great for firing pins. We used that
spay in an injection moulding tool where no oil was allowed, 10000 cycles a day were
no problem.

In Ireland, I think grease and oils on guns are ok, not much chance of dust where I shoot, grease keeps mud and water out of some parts. I use a heavy teflon filled grease for the threads in moderators, sometimes on the lugs of the bolt and use a teflon oil on the bolt.
Good thing about the Teflon product is that one can cycle say a bolt several times and then wipe away almost everything and one still has lube properties of the Teflon stuck in the pores of the steel. From what I have tested Interflon seems to have the best teflon lube products. They have an agent in Ireland. Pity I don't get a percentage.....
edi

As for the quailty of oils available here, your right at best its only ok but generally people arent willing to spend the money on a seperate cleaner/oil/protectant or are very slow to change there routine.... hence the reason why IMO rubbish products like CLP BreakFree remain popular.

Ive ran alot of rounds through several S/As F/As after treating it with Militec some of which were in sandy conditions..... its good stuff

GH

deerhunter1

deeksofdoom wrote: »

Soldiers & good shooters are you joking me! soldiers fire their rifles a couple of times a year at best, have you ever seen the state of some of the weapons held in stores around the country, every one that I ever picked up had rust on it.

The rifle is cleaned meticulously and oiled every time its used and now it even gets a bit of grease on the bolt too!

In my 35years I have seen little or no rust on a Military Weapons, and believe me I have handled and Fired quite a few.