Historical question about black powder CARTRIDGE rifles (breech loading)

[Dr. Tad Hussein Winslow]

Of course, from the the 16th century (or whenever they were invented) all the way to modern times, muzzleloading muskets and rifles have a ramrod/cleaning rod attached under the barrel, for good reason.

But when we switched from black powder loaded through the muzzle, to breech-loading black powder cartridge rifles, in the late 19th century, the rods largely disappeared, did they not? Take the trapdoor springfield rifle for example, or a Sharps type rifle. Yet, the NEED for immediately cleaning the barrel remained, since it was still corrosive black powder being shot. So you'd *think* that even though the rod isn't needed for ramming the bullet down, it's still indispensible for cleaning to keep the barrel from corroding, so the attached rod seems like it should have remained an integral feature, as a handy place to store it. And back then, a man's rifle is what kept him alive, so avoiding corrosion was a matter of life & death. Why do you suppose the rods didn't stay on the guns? Is it just a matter of handling qualities & reducing weight trumping the handiness of storing the rod there? Or some other reason?

 

[mykeal]

I'm just guessing, being only an amateur at history and not quite old enough to remember, but when the rod function changed from loading to cleaning it no longer became necessary to have it immediately at hand in combat. It thus took the status of what we would now call a range rod - part of the rifleman's kit as opposed to part of the gun. Except for certain irregulars, I believe they tended to carry into combat only that which they absolutely needed, and not anticipating an opportunity to clean the gun, the rod stayed behind.

 

[Chawbaccer]

It didn't completely dissapear did it? Mosins Mausers had the rod under the barrel, others had a take down rod that fit in the butstock.

 

[RSVP2RIP]

The 1879 Tapdoor carbines had a trap in the butt to house a three piece cleaning rod. I'm not sure about the other versions of the trapdoor though but this one I know did. The Ballard No. 5 Pacific had a cleaning rod underneath the barrel but this wasn't a military gun. Yes they kinda disapeared from under the barrel but riflemen were given a cleaning rod or at least a pull through from then on. I believe this was largely a move to make the rod more compact or eliminate the weight from the gun or to place it in a place where it would be less prone to breakage since it was not used to load the gun anymore, thus not needed during a fight (hopefully).

 

[Tommygunn]

Winchester 1873 carbines had a similar trap in the buttstock for a collapsible cleaning rod.

 

[Macmac]

Military mausers were odd, at least the K-98 was, which had a rod 1/3 as long as was needed. That meant you had to have 3 guns to make 1 rod..

 

[Jim K]

The idea of the short rods was that soldiers would get together when they could and make one rod out of three, then clean all three (or more) rifles. Not a bad idea. Civilian shooters tend to forget that the military depends on numbers, not on lone riflemen.

As for cleaning rods in general on hunting rifles, the hunter usually did not need to clean his rifle until he got home. Those who would be away for long carried a pack which included cleaning material.

In the days of black powder, cleaning was not as important as later; the primers were corrosive but the salts tended to become part of the general black powder crud and were swept out of the barrel on the next shot. It was not until corrosive primers were used with smokeless powder that almost immediate cleaning was required.

Jim

 

[bonza]

Breechloaders made cleaning more convenient, & I think alot of people went to using pull-thrus, rather than cleaning rods. I know that the British SMLE rifles were issued with a pull thru in the butt-trap.

 

[Speedo66]

While not BP, SKSs came with cleaning rods.

Now some of that Iron Curtain ammo was pretty dirty, but....

 

[Onmilo]

If you get the chance to surf through old gun catalogs of that period, you will notice that even back in the good old days there were a whole host of special and specialized cleaning gear offered to sportsmen.

Pull throughs, folding and telescoping cleaning rods and a whole array of other items were offered going back even farther than the early breechloader era.
I don't carry any cleaning gear on board my bolt action, single shot, and lever action sporting rifles today and I imagine that sportsmen of the era felt the same way.

 

[Smokin_Gun]

There was a tome wen if you din't have a cleaning kit, solvent, LSA Lube, rod and brush...along with a knife to scrape the carbon off the piston of your bolt you'd soon be discarding the M-16 and pickin' up a Kolishnakov. And that wasn'rt even BP...thankfully they have improved greatly.
My 1871 has a large hole that leads to the stock to frame bolt, I will be puttin' a four piece rod in there, thanks.
my 1863 .54 paper cutter I carry a pull thru in my kit along with a bottle brush with squeeze bollte of water for the breech/chamber.
Good question good read.

SG

 

[ArmedBear]

I know that the British SMLE rifles were issued with a pull thru in the butt-trap.

Cool! Thank you.

I always wondered what that odd-shaped compartment was for.

I have a couple of Enfields, but have never known too much about them.

Also, the full-length Trapdoor rifles came with cleaning rods under the barrels and largely resembled Springfield muzzleloaders from the Civil War.

 

[Gewehr98]

They didn't totally disappear.

Google "Gemmer Sharps", for example.

I've also seen Officer's Model Trapdoors with the thicker ramrods hanging under their forends.

As has been mentioned previously here, cleaning rods hung around on military rifles through at least the SKS and AK designs. Some simply got segmented, and migrated to buttstock compartments, ala' the M1903 Springfield, M1 Garand, M14, and even M16.

 

[bonza]

I always wondered what that odd-shaped compartment was for.

There's also an oil bottle (brass or black plastic depending on age) that also fits in there. The oil bottle drops in first, followed by the pull-thru. By the was there's a smaller hole above the large one, that is were the weight for the pull-thru goes (the above photo kinda shows that).

PS Both the original mil-surp pull thru & the oil bottle are available at Numrichs:

http://www.e-gunparts.com/DisplayAd.asp?chrProductSKU=492750&chrSuperSKU=&MC=
http://www.e-gunparts.com/DisplayAd.asp?chrProductSKU=492730&chrSuperSKU=&MC=

 

[R.Clem]

So I have read, the old breech loaders i.e. falling blocks and rolling blocks didn't come with a cleaning rod except those which shot the paper cartridges. (I never understood the difference in thinking between the paper and brass cartridge cleaning system. May have been the era of development for the snake cleaner.) The reason most often given for this was the use of a weighted leather lace, with a slit in the non weighted end for attaching a swab of some sort. Walla', the bore snake is born.