Sciencemadness Discussion Board - I'm in a bit of a pickle. I could use some advise please

I'm in a bit of a pickle. I could use some advise please

Invictus395 - 26-1-2026 at 13:48

Hey folks,

Long time browser but first time poster. I could use some advise on a rather urgent issue. I'm not sure where to post this so my apologies if I posted it in the wrong place.

Long story short I need to dislodge a lead ball (with wad and powder charge) from a Hawken black powder rifle. I didn't clean it as well as I should have and got it jammed in there good. I tried everything to dislodge it and failed. I brought it to a gunsmith who also tried everything to dislodge it, and gave up (how over is it?). Unfortunately I had a listing online to sell this rifle and someone bought it. I figured I'd work it out before it got sold and left the listing up, now here we are.

So I'm moving to Plan C, chemistry. How can I best dissolve the lead ball, quickly, without damaging the steel or causing a dangerous reaction with the black powder behind it? My first thought is dilute nitric acid. The nitric will dissolve the lead -> lead nitrate, and diluting it at an approximately 1:4 ratio should prevent saturation and move the reaction to completion. It also should passivate the steel barrel, preventing any structural damage. Afterwards I can remove the passivation with a long brass brush. I am not certain how the dilute HNO3 would react with black powder so I'll likely test this prior just to be safe.

I've read that ammonia + H2O2 might also work for dissolving the lead, though I'm not familiar with this route or how it'll react with the other components so I'm not as confident with it.

My questions are, if you were in my situation, what would you use to quickly dissolve the lead while not damaging the barrel or causing any dangerous reactions with the powder? Do you see any potential issues arising from using dilute nitric acid that I'm not aware of? All other tips/advise/criticism is welcome! Hit me with it. Thank you!

[Edited on 26-1-2026 by Invictus395]

bnull - 26-1-2026 at 14:14

Flint or cap?

Invictus395 - 26-1-2026 at 14:17

It uses caps

bnull - 26-1-2026 at 14:22

Did you try an air compressor and some grease?

Edit: Black powder is simply going to get wet if you use dilute nitric acid.

[Edited on 26-1-2026 by bnull]

MrDoctor - 26-1-2026 at 18:09

lead nitrate will displace the iron and plate the entire interior in lead. and if the conditions permit the lead to dissolve so with that displaced layer, meaning passivation will probably be inhibited and its just going to favor eating the iron instead.
lead is soft. it might take some time but you can just couple a drill-bit to a rod or tube of appropriate size, slide it down in there and mill it away by hand. adding water beforehand eliminates the friction heat risk.

if the charge in there is chlorate based, armstrong mixture, it might be problematic adding nitric acid to that, the risk of nitric acid making its way through that is.

youll need to look into this, because i dont know what hazards it can create and what it takes to decontaminate afterwards, but mercury might soften the lead up. gallium will too though youd need indium and tin as well to make the alloy that is liquid at room temp, and i dont know how well it forms a soft amalgam with lead at nice safe room temp to warm temperatures. tin and indium are cheap but gallium is expensive.

Peroxide+base might work though, but it will be incredibly slow

DraconicAcid - 27-1-2026 at 11:32

You'd be better off trying to melt the lead than to dissolve it with acid.

bnull - 27-1-2026 at 14:45

Quote: Originally posted by DraconicAcid

You'd be better off trying to melt the lead than to dissolve it with acid.

Melt it inside a gun?

Chemical means that do not damage the rifle will be very slow, except for mercury, which will soften the ball but doesn't seem healthy.

Mechanical means, considering that lead is soft, will remove the ball. I don't know what methods you and the gunsmith have tried, so I'm probably listing most of them. You need to remove the nipple, though.

Add more powder, put the nipple back in and fire it again. I'm quite sure you did that before but, well, you're not going to spend a pound of powder to dislodge the ball. If two or three more firings can't remove the ball, then the situation is much more serious than I suspected. A real pickle indeed.
Connect an air compressor to the nipple hole. Don't forget to wet the powder first so it doesn't fire. How many psi is a good question.
Do the same as above with a grease gun instead of a compressor. Put some oil in the barrel so as to wet the ball and lub the exit path.

A last question: is it a .54?

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by bnull]

DraconicAcid - 27-1-2026 at 15:15

Quote: Originally posted by bnull

Quote: Originally posted by DraconicAcid

You'd be better off trying to melt the lead than to dissolve it with acid.

Melt it inside a gun?

The steel barrel will have a much higher mp than the lead. I have no experience with gunsmithing, but no matter how bad the idea is, it's better than trying to dissolve the lead in acid.

Twospoons - 27-1-2026 at 18:10

Pour in molten tin ( MP ~230C). It will alloy with the lead leaving you with lead solder (MP ~ 200C). Pour out the the molten solder. Temps easily reachable with a small gas torch, hot air gun, or domestic oven.

A small bar of Sn97Cu lead free solder should be easy to obtain (97%tin, balance copper)

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by Twospoons]

Sulaiman - 27-1-2026 at 21:29

first job is to make the black powder safe
eg flush (via a syringe needle or very small bore tube) with water to dissolve away the oxidiser.

Any heat will melt the sulphur, I don't know if that is a big problem,
if it is then before heating,
flushing with carbon disulphide would dissolve sulphur
it is VERY flammable, carcinogenic, and it ruins surface finishes.
worst of all it is hard to obtain and not cheap.
DO NOT FLUSH WITH SOLVENTS UNTIL AFTER ANY OXIDISER HAS BEEN REMOVED OR NEUTRALISED.

lots of warm Dichloromethane may work, also not a friendly chemical.
others may have better ideas

how about a red hot poker ?
steel rod, red hot at one end shoved UP the barrel. (wear ppe)

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by Sulaiman]

Radiums Lab - 28-1-2026 at 06:56

Heating to melt lead might not be an option because the gun can go off.

MrDoctor - 29-1-2026 at 00:08

tight as it might be i cant imagine that its perfectly vacuum tight. also is there not some sort of ingress point on the other side for the striking hammer? try pulling a vacuum on it, if nothing else it should let you draw water or some other liquid in there for a while until the carbon clogs up around the bullet, fortunately the oxidizers here are super water soluble.

Im asssuming that the cap probably blocks off direct access to the section where the powder is loaded, otherwise you could just flush it out with a syringe or something, but its not going to be perfectly vacuum tight without something acting as a soft/flexible sealant. A brake tester or whatever they use those vacuum hand pump tools for in automotive work, those go down past -700mmHg, try that, if it bleeds air through, introduce some solvent of choice through whatever seam its leaking through, if you get lucky maybe the up to 14PSI vacuum force will also dislodge the bullet.
If it were me, first thing id try to do is force a bit of a thick lubricant through there like your gun oil, then slide something in there with a flat ending that would go between the barrel and bullet, now excessively lubricated all throughout, and twisting it, hopefully that deformation is enough that it unsticks it, oil gets in there preventing re-binding against the wall, and the end result is the bullet moves. from there, a vacuum pulled on it along with some tapping would dislodge it. if not though id still be able to wet it enough to drill a hole through manually by hand, and i can just hook the hole and pull it out with some wire or something.

DraconicAcid - 29-1-2026 at 11:59

Quote: Originally posted by Radiums Lab

Heating to melt lead might not be an option because the gun can go off.

Yeah, I missed that it still had powder in it. So it's only a slightly better idea than using acid.

At least nobody suggested using ethyl bromide to convert it to volatile tetraethyllead. It might work on paper, but worst plan ever.

Twospoons - 29-1-2026 at 12:34

Heating is still an option - you just have to allow for the possibility of powder ignition. Which means securing the barrel to something solid and pointing it into a sandbag or similar. Heating can be rigged so you can observe from a safe distance.
I doubt there's any chemical method that will remove the lead without also destroying the barrel.

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 12:41

Quote: Originally posted by MrDoctor

"lead nitrate will displace the iron and plate the entire interior in lead. and if the conditions permit the lead to dissolve so with that displaced layer, meaning passivation will probably be inhibited and its just going to favor eating the iron instead.
lead is soft. it might take some time but you can just couple a drill-bit to a rod or tube of appropriate size, slide it down in there and mill it away by hand. adding water beforehand eliminates the friction heat risk."

I figured I was missing something. Really glad I asked. Ill try that

"if the charge in there is chlorate based, armstrong mixture, it might be problematic adding nitric acid to that, the risk of nitric acid making its way through that is."

This is the black powder I used. Likely just a granulated mix of the standard 75/15/10 KNO3/Charcoal/Sulfur but it is pretty old and doesn't list the exact composition on the container

"youll need to look into this, because i dont know what hazards it can create and what it takes to decontaminate afterwards, but mercury might soften the lead up. gallium will too though youd need indium and tin as well to make the alloy that is liquid at room temp, and i dont know how well it forms a soft amalgam with lead at nice safe room temp to warm temperatures. tin and indium are cheap but gallium is expensive."

I'd like to avoid this ideally

I have zero experience with decontamination and it needs to ship ASAP, could create a nasty liability issue

Peroxide+base might work though, but it will be incredibly slow

Another time I'll test this out when I'm not in a rush

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 12:44

Quote: Originally posted by bnull

Did you try an air compressor and some grease?

Edit: Black powder is simply going to get wet if you use dilute nitric acid.

[Edited on 26-1-2026 by bnull]

I did try lubricant oil and elbow grease, but not a compressor. I'll try that too, good idea. One thing I forgot to mention is the ramrod is stuck in the barrel too... Would have to force air through the cap hole (for lack of better words). Not sure how I'll create a good enough seal to force air through

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 12:50

Quote: Originally posted by DraconicAcid

You'd be better off trying to melt the lead than to dissolve it with acid.

The question is how do I melt the lead without igniting the black powder charge?

I did a quick search and it looks like the auto-ignition temp for black powder is somewhere between 572F and 867F. The melting point for lead is 621.5F. Perhaps if I had a high end kiln I could slowly increase the temperature until reaching the melting point. But its risky and it would likely compromise the temper for the steel barrel. One source is saying between 300F-500F is enough to lose the temper depending on steel composition

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 12:57

Quote: Originally posted by bnull

Quote: Originally posted by DraconicAcid

You'd be better off trying to melt the lead than to dissolve it with acid.

Add more powder, put the nipple back in and fire it again. I'm quite sure you did that before but, well, you're not going to spend a pound of powder to dislodge the ball. If two or three more firings can't remove the ball, then the situation is much more serious than I suspected. A real pickle indeed.
Connect an air compressor to the nipple hole. Don't forget to wet the powder first so it doesn't fire. How many psi is a good question.
Do the same as above with a grease gun instead of a compressor. Put some oil in the barrel so as to wet the ball and lub the exit path.

A last question: is it a .54?

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by bnull]

I havent tried firing the rifle to be honest. I was concerned about it blowing up if it didn't dislodge it. Also the existing powder charge could be wet with barrel lubricant that I poured down the barrel during my initial attempts to dislodge it. I can try the air compressor through the nipple route, though how would you recommend I get a good seal? I have some basic compressor heads that I can post pics of if needed. My compressor maxes out at 200 PSI. Its a .45 cal

chempyre235 - 29-1-2026 at 13:06

Maybe a can of spray air will to the trick. These usually come with a straw, and by flipping the can upside-down, the liquid that sprays out can reach -50°C, which might be enough shrink the ball loose. Also, I'd think that the lead should cool faster than the steel because it has a smaller total mass than the barrel. Additionally, lead has greater than double the coefficient of thermal expansion of steel, and so the ball should contract at a much more rapid rate than the barrel. In the steel industry, a shrink fit is similarly achieved using liquid nitrogen.

[Edited on 1/29/2026 by chempyre235]

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 13:07

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman

first job is to make the black powder safe
eg flush (via a syringe needle or very small bore tube) with water to dissolve away the oxidiser.

Any heat will melt the sulphur, I don't know if that is a big problem,
if it is then before heating,
flushing with carbon disulphide would dissolve sulphur
it is VERY flammable, carcinogenic, and it ruins surface finishes.
worst of all it is hard to obtain and not cheap.
DO NOT FLUSH WITH SOLVENTS UNTIL AFTER ANY OXIDISER HAS BEEN REMOVED OR NEUTRALISED.

lots of warm Dichloromethane may work, also not a friendly chemical.
others may have better ideas

how about a red hot poker ?
steel rod, red hot at one end shoved UP the barrel. (wear ppe)

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by Sulaiman]

Not bad ideas, but each leaves me with more questions/concerns than the last

If I put water through the nipple itll rust so fast in there if I dont resolve it quickly. I don't think KNO3 is very soluble in ethanol, but maybe glycerol would be an effective solvent that wouldnt oxidize the steel?

Melted sulfur is a nightmare unfortunately. I once filtered some melted sulfur through a mesh sieve and it completely ruined it. Filled all the holes and hardened, and can't be dissolved with any chemicals I have on hand (no carbon disulphide unfortunately). Though I do have dichloromethane, albeit only a small amount. I'd be terrified poking a red hot poker down the barrel of a loaded black powder rifle

It could work, but that margin for error worries me immensely

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 13:08

Quote: Originally posted by Twospoons

Pour in molten tin ( MP ~230C). It will alloy with the lead leaving you with lead solder (MP ~ 200C). Pour out the the molten solder. Temps easily reachable with a small gas torch, hot air gun, or domestic oven.

A small bar of Sn97Cu lead free solder should be easy to obtain (97%tin, balance copper)

[Edited on 28-1-2026 by Twospoons]

Not a bad idea, but the molten solder might ignite the black powder charge right?

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 13:14

Quote: Originally posted by MrDoctor

tight as it might be i cant imagine that its perfectly vacuum tight. also is there not some sort of ingress point on the other side for the striking hammer? try pulling a vacuum on it, if nothing else it should let you draw water or some other liquid in there for a while until the carbon clogs up around the bullet, fortunately the oxidizers here are super water soluble.

Im asssuming that the cap probably blocks off direct access to the section where the powder is loaded, otherwise you could just flush it out with a syringe or something, but its not going to be perfectly vacuum tight without something acting as a soft/flexible sealant. A brake tester or whatever they use those vacuum hand pump tools for in automotive work, those go down past -700mmHg, try that, if it bleeds air through, introduce some solvent of choice through whatever seam its leaking through, if you get lucky maybe the up to 14PSI vacuum force will also dislodge the bullet.
If it were me, first thing id try to do is force a bit of a thick lubricant through there like your gun oil, then slide something in there with a flat ending that would go between the barrel and bullet, now excessively lubricated all throughout, and twisting it, hopefully that deformation is enough that it unsticks it, oil gets in there preventing re-binding against the wall, and the end result is the bullet moves. from there, a vacuum pulled on it along with some tapping would dislodge it. if not though id still be able to wet it enough to drill a hole through manually by hand, and i can just hook the hole and pull it out with some wire or something.

That's actually the last thing I tried. I poured gun lubricant down the barrel and attempted to use the ramrod to dislodge it and force the lubricant around the bullet. Unfortunately the ramrod is now stuck in there too. I even attached a hook to the end of the ramrod for better grip and even with the combined strength of two grown men (my brother and I) it wouldn't budge an inch. That was BEFORE I brought it to the gunsmith

I'll try feeding a wire down there and scraping the lead out next I think. maybe a wide steel screw at the end of a dowel or something, so I can dig into it and pull

Invictus395 - 29-1-2026 at 13:17

Quote: Originally posted by chempyre235

Maybe a can of spray air will to the trick. These usually come with a straw, and by flipping the can upside-down, the liquid that sprays out can reach -50°C, which might be enough shrink the ball loose. Also, I'd think that the lead should cool faster than the steel because it has a smaller total mass than the barrel. Additionally, lead has greater than double the coefficient of thermal expansion of steel, and so the ball should contract at a much more rapid rate than the barrel. In the steel industry, a shrink fit is similarly achieved using liquid nitrogen.

[Edited on 1/29/2026 by chempyre235]

That's very clever, I like that idea. I'll try this as well. I'll pick up some computer duster and give it a shot

bnull - 29-1-2026 at 13:39

Quote: Originally posted by Invictus395

You need an adapter that fits the nipple hole thread. Remove the nipple and take it to the hardware store to find one that fits, if the heads you have do not fit the hole. Flush the chamber with WD-40 or soapy water (be quick and beware of rust!), plug the compressor and try 20 to 30 psi. Increase the pressure by 5 to 10 psi each time and do it with the barrel pointing somewhere safe; you don't want to spear someone or something with your ramrod.

You can post pics of the heads and the nipple (the rifle's), that could help.

pesco - 29-1-2026 at 14:53

Lead has significantly higher thermal expansion coefficient compared to steel.

That means, that it also contracts more.
Try freezing the gun. the lower temp the better and then try to dislodge the round.

If doesn't work, then once charge is made safe you can try to heat-freeze cycle couple times.
Reason is when you heat it, the round will want to expand more than a barrel, but having nowhere to go it will "elongate" instead. Once cooled it should have slightly smaller diameter. Freezing should make dislodging easier.

If you have access to welder, weld some drill bit to the end of a steel threaded rod. Using such looooong drill bit you should be able to access the round, gently drill in and pull out. Lead is soft, so shouldn't make much difference.

If the charge is still present do not, at any moment, put hand or tool on top the rod. Rather grab a side of it with pliers and "drill in". That is precaution in case the charge goes off. Very small chance, but not 0%.

Trying to use acid will most likely permanently ruin the barrel.
Trying to melt the lead or sulphur might trigger the charge, besides such immense heat is probably not the best for antique firearm.

clearly_not_atara - 29-1-2026 at 14:55

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman

first job is to make the black powder safe
eg flush (via a syringe needle or very small bore tube) with water to dissolve away the oxidiser.

I think Sulaiman is on the right track here. Rinse out the oxidizer (usually soluble) from the powder, then you don't have to worry about blowing yourself up.

But we also need to consider what is actually going on inside the barrel. An explosive charge should be able to displace a bullet from a rifle. No amount of friction should prevent this. Therefore, we should consider the pessimistic scenario: the bullet is already welded to the barrel.

Consequently, your best bet is probably to remove the lead by abrasive means. Clean the powder out, get a long drill, and drill a hole through the bullet. Then use a long metal rod (e.g. rebar) as a chisel to break off as many chunks as you can, then carefully file out the barrel (lead is much softer than steel and won't be hard to erode). Wear appropriate PPE and work somewhere that you can clean.

pesco - 29-1-2026 at 15:00

If using the "looooong drill bit method" make sure you make some spacer around the drill bit to prevent it sliding and scratching the inside of the barrel. It meant to be a guide.

If you cut a circle out of thick plastic to fit into the barrel then it should work fine. The plastic should be thick, or several thinner glued together, even if with double sided tape.
If its thin it might bend or fold and the drill bit would scratch the barrel, and you want to avoid that.

Twospoons - 29-1-2026 at 16:36

OP says he's got the ramrod stuck in there too

, so its going to be tricky getting a drill bit in until he figure than issue out.
How on earth did you get the ramrod stuck?
Drilling lead wont be easy (I've tried it for fishing sinkers) - being soft and sticky it tends to gum up the drill bit flutes rather than making nice chips. Use a lot of cutting oil.

bnull - 29-1-2026 at 17:56

Another thing I forgot to ask: is it a smooth bore or a rifled barrel?

Freezing the barrel may mess up the temper of the steel. I don't know how cold it would have to be, though, and I suppose the OP don't want to find it out experimentally. Gun barrels are projected to withstand heat.

The ball is not welded to the barrel. Why? See the picture below:

The lead ball is sort of wrapped in a patch, which is usually a piece of cotton fabric because cotton is flammable but doesn't melt and can make a pretty good seal between ball and barrel. When the rifle is fired, the main charge sets off and the resulting gases push ball and patch out of the tube. What happened here is that ball and patch are still in the same place. I don't know what happened, maybe the OP used too little powder and the barrel is a rifled barrel. It would go a long way to explain why the ball is still there.

The drill bit would work if it wasn't for the ramrod. It wouldn't scratch a smooth bore barrel enough to be a problem because a smooth bore has always a lot of scratches; forensics use the scratches as a sort of fingerprint. A rifled barrel is a different kettle of fish. A flat wood drill bit smaller than .45 with a soft sleeve would be perfect, or else an even smaller HSS bit so the OP could make a hole deep enough to introduce a drywall screw and use it to pull the ball out. Being a rifled barrel would make it harder.

The only ways, unless @Invictus395 removes the ramrod, involve (1) blowing the ball out from the chamber side with air or grease or (2) removing the breech plug or the barrel, which is more work than really needed. Firing with the ramrod still there is out of the question.

clearly_not_atara - 29-1-2026 at 18:27

Yeah, no idea about the ramrod. Maybe there's tar involved? You could try heating the whole thing up and then yanking on it.

pesco - 29-1-2026 at 22:13

Freezing won't affect temper. It will affect steel properties while it's at low temperature, but this changes are not permanent, and it's all reversed when the steel comes back to room temperature.

Heating it to 200-300 °C will on the other hand affectt temper permanently. For older alloys it is safer to assume the lower end temperature is detrimental.

Didn't see the stuck ramrod mentioned before. Nevertheless, dislodging the ramrod shouldn't be a problem. Vice + prying with twisting should do the job.

MrDoctor - 30-1-2026 at 04:26

doesnt this mean the thing causing everything to be stuck, compressed into the gaps, is cotton then? cant something be done about that?
from experience i can tell you, strong hydrogen peroxide over 30% makes paper crumble like its ash, im sure there would be a peroxide conc safe to potentially expose BP to

DraconicAcid - 30-1-2026 at 05:52

Quote: Originally posted by MrDoctor

doesnt this mean the thing causing everything to be stuck, compressed into the gaps, is cotton then? cant something be done about that?
from experience i can tell you, strong hydrogen peroxide over 30% makes paper crumble like its ash, im sure there would be a peroxide conc safe to potentially expose BP to

That's also going to rust the barrel.

pesco - 31-1-2026 at 03:54

I don't believe this can be successfully resolved with chemical means. At least not without proper lab and "exotic" solvents.

It is mechanical problem and more fit for some mechanical/gunsmith/metalworking/machining forum.

Even so, its good that it was asked over here - we have here many people with brains

MrDoctor - 1-2-2026 at 00:36

im surprised the gun smith wasnt able to get the ram rod out either though, thats very strange. unless i missed something, id have to draw the conclusion that the ram rod was too short and is fully inside the barrel.
I posted a reply earlier, i dont think peroxide will do much to this steel, especially if its oiled and, idk what youd call it but, well weathered i guess? like, its exposed to sulfur and nitrate, the interior should be coated in some sort of stable passivation layer, also unless guns are as prone to rusting as mild steel, at least in my experience, 15-20m of exposure that would properly compromise cellulose wouldnt do anything much to any sort of air-stable steel.
But theres also cellulose dissolving enzymes out there, iirc nilered or some other chemtuber used some to make toiletpaper wine. i dont know how effective they are but, they break cellulose down into sugar, i can see them being available at places that service septic systems, and possibly at the more sciency brew shops, but the enzyme(s) do exist. The only one i know of is cellulase.

bnull - 1-2-2026 at 05:02

Quote: Originally posted by Invictus395

Long story short I need to dislodge a lead ball (with wad and powder charge) from a Hawken black powder rifle. (1) I didn't clean it as well as I should have and got it jammed in there good.

(2) How can I best dissolve the lead ball, quickly, without damaging the steel or causing a dangerous reaction with the black powder behind it?[Edited on 1-2-2026 by bnull]

(1) The barrel is dirty. Black powder always leaves residues, mostly potassium salts (potassium carbonate, sulfides, a little sulfate, maybe some nitrite and nitrate) and some carbon and sulfur. The steel is coated with them, that's why the ball doesn't budge. (2) The barrel must not be damaged beyond usual (those tiny scratches I mentioned before) because the rifle has already been sold and is someone else's gun now.

A peroxide solution has a few problems. It will react with the sulfur-potassium derivatives in the barrel, it is mostly water, it will be decomposed by the dirt, and the reaction products may be able to attack the steel in the barrel before getting to the cotton patch itself. To make things more pear-shaped, potassium carbonate and sulfides (and some nitrite perhaps) in the residues would make the solution alkaline and more prone to decomposition. Chemical means are out. Mechanical means can remove ball and ramrod.

The environment in there is not proper for enzymes and they would be too slow anyway. Remember, the cotton is compressed into a thin layer between ball and barrel and it is this part that is the problem.

[Edited on 1-2-2026 by bnull]

Fulmen - 1-2-2026 at 07:11

The proper way to do this is to remove the cap nipple and attach either an air line or a grease gun. Some shooters recommend vinegar/peroxide for removing lead fouling from the barrel, but as far as I can tell it will attack the barrel to some degree, at least if left for an extended period. I would not recommend it for this job. The only aqueous solution I can think of that will dissolve lead without attacking steel is hot concentrated caustics.

RedDwarf - 2-2-2026 at 17:22

If it was my problem I'd probably be turning to drilling the ball out as others have suggested, but I wondered if Bnull is correct that the ball is jammed because of the cotton, whether it would be possible to dissolve the cotton using Sweitzer's reagent (Copper Hydroxide in aqueous ammonia). There are practical problems even if this would work theoretically:

1) I've no idea whether the reagent would react with the barrel and/or black powder components
2) The process could be very slow with the jammed material having very little surface area available for reaction, and you'd probably need to recirculate the solution pumping it down a tube to jet into the reaction area to promote turbulent mixing
3) Having already used oil to try to free the ball you'd probably need to clean the cotton (to make it available to dissolve) by flushing the barrel with solvent or detergent solution.

So, probably all in all not a solution, but in the spirit of brainstorming might trigger other ideas!

pesco - 3-2-2026 at 11:47

Sweitzer's reagent will copper plate inside of a barrel and lead ball and by the time it gets to cotton it won't be Sweitzer's reagent anymore.

Not ideal.

Drill the ball out. Once hollow it will be, relatively easy to remove as it will fold. Lead is soft.

bnull - 3-2-2026 at 15:44

(1) Schweizer's reagent will react with the ball, the barrel and the lead residues in it, not to mention the various salts in the gunk. (2) The ball-patch combination looks like a badminton birdie, so the reagent will react with the excess cotton opposite to the chamber. It would take a large quantity of reagent to dissolve it before attacking the pressed cotton around the ball.

Perhaps using a hammer would loosen the ball enough to be pulled out. A ramrod can be wood or metal. If it is wood, using a vise to remove it and using a hammer are possibly bad ideas. Assuming it is metal and the powder has been flushed out of the chamber, the ramrod could be tapped with a hammer--I mean soft taps, not a rehearsal for Mahler's Sixth. If it works and the ball is removed, good; if it doesn't, the barrel won't be damaged beyond normal.