Did he say Turpentine? to clean with

[Sharpsman]

Regular alcohol contains 20% water!

If you're going to use alcohol....use 'denatured' alcohol!

The BEST cleaner for removing BP comes out of your faucet!

[Mike Brooks]

After reading the letter mentioned in "Muzzleloader" + the above posts, I had to see whether turpentine was the magical cleaner as claimed.  My rifle was cleaned with warm, soapy water, patches on a jag, and a bore brush, followed by more patches.  (It was really filthy.)  I then oiled the bore and put it away.  A little while ago, I dried the oil and used a patch saturated with turpentine and ran it in and out of the bbl. a few times.  Well, either I cleaned the bbl. [by conventional means] really well, or turpentine isn't the miracle elixir which the letter writer claimed because the patch wasn't dirty at all.  You may want to try it and draw your own conclusions about its effectiveness.

It is effective for removing lead. I have never seen any lead in a ML rifle that shoots a patched RB..... It is used in ML shotguns and works well. It also works well in modern cartridge guns you shoot lead bullets in.
 There is no reason to clean a ML rifled barrel  with turp that  shoots a patched RB.....there won't be any lead in the barrel to clean out.

[Marcruger]

"It is effective for removing lead. I have never seen any lead in a ML rifle that shoots a patched RB..... It is used in ML shotguns and works well. It also works well in modern cartridge guns you shoot lead bullets in.
 There is no reason to clean a ML rifled barrel  with turp that  shoots a patched RB.....there won't be any lead in the barrel to clean out."

What Mike said.  Exactly.   God Bless,   Marc

[hanshi]

A bit stray of the subject, but I am originally from Georgia which was (and still is, IIRC, the naval stores capital of the world).  A product called "astyptodyne" is made from the LL pine sap and it smells very much like it's sister, turpentine.  I think it's still available.

Back when I was still a chap it was used as an antiseptic/styptic/pain reliever.  It did do all those things and was credited with other (undocumented) powers.  It was used externally; castor oil was used overused for everything else internally.  Anyone ever tried turpentine for these uses??