oiling the bolt head

[douglass]

hi all
would you oil the part of the bolt that twists into the grooves when a round is chambered, or best to leave dry, any advice appreciated
douglas

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[Surpmil]

If you mean the grooves or shoulders where the locking lugs on the head of the bolt rest, best left as is unless you have cleaned the whole thing out with oven cleaner or some other method that would remove every trace of oil from the steel. All you need is enough in the steel to prevent rust, certainly not enough to be visible IMO.

We'll see what others say.

[smellie]

That sounds quite reasonable.

When I am putting one back into service, usually after many years of standing, I give it a good cleaning which usually ends up leaving the metal itself dry: an invitation to rusting. What I usually lubricate things with is Lubriplate 105, which I learned to use while working in the oil patch. It will take just about any amount of pressure, it doesn't freeze up and it prevents rust. Of course, it also acts pretty much as a magnet for dirt, dust, dead wasps and so forth. What I do is lubricate the inside of the bolt with a bit of this, assemble the bolt, wipe a SMALL quantity onto the bolt-head, making certain that it gets into the locking recesses in bolt AND receiver..... then I wipe OUT as much as I can with a dry patch, leaving just enough to help things to turn and prevent rust, but without leaving enough to gather spiderwebs and dead sparrows.

You DO need SOME lubrication here, but you sure don't need MUCH.

BTW, Lubriplate 105 is white in colour, so you don't want it obvious, anyway. It is a GM product and you should be able to get it (it comes in 14-ounce tubes) from your local GM garage. One tube should do your Ross Rifle into the NEXT century!

Have fun.
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