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- Feb 21, 2025
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Manufacturers usually suggest certain lubricants for winter storage. Do these suggestions match what you've seen in practice, or have you found other methods that work better?
Curious about using oil or grease in cold weather?
- Thread starter Alan
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This is a huge concern farther north. At higher elevations, in Alaska or Canada a lot of hunters never use grease because the soaps will thicken and harden. Grease is nothing but oil mixed in a soap base, usually polyurea or lithium.
I only use grease on the fire control components and I use it sparingly. If your firearm is clean and lightly lubed before taking it to the field you should be fine. The opposite concern is what to use in the summer. Summertime matches generally bring out more shooters and I have seen a few literally dripping lubricant at the end of a stage. Those tend to be the folks that grab a can of CLP and squirt a blast or two down the open action and call it done.
Every lube, oil and grease, will hold contaminants in the action weather it is powder residue, dust, lint or sand and dirt form the environment where the firearm is being used and stored. If I were going on a cold weather hunt the first thing I would do is strip the firearm as far as possible and clean it. Follow that with a LIGHT coat of a lubricant and head out. Even if you left it completely dry of lubricant the amount of use it will see on a typical hunting trip isn't likely to wear the moving parts to an unusable state.
I only use grease on the fire control components and I use it sparingly. If your firearm is clean and lightly lubed before taking it to the field you should be fine. The opposite concern is what to use in the summer. Summertime matches generally bring out more shooters and I have seen a few literally dripping lubricant at the end of a stage. Those tend to be the folks that grab a can of CLP and squirt a blast or two down the open action and call it done.
Every lube, oil and grease, will hold contaminants in the action weather it is powder residue, dust, lint or sand and dirt form the environment where the firearm is being used and stored. If I were going on a cold weather hunt the first thing I would do is strip the firearm as far as possible and clean it. Follow that with a LIGHT coat of a lubricant and head out. Even if you left it completely dry of lubricant the amount of use it will see on a typical hunting trip isn't likely to wear the moving parts to an unusable state.
