Cosmoline nightmare

lazarus · Jan 16, 2020

Man. I now officially hate cosmoline. I did before, other than it preserving things, it’s the devil’s snot.

Got a pair of surplus Yugo mags. Took probably 30lbs of force to pry them apart because they were stuck together with cosmoline. Took an hour with a heat gun, paper towels and hoppes #9 to get them completely cleaned up. One had 2oz of cosmoline in the mag body. Had to shove the follower really hard even after heating to get it to push out.

Yuck. Never had more than a light coating of the stuff on any surplus gun or mag. These looked like they’d been dipped and left in the vat to cool and then chipped out.

Art3 · Jan 16, 2020

lazarus said:
Man. I now officially hate cosmoline. I did before, other than it preserving things, it’s the devil’s snot.

Got a pair of surplus Yugo mags. Took probably 30lbs of force to pry them apart because they were stuck together with cosmoline. Took an hour with a heat gun, paper towels and hoppes #9 to get them completely cleaned up. One had 2oz of cosmoline in the mag body. Had to shove the follower really hard even after heating to get it to push out.

Yuck. Never had more than a light coating of the stuff on any surplus gun or mag. These looked like they’d been dipped and left in the vat to cool and then chipped out.

Bet they weren't rusty though :innocent0

Bertfish · Jan 16, 2020

Boiling them after disassembly will help to soften the real crusty bits

willtill · Jan 16, 2020

Soaking in mineral spirits, with a little periodic agitation; really helps the cosmoline slough off.

WatTyler · Jan 16, 2020

Save what you dug out. Reuse it on any metal you want to keep in storage for a long, long time. Won't flow, won't creep and won't flake off.

Melnic · Jan 16, 2020

yea, heat. If dealing with all metal, i start with heat, then go to the mineral spirits bath.
I can see how you can waste alot of mineral spirits doing this. I used to recycle my mineral spirits by using a coffee filter.
If you wanted to be cheap, you could take the mags, put it in a ziplock then put it somewhere hot but not too hot.
ziplock bags can fail at or near boiling point. cosmo liquifies just over 130F

cstone · Jan 16, 2020

willtill said:
Soaking in mineral spirits, with a little periodic agitation; really helps the cosmoline slough off.

That is what has worked for me. But I always start by putting the freshly acquired cosmoline caked Soviet surplus into a black trash bag and leaving it laying out in the sun on a warm day. It has made the disassembly much faster.

Threeband · Jan 16, 2020

Doesn't the army soak them in 55 gallon drums of aviation fuel?

By the way, with all the craziness in Virginia and elsewhere, it is really, really nice to read a good old fashioned "Cosmoline Nightmare" thread. It's like the good old days again...

cstone · Jan 16, 2020

Threeband said:
Doesn't the army soak them in 55 gallon drums of aviation fuel?...

Kerosene definitely works, but the smell.

lazarus · Jan 16, 2020

It wasn’t too terrible once I started hitting it with my heat gun a lot more. Was kind of fun watching it melt off the springs and soak in to the paper towels. BTW, cosmoline soaked paper towels burn really. Really. Really well. Tossed it in to my wood boiler and watched them take off. Not quiet C&R yet, but also cleaned up the associated zastava 70 they belonged with. That didn’t have much cosmoline on it at all. Worked it over, out it back together and good to go.

Unsure if I like it more than my Cz50. I think the Cz50 wins, but I still really like it. Really looking forward to getting it to the range. If my Cz50 just had a slide release...

It might be a small cartridge, but I really like .32acp. In a pistol, IMHO it seems quieter than 22lr. More recoil of course, but still very mild. Big enough to be reasonably effective. Obviously not like a big boy cartridge like 9mm, let alone .45acp.

Resisting urge to track down Colt 1903 hammerless immediately (bucket list. No one suggest anything, I don’t have the spare change to pick one up, even for a song).

willtill · Jan 17, 2020

Some interesting facts concerning cosmoline on Wiki... I didn't know it was originally developed as a pharmaceutical product. :brows:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmoline

Cosmoline was developed by Houghton International in the late 1800s as a pharmaceutical product. The original Cosmoline was an ointment and was used for many different cosmetic and medical purposes. It was kept in homes to disinfect wounds and was used by veterinarians to treat cuts, abrasions, bruises and sprains. Cosmoline could even be found on the farms, where it was used to relieve swelling in cow's udders. Cosmoline became an everyday name when it received a government specification as a rust preventive and began being used by the military to protect its equipment from rust and corrosion

Doctor_M · Jan 17, 2020

"Devil's Snot".... I gotta remember that one.

Uncle Duke · Jan 17, 2020

lazarus said:
It wasn’t too terrible once I started hitting it with my heat gun a lot more. Was kind of fun watching it melt off the springs and soak in to the paper towels. BTW, cosmoline soaked paper towels burn really. Really. Really well. Tossed it in to my wood boiler and watched them take off. Not quiet C&R yet, but also cleaned up the associated zastava 70 they belonged with. That didn’t have much cosmoline on it at all. Worked it over, out it back together and good to go.

Unsure if I like it more than my Cz50. I think the Cz50 wins, but I still really like it. Really looking forward to getting it to the range. If my Cz50 just had a slide release...

It might be a small cartridge, but I really like .32acp. In a pistol, IMHO it seems quieter than 22lr. More recoil of course, but still very mild. Big enough to be reasonably effective. Obviously not like a big boy cartridge like 9mm, let alone .45acp.

Resisting urge to track down Colt 1903 hammerless immediately (bucket list. No one suggest anything, I don’t have the spare change to pick one up, even for a song).

Remember folks that those towels mentioned can spontaneously combust "really really really well" also. Be conscious of this with disposal, via controlled burning or in tightly sealed metal cans,
to mitigate this reality.

lazarus · Jan 17, 2020

Uncle Duke said:
Remember folks that those towels mentioned can spontaneously combust "really really really well" also. Be conscious of this with disposal, via controlled burning or in tightly sealed metal cans,
to mitigate this reality.

Yup. I don’t end up with too much volatile wipes, but the stuff I think might not muck-up cast iron or SS goes in my wood boiler if I think it is safe to throw in (not something really volatile like gas soaked rags or paper towels where it might combust before it gets all the way in to the firebox). Off season or more dangerous stuff or that might have chemicals that could mess it up goes in a steel burn drum out back and torched from a safe distance.

KJackson · Jan 17, 2020

Melnic said:
If you wanted to be cheap, you could take the mags, put it in a ziplock then put it somewhere hot but not too hot.
ziplock bags can fail at or near boiling point. cosmo liquifies just over 130F

Should this be moved to the "Sous Vide" thread?

DivingDriver · Jan 17, 2020

Mineral spirits with a Sous Vide in the container?

Glaron · Jan 17, 2020

Melnic said:
y
If you wanted to be cheap, you could take the mags, put it in a ziplock then put it somewhere hot but not too hot.
ziplock bags can fail at or near boiling point. cosmo liquifies just over 130F

Actually I dumped all metal parts in a roaster. Put it outside on the gas grill. Turned it all on. Waited. Fished out the parts with tongs. Dumped out the waste water on the lawn. Worked fine. 212? Metal? :rolleyes:

Doco Overboard · Jan 17, 2020

I never had a significant amount of progress at any one time using mineral spirits, diesel fuel, kerosene, varsol, Safety Clean etc so I just use ordinary pump gasoline and a regulation parts cleaning brush.
Harbor freight sells both nylon and brass/steel galley brushes for reaching inside bolt wells mags and action bodies that can be discarded once they get bent up de-formed or permanently fouled.
A nice rolling pot of water with washing soda will remove the residuals. Be smart with the gas by doing it outdoors with PPE. A pvc pipe capped and sawed into a trough is a +.

Vile Shadow · Jan 17, 2020

cstone said:
Kerosene definitely works, but the smell.

Yer schnoz a bit sensitive? :lol2:

Bob A · Jan 23, 2020

lazarus said:
It might be a small cartridge, but I really like .32acp. In a pistol, IMHO it seems quieter than 22lr. More recoil of course, but still very mild. Big enough to be reasonably effective. Obviously not like a big boy cartridge like 9mm, let alone .45acp.

Resisting urge to track down Colt 1903 hammerless immediately (bucket list. No one suggest anything, I don’t have the spare change to pick one up, even for a song).

I agree on the joy of shooting 32acp. My fave so far is the PPK. A pleasure to shoot in that caliber. I don't care for it in 380 at all. And no one is volunteering to be shot with a 32. Not even the big boys.

As far as the Colt is concerned, patience and vigilance pays off. I got mine by haunting gunbroker for like over a year. Guns go in peaks and troughs. Once the folks who bid each other through the roof all get theirs, one will pop up and no one will notice. Pounce and it's yours.

Works for most of the stuff I've looked for. Just avoid the "gotta have it" frenzy, when you get so annoyed at some dude bidding up the pistol that you figured was already yours, that you say to hell with my maximum and just go for it. (True confession: that's what got me my Remington 51. Sometimes a guy's gotta do what a guy's gotta do. So sue me. Doesn't invalidate my advice, just shows that I don't always follow it.)

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