Out in Arizona, we tend to keep it very light, almost to the point of not using it at all.

In Afghanistan dust gets in everything in addition to being crazy cold in winter and stupid hot in summer. It's inevitable, and Helicopters are the worst since rotor wash kicks up fucktons of dust. A few of us have been dumping motor oil in the GAU 18's after each landing (literally) when CLP isn't available and it works nicely to keep the guns functioning. For GAU 2's the white camel cum grease is the best. It uses a calcium compound instead of lithium. I think it's Calcium sulfate.

Calcium sulfonate I could see, though that'd be close to some marine bearing greases, as I understand it.

Ah, that's it. Calcium sulfonate. We just call it camel cum. Glop it on heavily. The dust sticks to the grease and gets flung out of the housing as it clumps up.

For the more conventional guns, though, motor oil does work well. The idea of using just a thin layer of lube to prevent dust from building up doesn't work when the environment is that dirty. Carry a quart of oil and basically wash out the receiver with it between landings.

I was reading and the first time I read "camel cum" I took it quite literally. Can't stop laughing now.

The humble Camel produces semen of a highly lubricious nature.

I just read that in Morgan Freeman's voice. As in a Discovery Channel documentary.

Ah, well it just so happens I am Morgan Freeman.

Heh, that's pretty cool :D Never thought of using that. Thanks for posting!

Glad you like it! I was mostly just surprised to find out that motor oil was as good as it is. Someone came from out of state and brought his new carbine along to test, and nobody remembered to bring their CLP or anything, so we ended up wiping the bolt and carrier down with a little motor oil breaking it in.

Yeah really! I'd have never thought Castrol would do the trick ...maybe Mobile 1 but I digress.

Haha Nice :P Me and my Neighbor just use Hoppe's 9

I can see the motor oil thing working. Not because it is so different, but because as the article stated, most fancy products are just oils with some "special" ingredient. I have seen this in some other specialized products that I use in some of my other hobbies, and you see the same branding and mark-up of products for no other reason besides a few words saying how it was "made for this hobby".

Granted, some of the stuff I work it, if something goes wrong you don't have to worry about a live round messing up, or a very nice firearm getting screwed up.

One of my favorite products is Weapon Shield. I've only ever seen it on ther website, but the stuff is amazing. I sugest you give it a look! From what I understand, It was inveted by the same man who invented FP-10, only weapon shield is an improvement.

Cheesy label, but not a bad price and unanimous support from what I can see, I may just have to give that a try.

I think the label is plenty cheezy too. guess ya cant win them all!

The owner of Weapon shield sent us a bottle to test on Uzi talk forums not to long ago and it really is good stuff. It really soaks into parkerized finish well.

I use motor oil on all of our guns at work and my own, works just fine to. Use grease on my 1919 and the M-53, belt feds like it thick on the feed paw parts.

I've always used dexron 3 ATF for that. A quart lasts for ever.

Now that sounds like a good idea, too. I know it will burn at a lower temperature, but I suppose if your rifle's getting that hot, the energy lost may keep it from getting too hot, maybe.

Well hell, what parts of your rifle get hot enough to burn off oil? Which of those parts require lubrication? It burning off is not really a concern for lubrication, just fumes it puts off. I know burnt CLP burns my eyes when I have fired an AR soaked in the stuff (mostly the oil on the back of the bolt making the eye burning fumes).

The main reasons I use ATF are that it is a good rust preventative, it doesn't evaporate off when it is in the rack sitting, it's nice and thin so cold weather isn't a problem (most greases and thicker oils will gum up ARs and 10/22s), and well if it lets the bearing surfaces in a transmission last 100,000 miles (god knows how many revolutions that is) then it is way over-specced for firearms.

I was thinking it's probably going to burn off at a lower temperature than motor oil, but come to think of it, it'll probably handle heat better than the CLP my rifle usually gets. Which the last time I went shooting some months ago, didn't last all that long before it was smoke.

I'm going to guess it'll be somewhere around 360,000,000 revolutions. Do I get to keep the car if I'm closest?

lol It would depend on what bearing it is, tire size and what gearing the axle is, but it would be some ungodly high number like that.

If you think about it, the only parts of a rifle that get really hot are the inside of the barrel and the gas system, neither of which is supposed to be dripping with oil. A bit of oil to keep rust at bay is all that should be in either place. All the slidey surfaces never really get above the smoke point of most oils. Even the cam pin on an AR probably only reaches 400F or so after dumping a few mags. Heat is more or less a non-issue. Longevity of the oil film is a lot higher on the priority list, and that goes hand in hand with high boiling points, so any oil that doesn't evaporate in a month will survive plenty high temperature.

I'd take that article with a grain of salt. He uses the term "Tolerances" incorrectly, as if it's an inherent quality of the firearm and how it fits together as opposed to a generalized factor of the manufacturing process. It seems like he might be repeating a lot of internet heresay and rumor. I may also be wrong, of course, but I wouldn't exactly throw out every lube I own cause of this article.

I live in Louisiana. It gets really, really humid here. It's a dangerous environment. My AR and a few other guns have good finishes and materials to resist corrosion, rust, and oxidation, but others don't. CLP has been shown to be exceptional at preventing rust (Combining to form hydrochloric acid? WTF?), so I use it on guns that are vulnerable to rust. I find on my 1911 it seeps into the Parkerization and provides an excellent barrier.

CLP dries out fast though, and it's just sort of OK at cleaning. I don't freak out if there's carbon on the back of my bolt, so I add in a few drops of whatever synthetic lubricant I have on high-wear areas. I've been using M-PRO7 for a while. It stays "Wet" for weeks. I'd think full synthetic motor oil with minimal additives would make a good lube, but I haven't tried it. YMMV.

Yeah, I do like my CLP. I've always though it does burn off a little fast, but it's a good way to get a patina on parked metal, too. And what it doesn't clean, Kroil usually will, or lead/copper remover for the bore. I just found it interesting that motor oil was such a good lubricant, not something I've really thought too much about, but it does make sense, now. Had to use some in a pinch for someone's carbine once, don't really feel too bad about that now.

Damn, that never occurred to me, but it makes sense.