Is LSA a good lube/cleaner?

[Tropical Z]

I was wondering since i read on the can that you have to shake it before use and i thought that if this is true,maybe it would seperate after you use it on your guns. Any opinions?

[LIProgun]

My limited experience with LSA is that it is not a bad lube, especially considering the price. I suspect, however, that under extreme conditions it will not fare as well as more modern lubricants, including CLP. As one example, LSA was not supposed to be used in really cold weather -- that's what LAW was for -- whereas LSA's replacement, CLP, is good down to pretty extreme cold temperatures.

As a cleaner I don't think LSA is better than any other oil. My understanding is that LSA was never intended as a solvent, which is why the military issued RBC.

The one thing I can say is that LSA is an excellent rust preventative. It came out superior to several modern firearm rust preventative products in my testing.

[don't shoot it's me]

LISA who?

[Clayton]

LSA is a lube only, not a cleaner. It was first produced by Royal Lubricants during the 1960's and was a great improvement over standard rifle oil. ROYCO still makes it, and also currently holds the contract for the issue CLP.

www.royallube.com


Break-Free CLP is a far better product overall, both in the lab and in real world use.

www.break-free.com

www.midsouthshooterssupply.com has great prices on Break-Free CLP. A 12oz aerosol can sells for $6.15.

[Wild Romanian]

I would have to strongly disagree that Break free is better than LSA. Few people know that the Break free formula has been changed due to the enviromental fantatics. Also few people know that Break free makes two versions. One is CLP and the other is industrial Break Free. The CLP is natural and the other is synthentic. The factory man told me that the CLP to good for lower temperatures 40 below versus 20 below for the industrial type of break free.

I find that the new Break free is vastly inferior to the original although I still use it and like it.

LSA is by far the better temporary lube and I underline Temporary. LSA will congeal over a long period of time so do not store a self defense pistol with this lube for a long time.

LSA is a superior lube for every day shooting because it combines the advatanges of grease and oil into one lube.

Break free is much thinner and seems to have far less teflon in it than it use to. Break free is thinner and lubricates less well but does also clean. When I use Break Free I also lube all pressure points with Lubriplate grease (available at most bearing and auto parts stores). I do not need to use grease when I use LSA oil.

LSA oil is probably the best lube you can use on the M16 rifle. It was specifically developed for the M16.

For bore cleaning be smart and use a chemical specifically designed to clean. Ignore the do all cleaners. A good old standby available for decades has been the original Hopes No. 9. It will remove not only powder fouling but copper fouling and corrsive salts from corrosive ammo (assuming that you were stupid enough to use such trash ammo to destroy your expensive firearm).

Never use corrosive ammo if you can avoid it. I have seen people destroy new guns with as little as 8 or 9 rounds of this stuff folllowed by immediate cleaning. It all depends on the temperature, the humidity, the steel in the barrel and the power of the particular lot of corrosive ammo. Many historical and valuable firearms have been destroyed by this ammo.

Remember the worst thing you can do is never clean your gun and never lube it. It is the best way to destroy it in short order. Use whatever turns you on but use something on your expesive firearms. W.R.

[Clayton]

The only bad thing about LSA is just about all you can find is old surplus. Lubricants do go bad after long storage, losing many of their salient properties.

The only change made to Break-Free CLP, in the last few years anyway, was increased rust prevention, due to the change in a chemical provider's formula.

If you buy a can of Break-Free CLP, rest assued it is the exact same product issued to troops worldwide.

LSA is good stuff, but not worth the hassle of finding some made in the last ten years, as well as having to use a seperate product to clean with, IMHO.

In the military testing that resulted in the MIL-L-63460 standard, Break-Free CLP outdid all competitors, and showed a 400% improvement over LSA on the M60 machinegun when immersed in salt water then test fired for reliability. Break-Free CLP was the only product that actually increased the MTBF rate for the M16A1.

Break-Free CLP will remove firing residue better than most dedicated solvents, and will also remove corrosive salts. It was designed to clean weapons after firing corrosive ammo, specifically the M2 Browning, as most .50 cal ammo at the time(1978) was corrosive.

[Wild Romanian]

Most do all lubes like break free are great for lubing and quite the failure as cleaners.

One of the biggest detroyers of barrels and the accuracy that goes hand in hand with them is a build up of copper on the interior of the barrel walls. Break free and other do all cleaners almost always fail totally or come up far short in this department.

Copper is not easily removed so you must use a cleaner designed to remove it. There are quite a few on the market some of them extremely powerful like Sweets. Others act more gently on the bore such as Shooters Choice or Hope's bench rest. Some of these milder cleaners require quite a few soakings but they are easier on the barrel than the more powerful quick removal cleaners like Sweets.

Although there are many favorites I have always liked the original Hope's No. 9. It is still easy on barrels but acts quicker than Shooters choice or Hope's bech rest and it does a good job getting the powder and copper out of the barrel.

The experienced rifleman uses a good cleaner followed by a good lube that lubricates and displaces moiture. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. I have never found a do all lube that was worth a damn. W.R.

[Clayton]

"Copper is not easily removed so you must use a cleaner designed to remove it."

Very true...

I use CLP on a regular basis on all my weapons, and use a dedicated copper remover every 500 rounds or so in my pistols, and every 100 rounds in my rifle.

I like the Iosso bore paste, Remington's bore cleaner, and Shooter's Choice Copper Remover.

I'm not a benchrest shooter, but I am a bit anal about preventative maintenance .

FWIW, I know lots of guys who use nothing but FP-10 on their guns, and they've had no problems. One guy is the designated marksman for a local PD, and has experienced no accuracy problems to date, and he shoots thousands of .308 rounds a year.

www.mpc-home.com

www.iosso.com

[Clayton]

For all you LSA lovers out there, here's a source:

http://www.sarcoinc.com/new60.html

This stuff was made in 1995, by Castrol, of Germany. There are several companies that still make LSA for the military, such as Castrol, Royal Lubricants, Chemsol, Mil Spec Products, etc., but they will only sell it in bulk.

Here's the tech sheet on LSA from ROYCO:

ROYCO 46 is a light tan colored synthetic based semi-fluid grease with a lithium stearate thickener.
ROYCO 46 is intended for use in automatic weapons systems and accessory equipment operating in severe environments and conditions where thin film and extreme pressure lubrication are encountered.
ROYCO 46 is recommended for the lubrication of the M16, M39, M61, and other weapons systems where high cyclic rates of fire are encountered.
ROYCO 46 is suitable for use in temperatures ranging from -65F to +260F.
ROYCO 46 meets all requirements and is qualified against MIL-L-46000(LSA).

[Clayton]

Another note:

Many people, including me, ASSumed that the military had replaced LSA, LAW, and LSAT with CLP, but this is not the case. At least a half dozen contractors still make LSA, and Castrol in particular has provided LSA to the military in the last couple of years, at least. CLP began it's service in 1978.

I found a bulletin, written by one of the departments of the military in charge of updating specs and testing products, etc. The memo was from 1999, and they were requesting samples of lubes for testing, as the military was looking into replacing LSA.

Several manuals still call for the use of LAW and LSA.

LSAT was replaced, at least in part, by Milcomm TW-25B.

There are probably a hundred weapons lubes that currently carry a NSN.

[mpthole]

Personally, I like the smell of LSA better than CLP. I think they both work just fine. Have to admit though its hard to get used to the CLP - hosing things off then slapping it back together just doesn't seem right.