new M/L hunter advice

[brew]

so I received my optima V2 for my birthday and am looking forward to trying it this year elk hunting.  I have thousands of questions...starting out do I need "season" the barrel like regular firearm's and clean the rifle after each shot ?  The breech plug that comes with the rifle is for pellets.  do I need to buy a different breech plug and try loose powder?  thinking of using powerbelts .  Have read some of the threads but it seems like everyone has their own way of cleaning...have read a lot about using boiling water to clean the barrel ?  can you do this or use a manufactured bore cleaner ?   Way to many questions to start with but just looking for a starting point.  Great thing about my situation is that I have a way of shooting it at the house so I can try many different things to get something going without spending a lot of time going to the range.

[usmc74]

I clean with hot water, I don't shoot powerbelts (I use Barnes TMZ), no seasoning required.

[haftard]

I hope you have gotten out to shoot sice you posted. With my optima i clean,every 5 or 6 shots. Normaly just a dry patch or a boar snake. Clean its realy realy well when your done shooting or hunting m. Get in there with qtips and clean thr action realy well.
For loads i would stay away from power belts. I shot the blood line bullets. The tmz are realy good also. The hornady sst's are a good option. I shot my elk last year with 150g of 777 pellets with a 350g bloodline bullet. I dont forsee any issues you could have with a all coper or brass bullet. Good luck.

[James]

My Accura MR shoots Federal BOR Lock MZ's really well, and they load like butter. Almost don't need a bullet starter, I would recommend them over powerbelts.

Check with CVA but I think the only loose powder that takes a special breach plug is Blackhorn, all others (meant for muzzys) should be fine.

I use the CVA cleaning kit, but there are cheaper options (hot water, windex, etc.)

[callturner]

My Accura V2 shoots awesome! 77 weighed gr of Blackhorn 209 in a Blackhorn breech plug under a 300 gr Speer Deep Curl .452 in a Harvester crush rib black sabot fired off by a 209 primer. I clean with Windex w/ ammonia and DO NOT swab between shots.

[MountainDevil54]

https://buckskinsbp.blogspot.com/2020/07/why-we-dont-season-our-barrels-anymore.html