The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

I still swear by 009 for the powder fouling, and then bore foam for copper. That combo shifts anything I throw at it but I don't let it get bad anyway.

Gaz wrote:I have a 1980s vintage bottle of Sweets in my cleaning kit. I had to buy a sealable ammo box to keep it in because the smell of the stuff was impregnating my shooting gear and making me high every time I got it out!

Haven't used modern Sweets but I'd expect it to be less potent. Frankly I'm surprised the ammonia hasn't melted through the old bottle yet. Might try just buying the stuff neat and using that if it works out cheaper, Dromia for that tip.

Dromia doesn't have the ammonia neat - he adds a dash of lemonade (& a cherry on a stick if the suns over the yard-arm & his lass is down the shops....)

Electronic bore cleaners are the way to go for really fouled or dirty barrels.

Cheap and easy to make, you can go as simple or fancy as you want to in the construction.

From sticking some wires on two flashlight (torch) batteries with adheisive tape, to a nice bakalite case with a voltage reducing tranformer and full bridge rectifier, with switches, buttons and lights that you can plug into the wall. ( phone charger)

For a really old nasty rifle, (Left in the barn for years) rusty, crusty, dirty, you can strip the wood and clean the whole rifle in a large plastic tub using the same method.

Sweets does work great, even though it smells like the bottom of a cats sand box.

I think most labeled cleaners are a con.

Same with gun oils. Waste of money.

I clean with soap and water, and lube with Mobil 1 5-w-30, and have for years.
I bought a one quart bottle almost 10 years ago and still have most of it left. That maintains well over 50 firearms.
And I dont see me ever having to buy another bottle.
Besides the additives in automotive oils permiate the metal of the bore and make cleaning easier and easier every time you use it.

I was talking to an old gun maker I know one day and mentioned the smell of gun oil and he said he had poured a bottle of gun into a pot of motor oil years ago and was still using it, and it still smelt of the original gun oil, reckoned it had saved him a small fortune.