Rifle cleaning routine?

[Mike357]

I'd be really keen to hear how everyone cleans their rifles after use? Clean every time, quick oil & patch or do you scrub the bore?

[Dangermouse]

The eternal question, which will be asked for many years yet.

I believe that this changes from one rifle to another, with a shooter having different routines for different rifles in their collection.

For example, a F Class shooter with a nice tight bore will clean after every days shooting. A owner of an older rifle may not, as they believes that a little fowling helps with accuracy.
The problem is no one ever knows and it is a variable which is always changing, although reasonably slowly.

Another consideration is for those who hand load. Those using hot loads will want to clean more often than those using slow loads, and the types of powder get a look in as well.
If you are not a hand loader, don't think you get away with not having to worry about your ammunition. Certain makes use more corrosive powders than others.
Lead or copper heads are also to be considered.

Personally speaking, I never liked the idea of scrubbing my barrel, so when John Carmichael from HPS recommended "wipe out" http://www.hps-tr.com/wipe-out.asp I was sold and have found it works in my full bore rifles.

You may be interested in reading this report from 6mmBR.com
http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/201 ... afternoon/

And this one, gone in 6 seconds http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/201 ... rrel-life/

[Ovenpaa]

Cleaning, now there is a subject that can be nigh on emotive as choice of religion or political persuasion..

In our house different tactics have been adopted for different rifles, as an example the wife shoots moly coated bullets and applies a minimal clean regime after every outing with me giving it a deep clean a few times a year, the view is her rifle (quick 80 grain .223's) only gets a proper cleaning when accuracy starts to fall.

My AI in .308 gets bore foamed after every outing and I aim to remove all the copper fouling. I also use a few other solvents in the cleaning sequence as I have a totally unfounded theory that a single solvent will not do the job (How many times have you cleaned until nothing shows on the patch and then used a different solvent and it comes out light blue/green again)

Service rifles are a problem, should I strip all the copper out and take the bore back to it's original un-shot sparkly finish or leave some fouling in it? Modern cleaning solvents should in theory do a better job than those employed 50 years ago,.. or should they? I recently picked up a bottle of something different foe cleaning copper fouling only to read on the bottle that it was environmentally friendly and non toxic. Well sorry but if it is kind to the environment and OK to add to my cup of tea how is it supposed to clean my rifle??

One area I think people over look is cleaning the chamber (just look at the carbon build up on a fired case neck of your favourite factory chambered .308) Shoot 100 over day and think of the state of the chamber.

Also consider the ammunition you shoot, I remember looking with horror at a modern rifle chambered in 54R that had shot milsurp a couple of days before but only had a cursory clean. the flash arrester was red rusty, luckily the bore was OK however it took a fair amount of time to get it back to where it should have been.

One thing I will advocate is the use of a bore scope, if you have one use it, if you don’t then try and borrow one at least a couple of times a year to have a look at the throat and chamber. Mine is a commercial Olympus system with an external power source for the light that even allows you to see round corners, over kill for a rifle but it was incredibly cheap and just too good an offer to miss, it is an eye opener when you peer down the chamber first time.

[dromia]

I clean my barrels with Ed's Red as I mainly shoot cast thats all it needs and all the cleaning is a push through with a dry patch the a couple of passes with Ed's Red soaked patches and the bore left wet. I then dry patch before using.

In the few rifles I shoot jacketed in I patch turn about with Ed's Red and 10% ammonia for the copper fouling. I never take a barrel back to bare metal.

For really gunged up new to me barrels then I use Wipe Outs non foaming product Patch Out with accelerator I do this mainly for speed. It works good on old BP barrels too otherwise boilng water does well for BP barrels.

I feel that most propriety brands of cleaning solutions are chronically over priced, my way works for me and is very pocket friendly.

[woody_rod]

Good question.

After having recently gone into FO shooting, I now see some fouling I have not come across before. Fouling in my 6,5mm (260 INCH chamber) is weird - all in the last 6 inches. Much copper, my nickname for this rifle is now the "copper mine".

My wife shoots a 223 Rem in F Standard here in Australia. This is much like F/TR. This rifle shoots well, but needs to be kept clean to get the most from it.

We generally wet patch our bores with Hoppes ASAP after shooting - with the barrel still hot. This stays in the barrel for at least that day, and sometimes till the next shoot (next week). This gets the fouling from the 223 Rem out but only some in the 260. I use IOSSO bore paste (very fine white paste) and Sweets. This is the only thing that will shift the fouling. While running this barrel in, it took 3 attempts to get the bore clean.

So in short, it goes like this:

Hoppes (223 and 260)

Sweets (260 only)
Bore paste (but only the fine stuff).

The 223 gets cleaned once a day (50 rounds approximately), the 260 INCH no more than 2 details @ 12 rounds each.

We have a bore scope, and it gets used every time we clean our barrels. I now know that my cleaning previously was poor to say the least.

[ptheta]

Hi all,
not wanting to shamelessly hijack the thread but I have a couple of questions about cleaning that you might be able to help out with and generally add to the discussion in the process.

I have a Schmidt-Rubin and a Lee Enfield No4, neither of which have been with me very long as I've only recently moved up from pistol calibre rifles. For both of the rifles I adopted the same cleaning routine after reading an article on the 6br website.

I soaked my patches in Hoppes 9 and cleaned only from the breech end and removed the patch once it came out of the end of the barre, i.e. only go in one direction and don't pull back down the barrel. I cleaned the loose fouling out with a couple of patches, followed up once with the brush, and then more wet patches until clean, then dry patches followed by a final oiled one.

Perhaps you more experienced guys can help me with a couple of points.
1. Am I being too precious with the from the breech only technique? Would it do any harm to work a soaked patch back and forth to really coat the Hoppes over everything?

2. Although this technique seemed to work fine with the Schmidt-Rubin and the patches ran clear, I was left with a little trace of black on my patches through the Lee Enfield that I just couldn't shift no matter how many times I put patches through (and once more through with the brush too). In the end I ran out of patches so I oiled it and left it at that. That would have been after a lot of patches, say around 50 to 70. Should I change cleaners , do something different, or just accept the status quo? I should add that the Lee Enfield was new to me and it was the first time I had cleaned it, i.e. (I saw it, shot it, bought it and brought it home with me and then struggled to get it completely clean.

Regards,
Paul.

[The Gun Pimp]

No one likes cleaning their rifle, so many look for the easy option but take ovenpaa's advice and buy a borescope. Until you do, you will never know if your cleaning regime is working.

When I'm laboriously cleaning and decoppering my rifle after a shoot, I always get someone who comes up and says "I never get any copper out of my barrel" My answer? Try harder!

Vince

[zzr1100]

at one point i used to shoot .22 indoor 25m .... the guys in the club said NEVER clean the bore ?!?!?!
Its not the way i was taught as a youngster !

[woody_rod]

at one point i used to shoot .22 indoor 25m .... the guys in the club said NEVER clean the bore ?!?!?!
Its not the way i was taught as a youngster !

Well, that is pretty much what we do for our rimfires. If I clean my Anschutz hunting rifle, it will not shoot a clean group for 100 rounds. My hornet using 46 grain copper jacket bullets can shoot probably 200 rounds without cleaning, but the higher pressure stuff cleaned more often.

[Dangermouse]

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2010 ... ng-system/

I read that Bushmaster are launching a cleaning system which will do away with cloth patches. Full story above.

I can see that this might be attractive for my 10/22, shotgun and Marlin under lever, especially as it looks like you might be able to clean without dismantling the whole rifle every time. But I doubt that many bolt action users will be prepared to rely on it alone.

I know that some target shooters will not use a bore snake as they claim it damages the crown, the Bushmaster system would also act in the same way - if those fears are founded.
Time will tell.

DM