Just keep cleaning, just keep cleaning...

[Antelope_Sniper]

There are a few small tricks to using the Foul Out system. Once you figure them out, it's pretty straight forward.

If you clean the barrel with a good degreaser you seen to get a better connection. Clean the copper of the rod with rough sand paper. Drop the rod down the barrel, and hook your lead to the action. Watch the color of your fluid closely at first. If it starts to turn colors, give the barrel a scrubbing with a tornado brush, toss the old liquid, then start again. Sometimes you will have to do this two or three times before the liquid will stop turning. Once it does, check it every 4 to 8 hours, or once you get the green light. It's takes 3-4 days to get all the copper out of some rifles. I really like mine, so I buy the fluid from Midway by the gallon.

 

[wisconsinteacher]

I went to the local gunshop today and talked to a few guys behind the counter. One said the reason for all the black when using the Bore Cleaner was due to a reaction with the metal in the barrel. Another guy mentioned that he would use break cleaner to get the carbon out. The last guy said to use just Hoppe's #9 so that I don't hurt the barrel using an abrasive. I started with Hoppe's #9 and a brass brush. I am soaking the patch and running it up and down 10 times and it has black where the brush touches the barrel. I plan on doing this and then later today, foaming it one more time. I don't know about using brake cleaner???

 

[Guest]

I don't think brake cleaner would hurt chromoly steel, but I'm not entirely sure about stainless. I do know it will etch the finish on rings, bases, and other "blued" items in some cases, and I don't use it on my guns. I have used Birchwood-Casey gun scrubber when I needed an aerosol spray solvent. It's good if you get a lot of crud somewhere and want to flush it out - like when I seated a bullet too far out by accident and then opened the action and dumped all the powder in there....

I'd keep at it with the Hoppe's and Foam alternating. It's got a lot of layers of gunk, so it's going to take a long time to clean.

 

[wisconsinteacher]

I understand there are layers of carbon and copper, but why does it look so bright and nice down the barrel?

 

[OU812]

I understand there are layers of carbon and copper, but why does it look so bright and nice down the barrel?

Might be because it is. I may be way off base here but in my mind it seems to me that any brush that is run down the barrel during a cleaning process a portion of the bristles are running in the grooves. This being true you are draging carbon up out of the grooves/lower walls of the grooves as you run the brush through, thusly the patches are not coming out clean but show carbon on them. The lands and top edges of the grooves which contact the bullet may be clean as a whistle.

Will the grooves come clean in time?, I'm sure they will, but is it worth cleaning an area that the bullet never comes in contact with so extensively? Not to say the grooves should not be cleaned but to what extent? Jusy my thoughts.

Bill

 

[nodak7mm]

WITeacher,

One of the problems I note that alot of folk have cleaning problems and thats be to dang skimpy with the cleaner of choice.

I am one of those that drowns/flushes/floods the bore, using the cleaner also as a carrier to get the carbon & copper out.

An analogy that comes to mind is: Driving thru the Northwoods during the summer and your windshield gets really boogered up with bugs. How do you clean it?

Spray a little cleaner on a paper towel and then try to wipe it off?
or
Spray the heck out of the windshield with cleaner, let it soak a bit, brush it with a brush soaked in cleaner, then more cleaner to flush the bugs away?

Your driveway? Do you wipe it off with a damp mop or use the pressure washer?

Get a decent bore guide with a built in solvent port and flood that bore & flush the loose (fouling) crap outta there. Then let the stuff dwell & work the copper & carbon (studies I have read show 20 minutes, and most have worked their magic by then). Repeat till your happy.

I use a basic cleaner for the loose fouling crap. Hoppes, Shooters choice, Patch-out, whatever. I use a strong copper cleaner for serious copper and Iosso paste for carbon (every 100rds typ). There is no single magic elixer and they all work, some work better than others & some stink more than others.

After a match, I swab with kroil when the barrel is warm so it can lift/work/penetrate till I get home. If I get home late, I brush the loose crap out and hit it with Wipeout and go to bed. I hit er the next day/eve with my flushing process.

I can have my barrels sparkle if I need to within a 1/2 hr and thats with a 15-20 minute dwell time. And I have really gotten to love using Patch-Out & Accelerator (Wipeout products). Works as well as its stinky counterparts and is very pleasing to work with and the wifey dont object to the smell...

I do buy cleaner in the 16/20 oz bottles and several at a time. Beats the heck outta cleaning more than I shoot while trying to make a 4 oz bottle last a yr.. 8)

Oh yeah, I do have access to a borescope and have seen the light, I want one.. :wink: ...

Rod

 

[Antelope_Sniper]

Rod, I'm kind of like you with the cleaning solvant.
I dip the brush into the bottle of CR-10 every stroke until I have blue liquid running out the end of the barrel. Boreshine, Kroils, CR-10, will bring out alot of crud.

 

[nodak7mm]

Antelope Sniper,

The little 6/8oz flip top squirt bottles work great for this. No contamination and no spill...... Ya can squirt er right down the bore if ya want...

 

[BK]

Funny, on my maintenance cleaning, I hardly ever use a brush. I may be a little guilty of over cleaning, but the only time I really use a brush is when I'm cleaning a (new to me) used rifle, or cleaning somebody else's gun.

 

[IdahoCTD]

Shooters Choice is GM Top Engine Cleaner at 4X the price. The guy that developed it figured out it would be worth more as a gun solvent.

 

[257 Ackley]

Rod - your analogies make it easy enough for a jack-pine savage like me to understand :mrgreen:. Thanks

 

[cloverleaf]

I wonder about solvents, having a "color" of there own or reacting with the steel. I spent over an hour on the barrel of my 20 ga. Shotgun last night. (My annual round of Trap)That sucker was so clean and mirror bright that when I looked through the barrel at the floor that I couldnt tell the difference between the floor and the side of the barrel at times. :shock: Patches with a little Break Free CLP kept coming out black wherever there was solvent. Now I know that stuff works...but that good?!?!???. CL

A Jack Pine Savage....? Hadnt heard that one.... CL

 

[257 Ackley]

CL -
just another name for us country guys that don't act like the city folks want us to :roll:. Been in the city a long time and they haven't changed me yet...

 

[nodak7mm]

Joel,

You can take the boy outta the country, but never the country outta the boy, eh...? And your statement is an appreciated compliment...

CL,

Jackpine Savage is a euphemism for those of us that come from the land of pines trees & tamarack swamps... As I understand it the western border tends to be Highway #59 in MN and includes most of WI & MI. But there is a South border too, somewhere basically in the middle of the states. Joel and I are sometimes confused with Rabbit-Chokers too (MN scandinaivians that live on the plains, East of 59 = trees, west of 59 = plains)... And we also grew up spearing fish, "Norderns" specifically before we learned about angling.....

I dunno, it sure as heck aint PC, but it is part of the heritage and sounds good anyways.. Oh, and the movie "Fargo" was shot in Brainerd & Msp/Stp........

 

[CAhunter]

WT- You have been given some great tips and advice. The rifle will come clean it is just a matter of time and how quick. In all honesty I would get some Boretech Eliminator. Its an amzing product and will honestly help speed up the process. Also JB bore paste will help cut the crud real quick.

 

[boomer68]

Just curious regarding others using BTE. Do you hit the bore first with a nylon brush, then follow with patches? Or just use patches?
What is your routine?

 

[Antelope_Sniper]

These are the best bore brushes ever made:

http://www.brownells.com/.aspx/pid=9791 ... DO_BRUSHES

Here's a better pic:

 

[6mm Remington]

WT- Lots of good tips here on cleaning. One thing I have not seen mentioned is the Patch Hog by Bore Tech. It slips over the end of your muzzle and you screw an empty plastic drinking water bottle or empty 16-20 oz soda bottle onto it. Push your patches into this thing and then when done just unscrew and put the cap back on . Keep using it until it's full of patches. When full put the cap back on and throw the bottle full of dirty patches away. It helps keep the smell down to almost nothing and you don't have the brushes and patches spraying solvents everywhere, although I have been known to put a little Hoppes on my finger and rub it behind on my neck! Maybe that's why the wife avoids it? :mrgreen: :grin: I've seen others but they really look cheap. This thing works wonderfully, won't mar the barrel, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg. :lol:
Bore Tech Patch Hog
http://www.boretech.com/products/patchhog.shtml

 

[SJB358]

Man, I never thought of that David! I really need one of them. After a session with the 264, 270 and 7WSM's, the pile of patches on my bench is pretty high.

FYI- loaded up some of those 130's tonight. Thanks again. Scotty

 

[DrMike]

David,

I've looked at the patch hog, but so far I use a plastic 4-litre pail at the muzzle to catch the patches. There is quite a pile by the end of the day for me.