UPDATE

Bore electrolysis works wonders!

I would have posted during the project but I was on a 72hr lock.  

Between 6 bore electro cleanings (20-30 minutes each), about 10 foaming bore cleaner overnighters, a bunch of scrubbing, and todays 20rd hot lunch and CLP - she looks pretty good.  (Had it so hot the CLP was boiling out of the muzzle - man did the old wood sweat!)



This was my original attempt - with a stainless steel cable -





It was maddening to keep it from touching the bore - so I ended up going with a threaded steel rod about the width of a .22 - I drilled a hole in a rubber stopper (tapered) that I grabbed at Lowes - I jammed that into the chamber and pushed the rod down the bore into it - then I cut off a small part of the foaming bore cleaner rubber straw to use as a buffer on the muzzle end.  I made my mix - 1/4 ammonia, 1/4 white vinegar, 1/2 water and poured it down into the bore (after attaching a funnel of course - use a lot of tape, the ammonia makes everything smell like cat piss ).

I installed the rubber straw washer and then hooked up my power supply.  Ground to rod, hot to receiver (pretty sure it doesn't matter which is which.)

The power supply was made with an old Blackberry charger that I got at a salvage store (Marden's) for $4.00.  I just lopped the ends off and installed alligator clips.  I had a little issue with it - it seemed to cut out every once in a while - maybe shorting, I dunno.  I would unplug it and plug it back in and the microbubbles would start rolling again.  


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Original Post

Not sure if I can clean this thing up or not.  The Seller did not tell me about the barrel being almost rusted shut.  I can only assume he didn't check it out when he removed it from his safe - must have shot it and put it away without cleaning it for some time.  

Edit He said it spent some time in an evidence locker after being stolen - so this might explain it.

I opened the box, pulled out the rifle, held it up to my kitchen light and just about threw up.  It looked like a super dark 22 cal bore.  Tiny and barely letting light through.  

If I would have thought, I would have tried to take pics of it before cleaning, but I panicked and ran to the shop like I was heading to the E.R.    








What kinds of solvents do you guys recommend - I tried 3 bouts of foaming bore cleaner so far - and I keep getting this brown rust mess.

These pics of the bore are after about an hour (3 sets of 20 minutes and cleaning with foaming bore cleaner and CLP)





I couldn't even get CLP to travel down the bore for the first run of the brush - it was just running right back out of the muzzle - rusty dust was coming out and going everywhere with each stroke of the cleaning rod.

I'm a Mosin guy and use hot soapy water after I shoot - but I've never been confronted with an abused baby like this one.

Do I have any hope?  Any tricks you guys have used to clean up rust (or attempted to clean up rust) are greatly appreciated.

User names kept silent for a reason - I realize you guys can find the thread easily, but I'm not posting to bring shame - I would just like to do my best cleaning it up.  So please no call outs or hot links to the EE thread.

How was the bore described in the ad? Can you get a refund? I would be pretty pissed off if this wasn't mentioned.

You could try Patch Out and let it sit overnight. It might take a few applications to get it to clean up. However, judging by the photos, it doesn't look very promising.

No mention in ad - but I don't want to turn this into a feedback forum thread.

I will keep repeating my process and see, but there's a lot of damage that isn't going away - that's for sure.

I helped a guy clean an old rifle that had been fired with corrosive ammo and not cleaned.  It was crusty and I went at it with liquid wrench and a bore brush.   I ended up finding a pit on the breach where in just one tiny spot, it was rusted clean through.  Inspect the outside of the barrel carefully after cleaning the bore.

That appears to be pitted VERY badly. Won't know for sure until it's clean though...

good god.. i thought my bore was bad from classic..







Until it turned out to be old dried up cosmoline. I have had good luck with JB bore compound and hit it when the rifling is hot if at all possible

After compound on a brush





Yours looks like someone went out shot it with milsurp and let it sit for a year and a half.

Drill motor, cleaning rod, steel wool. Make it hum. Plug barrel, fill with penetrating oil, let sit. Repeat.

And, if it wasn't screwed up before, this will surely do the job!

For sure!

Dont do that OP!

Keep at it with the foaming bore cleaner. When it gets to the point that you aren't afraid of a bore obstruction, take it out and shoot it. Clean it again while it's still hot.

Mine was so corroded the first case froze in the chamber.  After pounding the bolt open, I went to work with all the usual suspects.   Hoppe's (powder AND copper) solvents, gun oil, penetrating oil, penetrating oil on a bronze brush in a drill, polishing compound on a shotgun mop in a drill all failed to clear the chamber up.  I got some super aggressive copper solvent (Can't remember what it was and i used it all so i can't check the container)  I got ti broken loose some with some wet/dry sandpaper wrapped around a bronze brush (45 ACP) and oiled the devil out of it.  That muddy looking crap that you have kept coming out of mine for almost the whole time.  Never got the foamy copper solvent to stop turning blue, but it shoots with no shrapnel.

After the exercise I found a thread on a mosin enthusiast site on an electrical cleaning technique using some solution, rubber washers, and a steel rod in the liquid to electrolize the crud off.  I bought the parts and never did the job.

Also, that is a fake PU sniper. I would ask for a refund if I were you, that is neglect.

Seriously bring it by my house and let me take a look. I have this week off.

That's enough to make the baby Jebus cry!

Yeah, I knew it was a clone from the start.  Got it as a shooter...    - so I could leave my real one in my closet.

Having a barrel this bad kind of defeats the purpose.

Hey "Dirty Kenny!"

I've got the next two days off as well - I'm going to do my best - if I can't fix it, you sure can.    I saw what you did with my George of the Jungle carbine.  

I have sort of been off since Oct 1st...  well, not getting paid anyway...  I still have to report to work for a f/u amount of hours and put up with all kinds of crap, but I continue to be on "Essential non-paid status."  Yay Shutdown!  

If it is that bad then you might want to try bore electrolysis. It is messy and a bit of a pain to set up but it will do a lot better job then a bore brush and penetrating oil. Or a foaming bore cleaner would be a good option.

That's actually pretty cool.  This will happen on my days off.

You're being a better Sport about this than I would be, if I were in your shoes.  That rifle would've gone back to its neglectful owner, and he would've refunded all of my money.  

I guess it always pays to find out the condition of a rifle's bore prior to purchase, especially a mil-surp which used corrosive ammo.

I am curious how your bore electrolysis project goes though, so please keep us updated.

Return it. You are in the driver's seat in that regard. Heck it even looks like the scope has rust on it.

Even if you get the bore "clean" it will never shoot the way a decent bore would and be a bitch to keep clean from here on out what with the pitting.

I've bought mil-surps with light pitting/dark bores before and they shot fine but I would have run away from the one you got.

It probably doesn't matter with this particular rifle, but is there any reason you're cleaning from the muzzle instead of the breech?

I've de-rusted some pretty nasty blackpowder bores by plugging them, filling the bore with Evapo-Rust, and letting it sit overnight, then brushing and repeating as needed. Can't do much about the pits, but it does kill the rust. Unlike Naval Jelly, it won't corrode the steel.

Don't give up on the foaming bore cleaner yet: some milsurps of my acquaintance have required an entire can, a couple of bore brushes and 3 weeks or more. Fill bore, let sit overnight, repeat, brush out every 3rd day.
Eventually they all come clean, and usually shoot better than you'd think, especially if you touch up the crown.

shoot it clean.... then shoot for groups

I had an Egyptian Hakim that my brother took  out shooting when I was away in the Army Came home to shoot it and it wouldn't chamber a round and all types of crude came out of the chamber and barrel when removing the live round I knew what he did even though he didn't admit to it I had some GI rifle bore cleaner and soaked and scrubbed the chamber and barrel. Shot the Hakim with 10 rds to heat the barrel up, and hit it again with the bore cleaner. Repeated this process. I just keep the barrel cleaned and lubed and Keep my brother the hell away from my milsurp rifles and corrosive ammo

Brake cleaner + bore brush + hot water = my method.
 






























 

I'm just in scrubbing mode on this one man.  All my other stuff I clean chamber to muzzle.  

I'm going to keep up with the foaming bore cleaner like you said.  I'm in no hurry.  

Seller has logged in, but has must have me on disregard.    - but that is for a different forum.  

I'll probably chalk it up as lesson learned - nothing purchased without picture of bore from now on.  

Unless it's a good deal.  I would buy a Mosin with a crappy bore.  I probably have already.  I think it's good and clean because I cleaned it but I'm sure none of them are perfect.

 

Ah, your brother is nicer than me.  I sent mine off w/ my new to me Jap rifle to shoot & some old 6.5 Norma.  Only it was a 7.7 rifle.  He tells me it went "Bloop!", the bullet keyholed & the case split.

OP, I picked up a .22" LR FIE single action once that had visible lead chunks in the bore.  Plugged the bbl w/ an eraser, & let Hoppes #9 sit in it overnight.  It came out decently.

OP - Kroil, JB Bore Paste, and a box of .30 cal brass brushes are your friends here.  I might even try one of the stainless brushes, its not like you are going to make it worse.

With that said, I'm with 1srelluc.  Send it back.  The whole point of a fake sniper is to have a fun shooter, and from the looks of that bore, you are not going to have much fun.  Getting it to shoot will likely be an exercise in frustration.

You guys know the stuff I have done to get these old girls to shoot, and even I think that bore is toast.  

If you keep it, you might just want to look into a replacement barrel.

Matt

I'd just transfer the sniper parts over to another 91/30...  Or is it not that simple?

I think it is, but I'm no expert on snipers or most other things.  Mosin bbls are cheap, I bought two actions w/ carbine bbls for $15 each @ Tulsa a couple years back, sold 'em both on for the same in Ft Worth before I left.  I'm down to only 4 Mosins from 7 : )

You can always use the action as a donor for a machinegun bbl build.

Moving the sniper parts means drilling and tapping another action, and the 6x0.75mm tap that you need is a pain to get.

Rebarreling saves the action.  91/30 barrels can be had pretty cheap.

Matt

Moving fake sniper parts to another rifle? Rebarreling a fake PU sniper? Madness! How about shooting the thing and see how it does? Or better yet, buy a real PU sniper. They are only 600 bucks right now for the real deal.

As long as it shoots within a 6" circle it'll kill anything that would ever require to bekilled.

Fair enough...  that makes complete sense.  How hard is it to change a Mosin barrel?  Are they threaded like a Mauser or pinned in like some SKS barrels?  I've had Mausers completely apart, but never took the barrel off a Mosin before...

Not going to re-barrel this.  I'm working on re-barreling a M91 Fin. - that is worth it.

A fake P.U. sniper I want to shoot instead of taking my real one out every time - probably just going to try to make the best of the barrel it has.  Hence... how can I clean it up?  

Thanks for all the great ideas though.

Also - some Mosins take 500+ ft/lbs of torque to remove a barrel - it's a job, that's for sure..  

I'd clean the barrel up as best as I can and see if it'll "shoot clean".

I've had pretty good luck with that, in the past.

In my limited experience in CONSIDERING rebarelling milsurps rifles, barrels are more expensive than guns.

Bump for the update in the OP.

Your workbench looks worse than mine.

Nice job OP!

You should probably slug your bore to find out what size bullet you need.  0.310", 0.312", or bigger...

Why were you on a 72 hour lock?  

Matt

That is another story...







I have about 10 projects going at the same time...  I really need to sort the mess out...  but believe it or not, it's an organized mess.  

Why not place the flag in the flag box and that takes care of one project?

I hear you.  It's an old WWI 48 Star Burial flag - it's been folded all nice - just hasn't gone any further.  It's got huge metal rings on it - makes it quite bulky.  I was going to hang it - but I don't have any wall space big enough.

WOW, that looks fantastic!  So, if you kept on shooting it versus doing the electrolysis process, would the outcome have been different?  Would shooting it in the condition that it was have made things worse?

That bore looks amazing by comparison. I second slugging the bore, Link, a good bullet to bore match up will make a big difference in accuracy. Or given your lack of time just take it out and shoot it, and if it groups bad then slug it.

If I would have shot it the way it came in - (I couldn't fit a .30 cleaning rod down the bore...  I had to start with a .22 brush - should have seen all of the rusty dust go flying when I was honing her down.)

I think it would have gone something like this...



Remember: My original pics were after about an hour of cleaning.

So yeah, I think the electrolysis helped - I just kept doing it until the rod wasn't gathering rust anymore.  

In hindsight - I should have taken a pic of the bore after the electro treatments - before shooting it.  There was quite a difference.

No kidding.

Well if you are nothing else you are persistent.

Send the seller a bill for what a Smith would have charged you to do the same work.

Wow, the seller is a rat bastard if he didn't disclose the bore condition when it was that far gone.    A little frosty or a couple SMALL pits I can forgive see to forgive.  A sewer pipe is unforgivable.  


Really you bought a stock and bits, a bolt, and the sniper mount.   The barreled action is pretty much junk even though you brought it up to only "inferior".  Good on you for your efforts.  


Seriously I'd want to know who the dick bag seller is so I never have to deal with him.     Do the board a favor!

THIS

IMO there is no excuse to mistreat a rifle this way and not disclose it to the seller. I hate to know how many hours it took for you to get it looking like it does. That must be factored.