AR Sponsor
Posted: 4/18/2006 11:26:58 AM EDT
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I have been shooting AR15's & M16's since 1990. I spent 6 years in the U.S. Army and became anal about cleaning my weapons out of necessity. I can honestly say that no matter how hard I have tried (and I have spent hours) I have never gotten a barrel clean to the point where if I ran a clean brush down the barrel a few times and followed it with a patch, it would come out clean. I get to the point where a dry patch comes out clean but if I put some solvent or clip on a patch and run it down the bore, followed by a brush and then more patches, I always get more black stuff. I do not feel that it is necessary to get the bore any cleaner than I do but it's always kind of bugged me that I couldn't get one absolutely clean. Anyone else agree with me or has anyone actually gotten one as clean as it was before it ever saw a round down the pipe? Just curious. |
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Steel can come off on your patch. It would look black/grey. Carbon hides in the little corner where the lands come up off the bottom of the grooves. QUESTION - Why do you clean a barrel? ANSWER - To prevent accuracy-robbing corrosion and maintain accuracy. What matters is that your bore not corrode and that it is accurate. Even that first cold, clean bore shot must go to your point of aim. What else matters? What difference does it make how clean it is if it gets totally dirty again with your very first shot? |
I'm EXACTLY the same as you in the way I clean! Try Slip 2000's 725 gun cleaner followed by Butches Bore shine exactly the same way you clean now. That will get the bore as clean as you can get it. That patches will come out light gray after you hit it with the brush. When the patche comes out light gray stop cleaning. It is impossible to get a 100% white patch after you hit it with a brush. The Slip 2000 products are the very best I have ever seen. The Military is look to pick Slip 2000 up for perminetn use. Their website goes into detail about this. www.slip2000.com |
| Your patch will never come out clean. By using a bronze brush, microscopic particles of it wear off and are picked up by the patch, looking like carbon. Use a good solvent, soak the bore and patch it clean. Brush sparingly, not because it wears the barrel, but because you'll drive yourself nuts using the method you're using. |
Spray the 725 right into the barrel and let it sit for 5 minutes then hit it witha brush. Tons of black crud will come out. After the 1st 5 minute soak you no longer have to wate, just rewet the bore liberaly and scrub with a bronze brush and dry patch. Repeat till it comes out light gray(usually 5 times). Then nutrilize the 725 with 91% isopropal alcohol and dry. Then use Butches Bore Shine to remove the copper as 725 does not remove copper. Iso 1 more time and oil the bore back up. |
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My thoughts where the brush and solvent causing some type of oxidation, resulting in the gray crap your getting on your patch. I can run a new brush down a wet bore and get the same type of crud your talking about. I like to eyeball the barrel with a flashlight, be sure to get all the specs out. |
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What we need is a fairly dirty bore: like an AR-15 barrel that has shot about 500 rd of ammo. Cut away part of the barrel so its like 3/4 closed (from the side). Use brushes and patches and start cleaning them like you normally do. Examine closely how clean is "clean", and how much of the "black stuff" is really just the barrel steel or the brush material. That should help disprove/prove any myths. |
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On a chromed bore Im not sure the black would be anything but powder fouling.That is unless the chrome is damaged...and then it does not matter either way. Personally I clean until I get just a hint of gray on the patch.Thats clean enough. If I intend on getting the bore spotless I decopper the bore.The layers of copper will hide and hold powder fouling.As a result will continue to foul a patch. I do not think this is much of an issue with the chromed AR barrels.Only ones I concentrate on is my non-chromed 7.62 NATO,7mm Rem.mag. and bores that see corrosive ammo. Otherwise whats left CLP will work on pulling out while in storage. One other thing folks miss,is the fact that the bore brushes need to be cleaned as well.If the bore brush is filthy it will leave residue in the bore every time its passed through. HTH |
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I understand the desire to want a shiny clean bore. I used to be that way with all of my guns. I got to a point where I realized I could be doing more harm than good. BTW, I agree with those that have said you'll always get a somewhat dirty patch after brushing with a bronze brush. Bronze is softer than steel. That's why brushes wear out after a while. That "dirt" on the patch is microscopic residue of the brush normally wearing away. Use a good non-abrasive copper cleaner that works by chemical action. These usually contain ammonia and are easily identified by odor. The patches will get a blue-green color from the chemical reaction with copper. When those patches come out with less of that color, you know you're down to the last of the copper. Leave it go at that and you'll be fine. K |
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I find that most of the crap is near the throat of the bore, not at the muzzle end, but even then its not much dirt at all. Using a white q-tip and a light, I can see how shiny the chromed surface is and how "clean" it is. I've tried several cleaning solutions including M-Pro 7, and they all work well. I stick with CLP and have been trying M-Pro 7 because of its non-toxic qualities. My Glock gets scrubbed with hot water and simple green or Slip 2000 Carbon Killer, nothing sticks to the bore. |
I just recently bought two lightly used AR barrels. Both were claimed by the seller to have seen less than 500 rounds. When I get used barrels, I like to clean them absolutely before I start shooting them. I get less picky once the fouling is mine .With these barrels, I have been cleaning them over a couple of weeks. My procedure is usually to soak a bronze brush in solvent (usually M-Pro 7, but also Blue Wonder when I feel like some variety), scrub back and forth 10 times or so, let sit 5-10 minutes, then 2 dry patches to clean it out. Repeat. In a night, I probably keep this up for 2-3 hours. With the A1 barrel, I attacked it three nights before the patches stopped coming out grey. At this point I stopped using the brush because the way to tell that MP7 is working is it will turn blue if it is attacking copper, and the brush itself is mostly copper, so it screws up your ability to judge. I applied the solvent with a cotton mop for another hour and finally the patches were coming out almost as clean as they went in. This was last night. This morning, I put a single soaking patch of Break-Free into the bore and let it sit for 10 minutes. When I cleaned it with a dry patch, it showed no discolouration at all and I declared it clean. The M4 barrel has been through two nights and is just down to the stage where the brush is affecting the colour of the solvent. One more night and it should be good to go. It is a LOT of work to get a bore truly clean. That is why I do it so rarely. |
I think this thread is about rifles, not pistols. Yep, that's what it is. |
Why don't you use some JB Bore Paste to clean out the crud from a barrel instead of all that tedium? |
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