Cleaning methods

Smokey Plainsman · Feb 25, 2020

I pour some warm water tap down the bbl, slosh it about with thumb on muzzle, two or three times.

Remove lock, use moose milk (ballistic and water) and a cleaning brush and q tips and clean the lock. Then I add some pure ballistol to lube it once dry. I sparingly use the moose milk so it doesn’t really get soaked.

Remove nipple and soak in a cup of warm water.

Send breech scraper down barrel, followed by a few patches till it starts to run clean, usually 3-4. Next a couple q tips and a pipe cleaner to detail the nipple drum and seat.

Clean nipple with wipe cleaner. Lube.

Clean fouling around breech with a couple drops of moose milk (or water) on cleaning brush and wipe dry. Wipe barrel with *very* slightly damp cloth and then a dry cloth, then oil it.

Finish swabbing bbl with patches till it runs clean, another 3-4 patches. Lube thoroughly with ballistol the bore, nipple, etc. Reassemble.

No buckets, air compressors, hoses, poisons, etc. needed and I’ve never had so much as a lick of rust. Can be over and done with in 20 minutes. This same ritual can be done in the field. The barrel need not be removed from the stock. I might do that once or twice a year, all it needs.

Here’s a tip, DO NOT use boiling or super hot water. It promotes flash rust severely, and is not a substitute for patches or ensuring the flash channel is free of moisture anyway, not to mention the safety issues of scalding.

hanshi · Feb 26, 2020

Plain tap water is all I've ever used and it's cheap and cleans wonderfully. If it costs money or effort I avoid it and continue to clean with water.

FlinterNick · Mar 5, 2020

In my smoothbores and rifles I use scotch brite Brillo (steel wood with soap), and I attach it to a worm with hot water, then rinse and hit the bores with W40 and then grease. For the rifles I don’t use a steel worm, I use a wooden dowel with a slot cut into the end.

Carbon 6 · Mar 5, 2020

hanshi said:
If it costs money or effort I avoid it

You should make that your signature. Wish i had said it. :thumb:

beginner · Mar 13, 2020

I use patches soaked with ballistol solvent then dry patches the last patch is soaked with automatic transmission oil. Before shooting I run a couple dry patches and no rust even after long period of time

wiksmo · Mar 14, 2020

hanshi said:
Plain tap water is all I've ever used and it's cheap and cleans wonderfully.

The best.

cannonball1 · Apr 11, 2020

This is more of a breech cleaning than anything. The attached file shows a brass air gauge with the end removed and the threads filed off. I put a round toothpick in the nipple, stand the rifle barrel up, fill with soap and water or your own preference, and let sit for a little while. I then put the gun on a horizontal stand with the end of the barrel slightly higher than the breech with just enough cleaning solution left so it does not come out of the nipple hole nor the end of the barrel, when the nipple is removed. Use a towel so as to keep the wood dry. Run the compressor - 50 to 100 lbs, stick the adapted gauge into the end of the barrel, hook the quick-connect up to the compressor, and vol-la the cleanest breech you will ever see. Then finish cleaning the barrel. In putting a barrel camera down to the end, everything is bright and shiny.

LANEY REECE · Apr 11, 2020

Historian said:
Y'all want to hear something funny! Back in 1986 when I was 16, after a day of hunting fox squirrels, I cleaned my dad's Navy Arms 12 SXS with some of my mom's nice white towels from her bathroom. Needless to say they had Holy Black all over them. My dad was a Hellfire missle engineer on Redstone Arsenal working for Rockwell Int'l. He had all kinds of nice chemicals to play with. So I proceeded to clean her nice plush bathroom towels with Military Grade MEK! Damn my hands burned from wringing them out under the garden hose. Well I thought they were wrung out enough and put them in the dryer then I went back outside to the garage to admire my first time cleaning of my dads gun. Well about 10 minutes later my younger sister comes out of the house screaming, her eyes and nose running and her face discolored between her coughing she asked what I had put in the dryer. We lived in a 2 story house and when I went in the entire bottom reeked of MEK. I ran to the dryer and shut it off. Got the towels and nearly passed out by the time I got back outside. Needless to say the MEK stank permeated the dryer completely. So then I get the bright idea to use full strength Clorox to clean the dryer thinking that the Clorox would cover up the MEK smell. Wrong answer there. Luckily my dad had a heavy duty respirator and wrap around enclosed goggles again compliments of Rockwell Int'l which probably saved my ass from dying. My dad thought it was hilarious as he got home earlier than my mother. My mother on the other hand was not amused especially since my father thought it was funny. My mother made him and I go purchase another dryer that very night. The other one set out on the curb and every so often someone would come by and ask if they could have it. Sure my dad would say, however when they opened the dryer door they would just leave without saying a word.

That is the best story I belive I have ever heard in 63 years of living on this earth.

Art Caputo · Apr 12, 2020

Been using this solution for a few decades. Fastest and easiest method I have used to remove ALL residue from the barrel/breach. Harmless to the bore. For really heavy breach build up you can use a scraper jag to loosen the crud, but I usually find this unnecessary.

6 parts- 91% Rubbing Alchohol(drugstore grade)
6 parts- 3% Peroxide(drugstore grade)
4 parts- Murphy’s Oil Soap
I store in a brown, light protective, 16 Oz plastic bottle. Light will degrade peroxide to water.

Plug vent hole, and pour a few ounces down the bore. Plugging the bore with your thumb, invert(turn upside down) the rifle/barrel every 30 seconds for 3-5 minutes. Pour out/discard the solution and swap the bore with dry patches until nearly dry. Swab the bore with rubbing alcholhol, dry. Clean vent with a pipe cleaner. Lubricate. I use Ballistol or Mink Oil.

Give it a try!

RAEDWALD · Apr 12, 2020

Back in the percussion muzzle loader days the best British makers all recommended cold water. Just that. Hence the old term 'washing out' the barrel. They had assorted soaps and soluble oils but still recommended plain cold water. It really is that simple. I have even stopped using patches and clean with tow then wash and dry that and card it to use it again. There was a reason the older name for a ram rod was a 'scouring stick'.

ChiefBrown · Apr 13, 2020

At the range I use solvent wetted wads between shots. Once home, for wedge guns, I have a long narrow plastic planter box that has a wire mesh false bottom and fish aquarium pumps at each end. I put dish soapy water and the barrel in the this. I run a bronze brush and breach scraper before I get really busy. Soapy water with patches get it al rather quickly. For the small stuff I have sized Tupperware that the small bits soak in. For cap and ball revolvers, I treat them like the small bits of long guns. I soak them in solvent in Tupperware until I get home. Then soap and water with a rag at the kitchen table until clean. Then dry, oil and reassemble. For pinned long guns I use the Nipple/Touch hole adapters and a can of hot soapy water as already described by others.

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