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anyone have experience using Chore Boy

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uncmrkhd

36 Cal.
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trying to clean up a 45 cal Italian half stock thats a bit pitted and heard using Chore Boy(copper pot scrubber) any help?
 
I use Chore Boy's on old/really thick cruddy stocks along with acetone to strip them, but if I read your question correctly, copper won't do anything but take off some surface rust from the lock or barrel. If those are pitted, Chore Boy's won't help at all. Pits in that metal has to be polished or sanded or filed out to get rid of them and as long as there is plenty of metal to do that.

Gus
 
For rust I use molasses and water and 3 days wait. For BAD pitting it sounds like a Hoyt project. I will be sending him two barrels soon. One a .36 CVA bobcat that shoots a great pattern (and a horrible group) and the other a CVA Frontier my older sis got for me at an auction in WI. Thats an ugly bore! Shot with Pyrodex and stuck in a closet it looks like. Gonna have it bored .54 or .58 which ever he can/will do.
 
The problem with CVA's is the breech configuration. You can always cut the barrel in front of the breech and have the barrel bored, rifled and threaded for a new breech plug. Or perhaps make a few pistol barrels.
 
At my lgs, they use Chore Boys stainless steel to clean up badly treated guns. And a lot of oil. The copper ones I've seen are merely copper coated; otherwise they'd cost a lot more.

But not pitting. That's sub-surface rust.
 
uncmrkhd said:
trying to clean up a 45 cal Italian half stock thats a bit pitted and heard using Chore Boy(copper pot scrubber) any help?

Chore Boy or Brillo copper will work fine for cleaning. As will some of the stainless steel similar products. Midway Arms sells it for modern guns. However, as others have said, they will not remove pits. OTOH, try cleaning well with whatever suits yer fancy. Then shoot. Sometimes even a pitted barrel will shoot well. They do require extra care and cleaning but worth a try before making further investments.
 
Have you tried actually shooting it? Many firearms with pitted barrels will actually shoot well.

Now, knowing your shooting BP the BP will leave residue in those pits, so a good cleaning after each use will be needed.....That is, if it shoots well 'nuff.
 
A copper pot scrubber is for removing lead fouling ...Not removing rust.

For rust I use 0000 steel wool.

I've also used acid(warning not for people who don't know what their doing) scotch brite pads and lapping compound.

It all depends on how bad it is....

Repeated shooting and cleaning also helps.
 
I place the barrel into a pvc piple with one end capped, that is large enough and long enough to hold the entire barrel, and then fill with Evaporust. Let it sit 48 hours. All the rust will be gone..., so will bluing or browning, but at least you're have a rust free barrel. You could plug the nipple hole and merely fill the interior of the barrel with the solution.

I then save the solution for the next barrel. Will work on lock parts too.

LD
 
I haven't tried it, but here's a lead removal recipe....


Lead Removal
Liquid Solution
For really stubborn lead removal try a 50/50 mix of 3% Hydrogen Peroxide (the common drug store variety) and white vinegar. Plug the bore, fill it up using a dropper or syringe and let it stand for 2 to 3 minutes. (Do not let it stand for too long.) You may get some foaming so protect the barrel's external finish as this solution is not kind to bluing. Drain and wipe out the black muck that used to be lead and then immediately clean well with bore cleaner.
One special note. The solution works by changing the lead to lead acetate, which is water soluble, so wear protective eye wear and latex gloves to prevent lead poisoning.
Thanks to Joe Sledge for this recipe.
 
Smokey Plainsman said:
I've heard the druggies use the Chore Boys for their pipes. The Man has pressured stores to quit selling them because of that. Sad! They really are excellent for removing lead safely.


Sorry Smokey. That sounds like urban legend to me. I'm going to Walmart later today. Will look to see if Chore Boy is still for sale. Betcha it is.
 
For exterior rust use the stainless scrubbers and "Eliminator" soap and water. The key is to keep the loose rust off the scrub pad. Loose rust scratches. Don't scrub hard, only a little pressure is needed. You can also use steel wool. I have found no advantage in fine grades vs coarser. Oils also works but I like soapy water better. Again the trick to not scratching the finish is to use a light touch and keep the pad clean.

Can not find Chorboy?, Amway Scrub Buds work the same as other stainless scrub pads. I see they are readily available on Amazon. When I was stabilizing antique guns in a gun shop we used Scrub buds and Eliminator. The owner of the shop had worked as a museum curator in the firearms section. He knew what he was doing. If you use reasonable technique you will not hurt any remaining Finnish using this technique.

Sanding and acids and other chemicals will remove rust and the remaining brown. I would not use them unless you are going to refinish. The best rust remover I have used is Evapo-rust. I have tried most of them. They will all remove the blue/brown. Unlike the others, Evapo-rust will not harm the base metal at all. It is not an acid and does not bother your hands.
 
I am not a big fan of using anything made of metal to clean rifling in a barrel unless it's a bore cleaning brush.

I've used Kroil to clean gunk out of old military surplus rifle barrels. On a black powder rifle, you would seal off the nipple, place the rifle muzzle up and fill the barrel to the muzzle with Kroil. After a day or two, pour out the Kroil and clean with hot soapy water and plenty of patches.

Once a barrel is pitted, you cannot un-pit it. One of my best shooting 8mm Mausers has a pitted barrel. You won't know how well it will shoot until you try.

I picked up an old CVA .45 caliber Kentucky rifle last week and the bore was really cruddy. I cleaned it after I got home, but still had some build up in the barrel. After two trips to the range, firing 70 shots of patched round ball loads and two more cleanings the barrel looks like a mirror.
 
An old way of removing rust was to rub the edge of a copper penny over it. That's an actual old time copper penny. Copper scrubbers ought to work just fine on bore rust. Getting rust out of pits might be the real problem. Google electronic bore cleaners. You should find info on do it yourself set ups that can be quite effective for very little money. I have the necessaries in a shopping bag. I just can't seem to get around to assembling them, and its dirt simple.
 

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