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advice, opinions on cleaning my rem 700 .308

thechristianbear2001

Private
Full Member
Minuteman
Jan 16, 2014
59
0
Canadian, TX
I have a rem 700 aac-sd that I use for shooting out to 1400yds so far. This is my long range build and is used for such. I have recently had a few people tell me to stop cleaning my barrel. I think I understand the reason why (removing copper fouling and the like) and they said cleaning your barrel after each range visit just makes you have to shoot many many many fouling shots depending on your barrel. So, other than the wipe down of the barrel and chassis to get dirt and grime off is there anything else this OCD person can do to keep accuracy up, improve the life of my barrel, and still clean a little. I usually use butch's bore shine and a few dry patches after….
 
I went from cleaning after every session, but no brush, to trying a brush and seeing my accuracy plummet, to just patching out with Patch-Out, to patching with Hoppes No.9 to ease up on copper removal, and now am patching with CLP. The idea now is to remove the carbon but leave the copper, until the copper begins to ruin accuracy, at which point it's time for a Patch-Out treatment again. No more brushes for me!

Good read. As many opinions as *****, and they're all right and all wrong...
Bore Brushing--How Much is Too Much?
 
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I think that a good way to do it is to run one wet and dry patch into the chamber and through the barrel after a hefty range session to get most of the black shit out. As far as the copper goes, if the rifle was shooting well during that session, chances are that it won't shoot any better if you give the barrel a serious cleaning. In other words, the accuracy can only stay the same or degrade by an over cleaning. If your accuracy starts to erode from one session to the next, then by all means give it a bit of a scrubbing.
 
I use one of those cotton mops like you use for shotgun bores only smaller soaked in #9 only when my accuracy starts to go to shit and even then I run it up and down the bore maybe 3 times and then take a dry one to swab out the #9 and that is it for the bore. Where you might want to do a bit more cleaning is at the throat. It gets pretty nasty right there and I use a little more effort in the chamber/throat area to get it clean and that makes a world of difference.

But then again, the life of all barrels comes to an end at some point and no amount of cleaning or not cleaning will improve a barrel that is about to be shot out.

If you are shooting 1400 yards with a .308 then you are loading nuclear and those loads will erode your throat faster than a goose shits grass.