Gunsmithing What are you guys using now days to clean and lube?

[mark5pt56]

I keep some Hoppes on the bench and it works good prior to leaving the range to pull through with an Otis cable with a patch of it to work on the bore, especially when warm. Plus it won't hurt anything finish wise, did that once with Boretech and from range to home, took some finish off an AI magazine. Use the Boretech at the bench otherwise.
Reference the Hoppes, I've ran a couple wet patches through a pistol bore, let it dwell 10-15 ins, hit it 10-12 passes with a bronze brush, wet patched it out with Hoppes, then ran a patch of oil through(Lucas or Clenzoil) and still got carbon out?

 

[Ape_Factory]

Getting ready to try some Krytox products, GPL105 for the oil and haven't decided on the Krytox version for grease yet. It's a super lube, really cool stuff and I've used it on a bunch of projects, just never a firearm so kinda curious as some of it is rated for very high heat levels, is non-toxic and generally does a lot of cool things. It's hugely expensive though. I normally use Lucas gun oil. It's cheap, works and comes in needle dropper bottles which are super effective and keep you from wasting too much product.

For cleaning, I use a lot of different products depending on what part, what it's made out of and what it's coated with. I use CLR on everything titanium. For the rest, Radcolube as a CLP, Carbon X for a general purpose non-toxic, non-oxidizing decarbon for parts (usually in an ultrasonic) and Boretech products for the barrel. I used to use M-Pro 7 before they went full Gordon Geko and marked up their products 10X over the original price. And that stuff is just something else cheap, rebottled with a fancy label that tends to make things slightly tacky to the touch. Carbon X is every bit as good, if not better and about 1/4 the price and no stickiness. M-Pro 7 is going for about $116 a gallon which is just fucking stupid. Think about what other fluids cost that much and then think about how many of them are a weak, non-oxidizing cleaners. Yeah those dudes can go bankrupt.

 

[Frank Green]

Reference the Hoppes, I've ran a couple wet patches through a pistol bore, let it dwell 10-15 ins, hit it 10-12 passes with a bronze brush, wet patched it out with Hoppes, then ran a patch of oil through(Lucas or Clenzoil) and still got carbon out?

You didn't let the Hoppe's sit long enough or repeat the process enough.

I at times call it, "the barrel is sweating". Some think because the metal appears smooth they think it's smooth. In reality there are really small/tiny pores in it still. That's the minor part.... what I think is the biggest thing is as the barrel wears especially in the throat area of the chamber you get the fire cracking/dry river bed look to it. Your patch as you push it down the bore goes over the surface and not necessarily down in the cracks/rough areas. So the solvent will pool/build up in the cracks and it keeps working and will loosen the carbon and it will work it's way to the surface.

The more rounds on the barrel.... the bigger those fire cracks will be. You can clean the barrel.... you run a patch down the bore and it comes out clean. Now leave the barrel sit for a few days or few weeks etc... and you hear someone say, "the bore was clean and when I ran a dry patch down it some small streaks of dirt appeared on the patch" again all you are seeing is the carbon working it's way to the surface after X amount of time.

I repeat the cleaning process with Hoppe's over several days. Leave the bore wet. Come back the next day and run a few more wet patches down the bore. I repeat that till no copper shows anymore as well as the carbon. Once I feel nothing else is showing up... then I put the rifle away. It's most probable you pull it out 3 months later and run a few dry patches down the bore and some small traces of dirt will show on the patch. Don't lose any sleep over it.

Read the last sentence from the USMC M40A1 manual on cleaning.... saying the same thing I'm basically saying and I didn't see this until just a few years ago.... I don't know about three days but it happens for a given time period. Again what caliber and how many rounds on it is the determining factor.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

 

[kthomas]

Getting ready to try some Krytox products, GPL105 for the oil and haven't decided on the Krytox version for grease yet. It's a super lube, really cool stuff and I've used it on a bunch of projects, just never a firearm so kinda curious as some of it is rated for very high heat levels, is non-toxic and generally does a lot of cool things. It's hugely expensive though. I normally use Lucas gun oil. It's cheap, works and comes in needle dropper bottles which are super effective and keep you from wasting too much product.

For cleaning, I use a lot of different products depending on what part, what it's made out of and what it's coated with. I use CLR on everything titanium. For the rest, Radcolube as a CLP, Carbon X for a general purpose non-toxic, non-oxidizing decarbon for parts (usually in an ultrasonic) and Boretech products for the barrel. I used to use M-Pro 7 before they went full Gordon Geko and marked up their products 10X over the original price. And that stuff is just something else cheap, rebottled with a fancy label that tends to make things slightly tacky to the touch. Carbon X is every bit as good, if not better and about 1/4 the price and no stickiness. M-Pro 7 is going for about $116 a gallon which is just fucking stupid. Think about what other fluids cost that much and then think about how many of them are a weak, non-oxidizing cleaners. Yeah those dudes can go bankrupt.

Wow, you aren't kidding about M-Pro 7 prices

I have a lot of it stocked up still, but when it's time to replenish I guess it's getting replaced with something else...

 

[Ape_Factory]

Wow, you aren't kidding about M-Pro 7 prices

I have a lot of it stocked up still, but when it's time to replenish I guess it's getting replaced with something else...

Not kidding. I think I bought a gallon for $39 back in 2019 or so. Midway has it for $116 here. Click on the drop down menu and select the gallon option even though it isn't available. At the time, I couldn't find it for less than that. I did do a search yesterday and found lt for $89 on Amazon which is still way too much for what it is. It's not even really that great other than being non-toxic and generally not smelling like a chemical factory.

 

[DeathBeforeDismount]

Frank do you have a theory about carbon/copper filling in any inclusions or for cracking and how the barrel will perform? I have burnt up a bunch of your barrels and have had ones that got minimal cleaning and ones that were scrubbed viciously. They all seemed to shoot about the same. Maybe in the game I shoot we can't see the differences ( if it's holding .1-.2 tenths that's good enough) but I would love to know your thoughts being a SME.

 

[db2000]

3 days?? I’ve had meat sweats last longer

 

[Herb Stoner]

I’ve been using a few KG products over the last couple of years so those are on the cleaning bench along with Wipe Out and usually a can of CLP.

So many great products out now that the better question is: What won’t you use? What have you used that you will no longer have on your bench?

I’ll start… Hoppes

 

[TheJeanyus]

So many great products out now that the better question is: What won’t you use? What have you used that you will no longer have on your bench?

Sweets or any other products with ammonia. They work fine as long as they're used properly, but there are too many options that do the job without that awful smell and the potential to cause damage if not used correctly.

 

[Genin]

^ this

 

[Frank Green]

Frank do you have a theory about carbon/copper filling in any inclusions or for cracking and how the barrel will perform? I have burnt up a bunch of your barrels and have had ones that got minimal cleaning and ones that were scrubbed viciously. They all seemed to shoot about the same. Maybe in the game I shoot we can't see the differences ( if it's holding .1-.2 tenths that's good enough) but I would love to know your thoughts being a SME.

Again some calibers will foul more than others... both in terms of carbon and copper.

The biggest thing in my opinion with the carbon is if you get a heavy carbon build up it can bump pressures and effect velocity. I've seen barrels so carbon fouled that you can't even see the lands/grooves in front of the throat.

Some copper in the bore is normal. As long as it's not building up like plating on tops of the lands... if that happens that's the accuracy killer.

Some guys will tell me.... I clean to bare metal. Every time I've had the opportunity to show them the inside of the barrel....99% of the time it's not cleaned to bare metal. The amount of time and work to get a barrel to bare metal is just unreal.

The picture here is from an accuracy test barrel that finally quite shooting at over 14k rounds. This barrel got cleaned after every 50 rounds most of the time. At times it went 150 rounds in between cleanings. This is in as received condition other than I/we had a wire EDM shop cut it in half for us. If you look close and up till about the 7" mark on the tape measure... all that black is carbon and it gets heavier towards the breech.

Hard to see in the pic but nearly the first inch of rifling is almost completely gone.

And this is what a brand new 30cal barrel and chamber looks like. Once that carbon/black color is in there... you never get it all out. What you can do though by cleaning is keep it all in check.

 

[Frank Green]

Sweets or any other products with ammonia. They work fine as long as they're used properly, but there are too many options that do the job without that awful smell and the potential to cause damage if not used correctly.

I agree on the smell of Sweet's.

I've never wrecked a barrel with Sweet's the way I clean and use it. I use it for my fast method of cleaning and follow up with 40x cleaner and after that gets all dried out a light coat of Hoppe's. Dry patch the bore in the morning before shooting the gun all day long again. Never had a problem.

Mixing solvents in a jar or in the bore.... that's a no no.

 

[kthomas]

I’ve been using a few KG products over the last couple of years so those are on the cleaning bench along with Wipe Out and usually a can of CLP.

So many great products out now that the better question is: What won’t you use? What have you used that you will no longer have on your bench?

I’ll start… Hoppes

KG-12 at $305/Gal

 

[Herb Stoner]

KG-12 at $305/Gal

Yikes - I didn't look at it that way. I've bought a couple of small bottles that were $12 or $15 or something. I like it though!