How clean is clean enough?

[enfield303t]

I have never gone too crazy trying to clean a new gun however I do believe no matter how clean you think any gun is old or new run a patch with Hoppes No9 thru it and you will think you should start over again.

That stuff is so good but it makes cleaning very frustrating.

[emmagee1917]

emmagee, I have seen homemade versions of your set up "online". Apparently Otis stopped selling the foul out set? Anyway, would it shine up say a RC Mauser bore or a Mosin fresh from a crate guns that have been abused before we get our hands on 'em?

It will remove all lead ( lead out ) and all copper ( cop out ) it can get to. You have to remove the powder residue first so the chemicals can get to the fouling. If you have stack of layers like a dagwood sandwitch , you'll have to remove them one at a time so the chemicals can get to it . I like it because you are freed up to do other things and you are not doing 100s of rod passes up and down the bbl . You can get a bore "perfectly " clean with rod and patch , but an hour on the cleaner will still coat the rod with copper and make a beliver out of you.
Chris

[Brian Dick]

And then there's the trusty British "Christmas Tree" bore brushes. I've been amazed many times with the results from scrubbing fouled-rusted barrels with them!

[Patrick Chadwick]

but the bore was a disaster except for the last couple of inches where the rifling was sharp with just a little shine.

Very unusual. More common is a bore that is usable apart from the last couple of inches, which are rusted and bell-mouthed. You were lucky with that one!

[Patrick Chadwick]

I knew I had a better one!

Attachment 44824

Martin-Henry MkIV after removing the "yakolene". It stank when I bought it, but it was well-preserved beneath the fossilized gunge!

[WarPig1976]

I knew I had a better one!

Having the bore bead blasted and chrome lined is NOT cleaning Patrick...

[Patrick Chadwick]

Having the bore bead blasted and chrome lined is NOT cleaning Patrick...

I thoroughly agree! In this case, I cleaned it initially in the shop. I found it by chance, sitting next to one that looked better, with excellent markings. In fact, the markings were suspiciously good and unworn, and when I studied the markings under a watchmaker's eyeglass, everything was exactly even in width and depth - in a way that no original markings ever are. Be warned, the Khyber Pass specialists have adapted printed-circuit board etching techniques to etching copies of genuine markings onto fake actions! It would have fooled me in a photo - in an online auction, for instance.

I therefore took another look at the scruffy object sitting next to the Khyber Pass Special. It was weeping oil out of the wood, the bore was black, and when I cocked it and fired, there was a tired sort of "click". The whole rifle was gunged up solid and smelt rancid. In fact, it stank, but what I could see under the eyeglass looked genuine.
Being an eternal optimist who reckons he can fix most things, apart from worn-away rifling, I haggled with the dealer, and agreed the price that I would pay for the rifle as it was at that moment, on the condition that I would be allowed to sit quietly in a corner, clean the thing as far as I wished, and then decide. Fixing the price beforehand was important, as I did not want to spend my time on increasing the value of his stock!

So I sat in a corner of the shop and cleaned and cleaned - enough to see that the bore seemed usable underneath the muck. Bought it. took it home, and spent a happy weekend leaching out the yakolene from the wood, removing more from the bore, and dismantling the action, which was packed solid with the muck and had to be washed out in turpentine substitute. The blackness of the bore was a century of dust accumulated on the hardened yakolene. The underlying metal was as you have just seen - superb. And the action now goes bang instead of click.

The result was a beautiful MH, that was featured on the forum a couple of years ago..
But going by photos on an online auction, one would have ignored it as a wreck!

[Peter Laidler]

I found a virtually unidentifiable Vickers machine gun barrel at High Wood on the Somme while out with Roger Payne many years ago. What caught my eye was the fact that it was a lightweight early Mk1 type barrel. I took it back to work and rammed a cleaning rod down the bore and it went into some old grease. The bore cleaned up like BRAND NEW. I kid you not! The outside was a rusted out sack of junk but the chamber and bore were MINT.

I put it on display with our Vickers guns and would invite trainees/recruits to pass it round - and then look down the bore. I've seen SA80's with worse bores than that Vickers barrel

[browningautorifle]

Sometimes it surprises one how perfect an old pipe will come out. Some you look down are goners and then after a brush and oil...mint again!

[Mike 56]

When i get a new surplus rifle i clean the barrel with hot water then with solvent. I finish up using a new bore snake and turtle wax chrome polish. I put a teaspoon of polish in the chamber and pull the snake threw 10 times. A dark bore will clean up in 6-10 cycles.