Can a factory barrel be really clean?

Z

zeke mccune

Member
Hi:

I was attempting to get a Remington 700 barrel clean when I asked a friend who has a few 700 rifles if he could get the barrels clean. He replied,"No." This guy is very anal retentive about his guns! He has tried many types and methods to get his barrels clean.

I have used Ed's Red, Hoppe's, JB Bore Paste, Bon Ami, and Blue Goo to no avail! I have used brushes, patches and mops. Even stainless steel rods do not make any difference! Lol This is a .270 Winchester that I bought used just for the action. After brushing, the patches come out very black. After using a copper solvent, the patches come out indicating that there still is a large amount of copper in he barrel. This gun was manufactured in 1964 so the bore may be rough from the factory.

I think that a clean factory barrel is perhaps an unattainable goal. Your thoughts.

Stay well,

Zeke
 
since most ammo is copper based bullets and powder is a carbon deposit..how about narrowing your work to just those two....

clean for carbon first.....get some fresh full size brushes....

then go for copper......if you use brushes they wear out quickly and you will need to change them.

if you go with stuff like sweets use a thick fibre brush or rcbs's nylon neck brush.

some bbls no longer shoot cause someone did not clean them, once clean they shoot again....
do not give up hope...

mike in co
 
If you keep at it....it will come clean eventually. Brush it with Butches bore shine & leave it soak. Patch it out & repeat the brushing and soaking.
 
I once cleaned the barrel on a Rem 788 .243 for a customer that had never ever been cleaned .

He was happy until it stopped shooting.

It took two weeks -I got annoyed.

Layers of carbon then copper ............

That was a long time ago but I still remember that barrel.
It taught me rather a lot about cleaning solutions -Ha!


Glenn
 
Rather than spend so much time and effort with cleaning rods, I have found that Wipe Out, a foam bore cleaner, is the way to go with factory barrels, unless I am cleaning at the range. It takes a little learning as to how to best get it in the barrel, and keep it off of stock finishes, but nothing too difficult.

I like to wash my hands (with warm water and soap) as soon as I am finished applying it in a bore. It has an acidic component that will not just wipe off your skin, and although it does not irritate my hands, I have found that I may wipe my eyes with the heel of my hand, and it will start to irritate the edges of my eyelids.

When I get home from shooting, I set the rifle in a cleaning cradle, with the muzzle over a waste basket, fill the bore, and patch it out after supper. Then, I usually put more in and leave it overnight. If a barrel is particularly dirty, I may repeat this. It is the easiest way to clean a dirty, rough barrel that I have found.
 
The real question is does it make any difference? Say a factory varmint rifle. If you clean it reasonably well and then shoot it. Is it any more accurate if you clean the hell out of it then shoot it?
 
I am working on my second bottle of Boretech. I feel that it is very effective. I use nylon brushes with it and pretty much follow the manufacturer's instruction. Quit using bronze brushes once I went to Boretech. It does attack the brass jags aggressively. Some barrels require etended soaks but will reach a point where no "blue" is evident on the patches. After Bortech, I followup with a couple of Hoppe's patches and then a couple dry patches. I'd rather soak with Boretech than Sweet's and prefer not to brush.
The firt three Boretech patches really drag the powder fouling out. Then brush with Boretech and a nylon brush. Pass svereal more Bortech patches through the barrel and start the soak. Powder fouling is usually gone after the first soak. Copper dissolution rate depends on the indiviual barrel and how rough the bore surface is.
 
That select match shilen is only barrel Ive got that will come clean. Guess its the bore finish. Remingtons Brownings come close. I clean on them till I get tired of it and quit. Had a Winchester , new mod. 70, it was the roughest.
 
In my experience a really clean factory barrel may not shoot as good as a "seasoned" factory barrel.

I really, really cleaned a great factory barreled shooter once and accuracy went to hell. After shooting it several times with normal cleaning the accuracy came back. Figure that one out.
 
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That was the point of my question earlier. Back in my high power days we cleaned between strings maybe, but not that aggressive. As long as you were shooting well you let the target tell you when you needed a super cleaning.
Benchrest is a little different and so is varmint hunting with factory barrels. Be one with the rifle and she well tell you what she wants.
 
ok u 2...but until he gets it clean once..he has no base line to work from....
he bought it used..he has no idea of its recent history.....
so clean it once and work from there...

mike in co
 
I had a Carl Gustav that I use to shoot Service Rifle comps with. I would deep clean it at the end of each year. The carbon fouling came out fairly easy with Hoppes and a decent brush. But to get the copper fouling out I would plug the muzzle of the barrel stand it muzzle down it in a plastic pot made from a 2 pint milk bottle and fill the bore with copper solvent, stuff a patch in the chamber and leave it stood in the corner of the garage for 2 days. I'd give it a shake once or twice over the soaking period. After 2 days if I was still getting signs of copper it would go back in soak for another 2 days. Never had to soak it more than twice. I always finished off with some Sweets and then it would get oiled and put away in the cabinet for the winter. If I had it now I'd use Wipe Out instead of Sweets.

I did have to put 2 or 3 fouling shots down it before it came back on at the start of the season. I
 
zeke mccune said:
Hi:

I was attempting to get a Remington 700 barrel clean when I asked a friend who has a few 700 rifles if he could get the barrels clean. He replied,"No." This guy is very anal retentive about his guns! He has tried many types and methods to get his barrels clean.

I have used Ed's Red, Hoppe's, JB Bore Paste, Bon Ami, and Blue Goo to no avail! I have used brushes, patches and mops. Even stainless steel rods do not make any difference! Lol This is a .270 Winchester that I bought used just for the action. After brushing, the patches come out very black. After using a copper solvent, the patches come out indicating that there still is a large amount of copper in he barrel. This gun was manufactured in 1964 so the bore may be rough from the factory.

I think that a clean factory barrel is perhaps an unattainable goal. Your thoughts.

Stay well,

Zeke
Click to expand...

Your bore must be pitted from rust. I have factory remington 700 barrels and they get clean very easily. I would suggest that you brush with JB, 25 strokes, then wet patch using short strokes for 10 patches. You should be down to bare metal.

Normally, I use a Montana Extreme plastic brush along with the Montana extreme bore solvent, then go to wet patching with the Montana Extreme Copper killer(which I thin is the best copper solvent on the market).

Note: The best quality bronze bristle brushes are only good for about 70-80 strokes, 100 on the long side. After 100 strokes, the brush is trash. Perhaps your brush has been worn out a long time ago.
 
Step #1. Hand lap the bore. Get is smooth.
Step #2. Clean the bore an polish it.
Step #3. Clean with bore paste and Koil.

I have cleaned up several old barrels on hunting rifles with this process. Once lapped and polished the cleaning get easy.
 
i suggest you read the instructions. jb bore pased is designed to be used on a TIGHT FITTING PATCH. a brush does not provide pressure, nor surface contact to allow jb bore paste to work properly.

mike in co

keithcandler said:
I would suggest that you brush with JB, 25 strokes.
Click to expand...
 
Greetings all.
Good post, I've seen the same issue with some old Remington 700 barrels. I am currently cleaning a 1965 ADL in 30-06. It's taking persistance but it'll get there. I like to use Hoppes and not get to agressive. I start with two wet patches then 10 strokes of a bronze brush, let it soak an hour, one wet patch to review the progress, then repeat. Eventually you'll see less and less copper showing up after the waiting period. This may take several days as other projects are taken care of. I agree with keithcandler on the brush wearing out, it can take a few brushes to get to the bottom of it all but it will happen. It took me a few times to reallize that some black on the last patch never quite stops showing up but the copper appearance gets so light you know you're done. I also agree with Del Martin and mike in co comments.
 
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Way back, I read in one of the Brownell books about how a guy used cutting oil to clean bad barrels (mainly rusted military ones, I recall).

I had a BSA Enfield in .375/2½ that had been 50 years or so on a wall in a South African hunting lodge that had resisted all efforts to clean - until I used the cutting oil. It seems that it needs to be one with sulfur in it, but since then, I've used the process to clean a number of stubborn barrels. Those that were coppered up shed the metal as a gold wash on the patches after they'd been soaked over night with the oil applied on bronze brushes.
 
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