Best pull-through to clean semi auto barrel

[bunnage]

All my life I have shot side by sides , now I have bought a semi auto to reduce recoil.

The question is , what is the best cleaning method as I don't want to keep taking the gun apart. If you use a rod cleaner all the gunk goes in the action , which is the best pull through to buy ?

Thanks for any advice.

[throdgrain]

fwiw I take the gun apart every time I shoot, so every 100 rounds or so. It's a gas operated gun, and therefore filthy after that.

[tandytommo]

I use a Boresnake all the rubbish comes out of the muzzle end. Then I push a lightly oiled lambs wool mop down from the muzzle end.

[p@cman]

fwiw I take the gun apart every time I shoot, so every 100 rounds or so. It's a gas operated gun, and therefore filthy after that.

 

Similar to throdgrain, I have gas operated gun so tend to take it apart after each use, remove the barrel and throughly clean the piston. I don't fully strip it down and remove the trigger, save for couple of times a year.

 

For barrel cleaning I use a rod and finish with a bore snake.

[motty]

Bore snakes will get rid of excess **** from the barrel, but they do a very poor job of cleaning any fouling from there - making them pretty useless.

[panoma1]

Bore snakes will get rid of excess **** from the barrel, but they do a very poor job of cleaning any fouling from there - making them pretty useless.

 

 

+1

[Breastman]

If its a gas semi you don't really have a choice, it needs to be taken apart and cleaned. As said, bore snakes only get the big chunks out, and while the barrel might look clean after a few pull throughs with some cleaning spray, just push a square of kitchen towel down the barrel with a rod or proper cleaning patches and you'll discover its still filthy.

 

I boresnake mine at the shoot once i'm finished to get the big bits out, then clean them properly once i get home/the next day

[Guest cookoff013]

i use my boresnake to finish up the cleaning job.

a jiffy cloth on the leading end and its done.

[CharlesP]

I use a cleaning rod and a bronze brush with Napier spray solvent oil. Then I mop that up with kitchen towel pushed down the bore a few times, the last twice after another solvent spray. Then I usually put a very slight coat of oil in with a mop. No more than a trace. You can tell from the above that I'm a traditionalist, but note I haven't even mentioned "Young's 303" oil because that would give away my age.

 

Mine's a Urika, so gas-operated. After Christmas it started to fail me - failing to eject, fail to cycle, fail to extract even. Naturally the place I bought it from told me I wasn't cleaning it enough. (At one stage maybe I was cleaning it too much, and then it was because I wasn't holding it properly). A change of cartridge away from the 24g Hulls I had been using brought about an instant transformation, and I began an experiment to see just how dirty it could get before malfunctioning. I'm up to nearly 2,000 cartridges without missing a beat, and she's getting grubby.

 

It's the gas ports that matter in mine, they say, so I keep a set of pipe cleaners handy. It's just possible with my Beretta to wiggle them through the gas ports without taking it all to pieces, but a stripped assembly is better to work on although tedious to achieve. I also have a small steel rod that's rounded on the end to broddle out the ports; it's a sort of caked carbon that fouls them.

 

The piston slide gets cleaned with the usual Napier spray and fine scotchbrite now and again, it has to be left dry. The forend cap gets dismantled now and again and brushed out; it has before now had a sneaky clean in my wife's ultrasonic jewellery cleaner, but that's dangerous. Wives don't like the misappropriation of their equipment for firearm fettling. They think their precious tank will suffer in the process. The trigger group and inside the receiver get a Napier spray followed by a wipe down to take most of the oil away - the trigger group gets left to drain on a few kitchen towels.

 

Apart from a general wipe of the other internals with a soft cloth with a tiny amount of oil that's pretty much it. As my supposedly wood stock is coated with some ghastly shiny plasticky stuff it really doesn't merit much attention, but overall sweaty hand marks get rubbed away with the ever so slightly oily cloth.

 

I know you asked about the barrel, but I thought the rest may be of slight interest.

[fenboy]

If you are not prepared to do a proper cleaning job a semi auto is not the gun for you

[davesw]

Bore snake great bits of kit

Strip it every 100 rounds or so give it a good clean !

If you are not prepared to do a proper cleaning job a semi auto is not the gun for you

i agree !

[bostonmick]

I use a bore snake but only to clear the muck after the bronze brush on a rod has been through.semi auto's need to be cleaned properly after every use to keep them reliable.

[Berettacocker]

There's no one lazier than me, I use a Sipe 32gm that does the job! Seriously it takes a minute to take the barrel off, I use a Paradox mop, can't beat it

[bisondan]

Bore snakes will get rid of excess **** from the barrel, but they do a very poor job of cleaning any fouling from there - making them pretty useless.

I use one on my over/under to get the initial rubbish out, but as you say they don't remove all fouling.

 

So after I've used the bore snake it's a good squirt of Tetra spray in each barrel which I leave to soak in for a few minutes, then pass a rod with a patch through then give it a good scrub with the phosphor bronze brush, then repeat until clean.

[bunnage]

Thank you all ,especially CharlesP !!!! ( he ought to write a book ).

I must not be lazy , there is no substitute for a strip down & thorough clean . ( of the gun barrel I mean ).