The Importance of Rifle Cleaning

[pavman]

I have seen a few posts about no need to keep your rifle nice and clean "i dont bother with my Rimmy" this may change your view?

 

 

 

http://www.gunnersden.com/index.htm.rifle-bore-cleaning.html

[Lloyd90]

the average centerfire hunting rifle

He's talking about centerfires rifles. Not the same as rimfire. I doubt the tiny rimfire rounds would have as big an effect as a centerfire.

 

Yer you make a good point, im just saying this article is relating to centerfire rifles, where as you specifically referrred to rimfires.

 

Although it is good information, thanks for the post im sure it will help the centerfire shooters out there, I am still undecided whether or not to clean my rimfire when I get it lol!

[al4x]

yep may apply to centrefires, I know my HMR takes about 10 rounds to get back to accuracy then only drops off after 150 rounds or so

[pbickerd]

On this subject, I have been shooting a friend of mines Anchutz .22rf at the club recently. That thing is SO accurate, i am shooting far better than ever before. It's quite an old rifle, I would say well over 5 years and he uses it a lot. He is one of the clubs training officers and lets a lot of new shooters use it.

 

The other day I heard a guy asking him about his cleaning regimen and he said he had NEVER cleaned it. This may be a fluke but this rifle is awesome, the lack of cleaning doesnt seem to affect it at all.

[Browning]

Mmm, how strange......any article that reccomends cleaning from the muzzle end should (in my opinion)

be completely ignored.

[MC]

On this subject, I have been shooting a friend of mines Anchutz .22rf at the club recently. That thing is SO accurate, i am shooting far better than ever before. It's quite an old rifle, I would say well over 5 years and he uses it a lot. He is one of the clubs training officers and lets a lot of new shooters use it.

 

The other day I heard a guy asking him about his cleaning regimen and he said he had NEVER cleaned it. This may be a fluke but this rifle is awesome, the lack of cleaning doesnt seem to affect it at all.

 

 

I also have an Anschutz target rifle and as far as i know it has only been cleaned twice, and it is over 25 years old. The lead on a .22 bullet won't harm the barrel and you spend a long getting the barrel to shoot properly and then clean it and start all over again

[pavman]

On this subject, I have been shooting a friend of mines Anchutz .22rf at the club recently. That thing is SO accurate, i am shooting far better than ever before. It's quite an old rifle, I would say well over 5 years and he uses it a lot. He is one of the clubs training officers and lets a lot of new shooters use it.

 

The other day I heard a guy asking him about his cleaning regimen and he said he had NEVER cleaned it. This may be a fluke but this rifle is awesome, the lack of cleaning doesnt seem to affect it at all.

 

 

I also have an Anschutz target rifle and as far as i know it has only been cleaned twice, and it is over 25 years old. The lead on a .22 bullet won't harm the barrel and you spend a long getting the barrel to shoot properly and then clean it and start all over again

 

 

In that case one wonders why Anschutz make a cleaning kit Ref 4422/1

 

self cleaning Rifles, its the way forward

Edited September 11, 2008 by pavman

[Oly]

Without getting drawn into this too much...not sure if my match annie shoots the same clean or dirty - if there is a difference it's not notice'able when the targets are scored. I just can't live with a dirty rifle though...it's just...wrong! In the interest of respect for the beauty, or safety, give her a good rodding!

Edited September 11, 2008 by Oly

[wannabefisher]

In that case one wonders why Anschutz make a cleaning kit Ref 4422/1

 

self cleaning Rifles, its the way forward

 

There's a myth about a drug company that sold aspirin (or something similar) which managed to double its sales overnight by changing the packaging from saying "Take 1 pill" to "Take 2 pills"

 

The moral of the story is companies want to make money...

[pavman]

In that case one wonders why Anschutz make a cleaning kit Ref 4422/1

 

self cleaning Rifles, its the way forward

 

There's a myth about a drug company that sold aspirin (or something similar) which managed to double its sales overnight by changing the packaging from saying "Take 1 pill" to "Take 2 pills"

 

The moral of the story is companies want to make money...

 

so what your saying is you don’t need to clean your rifle and if you purchase said cleaning kit the only benefit is to the maker

 

call me old fashioned but I have yet to be persuaded that not cleaning of any Rifle is of benefit, if you do I will be happy to stand up and acknowledge the fact and learn from it,

[Dunkield]

We need to be clear here as this is getting murky.

 

Rimfires using lead (subs) can be cleaned if you like, hence the kit, but it has been found that not cleaning them has no detrimental affect on accuracy.

In fact the only time I cleaned mine it shot like a dog for about 10 rounds after then it was OK.

 

Centrefires should be cleaned, whether you do that after every shot or every 100 is up to you.

 

This article is just another persons opinion, it refers to copper not lead.

If you goggle rifle cleaning you will find dozens of them, and they will probably all contradict one another.

 

And "I don't bother cleaning my rimmy" only the first 10mm or so of the bore, as CZ's have a habit of not extracting unshot rounds after a while if you don't.

[Oly]

but it has been found that not cleaning them has no detrimental affect on accuracy.

 

Out of interest, have there been any formal tests on this theory? It would be a good one for the likes of Sporting Rifle to cover.

 

It does also seem to vary between makes & models according to views expressed on here.

[MC]

In that case one wonders why Anschutz make a cleaning kit Ref 4422/1

 

self cleaning Rifles, its the way forward

 

There's a myth about a drug company that sold aspirin (or something similar) which managed to double its sales overnight by changing the packaging from saying "Take 1 pill" to "Take 2 pills"

 

The moral of the story is companies want to make money...

 

so what your saying is you don’t need to clean your rifle and if you purchase said cleaning kit the only benefit is to the maker

 

call me old fashioned but I have yet to be persuaded that not cleaning of any Rifle is of benefit, if you do I will be happy to stand up and acknowledge the fact and learn from it,

 

 

Pav,

 

It is not a case of that at all,

 

I religously clean my full bore rifle, following the barrel makers letter to the law. My rimfire however plays havoc with the accuracy of it if you clean it so i leave well alone. This works for me and is my opinion.

 

The only way you will be persuaded is to put your rifle in a test clamp and fire groups at differing stages of dirtiness. I don't know what rifle you have but if you are using copper jacketed ammo then I would be cleaning after every use. If you have a .22 and are using lead bullets and you clean every time you use it then that is fine.

 

The article you posted the link to is incorrect, if the copper builds up to that extent after 10 rounds then after 20 rounds the bullet would not go down the barrel.

 

As I say if cleaning every time works for you then that is what you should do.

 

There are two people who I shoot with, both have shot for Essex and England and one does not clean the bore and the other scrubs his until it gleams. Neither one is any better than the other.

[wannabefisher]

In that case one wonders why Anschutz make a cleaning kit Ref 4422/1

 

self cleaning Rifles, its the way forward

 

There's a myth about a drug company that sold aspirin (or something similar) which managed to double its sales overnight by changing the packaging from saying "Take 1 pill" to "Take 2 pills"

 

The moral of the story is companies want to make money...

 

so what your saying is you don’t need to clean your rifle and if you purchase said cleaning kit the only benefit is to the maker

 

call me old fashioned but I have yet to be persuaded that not cleaning of any Rifle is of benefit, if you do I will be happy to stand up and acknowledge the fact and learn from it,

 

my point is that just because someone sells something doesn't automatically mean it is useful

[Lloyd90]

Pavman would you like to buy my special tiger rock ? Keeps away tigers in the areas of wales england scotland and ireland! Only £100

 

(just because im selling it doesnt mean its usefull or works although I do have the tiger rock, and Ive never seen one lurking around my house )

[Graham M]

-----------Once you have fired a round through the barrel it will begin filling the bore with copper and powder fouling, after 5 - 10 rounds through the average hunting rifle, accuracy will start to deteriorate.

Between 10 - 20 rounds enough copper and powder fouling has accumulated in the lands and grooves of the bore to change its true bore diameter. It is at this point where bullets are barely being gripped by the rifling and accuracy is a total failure.-----------

 

This is the biggest load of nonsense I have ever read and seems to have been written by someone with very little knowledge about rifles.

It would seem that whoever wrote this has been looking through Black Powder books and has applied the same logic to modern metallic cartridge rifles.

G.M.

Edited September 11, 2008 by Graham M

[dunganick]

 

My rimfire wont shoot for about 50 shots after a clean. It just loves to be dirty.

 

Unfortunately the .223 seems to enjoy being clean

[pavman]

Pavman would you like to buy my special tiger rock ? Keeps away tigers in the areas of wales england scotland and ireland! Only £100

 

(just because im selling it doesnt mean its usefull or works although I do have the tiger rock, and Ive never seen one lurking around my house )

 

 

Bigthug, how much is it??? it sounds fab

 

Gents the point is not the word for word content of the cut and paste, moreover I was seeking to stimulate some discussion around the topic of Rifle cleaning and gauge the extent of what others are doing, reading between the lines opinion seems to be clean your CF but RF are a little more forgiving and don’t seem to suffer from a drastic performance drop off if you don’t.

 

I do sometimes get frustrated at the microscopic analysis of some topics word content rather than the intended broader message,

Is it just me

 

 

 

edit the line that would have got be banned

Edited September 12, 2008 by pavman

[MC]

Pavman would you like to buy my special tiger rock ? Keeps away tigers in the areas of wales england scotland and ireland! Only £100

 

(just because im selling it doesnt mean its usefull or works although I do have the tiger rock, and Ive never seen one lurking around my house )

 

 

Bigthug, how much is it??? it sounds fab

 

Gents the point is not the word for word content of the cut and paste, moreover I was seeking to stimulate some discussion around the topic of Rifle cleaning and gauge the extent of what others are doing, reading between the lines opinion seems to be clean your CF but RF are a little more forgiving and don’t seem to suffer from a drastic performance drop off if you don’t.

 

I do sometimes get frustrated at the microscopic analysis of some topics word content rather than the intended broader message,

Is it just me

 

 

 

You started it!

 

 

The problem with this is you can only ever have one shot with a clean rifle. I clean mine because it is an expensive piece of kit with the barrel alone costing more than a lot of sporting rifles complete. The rimfire does not need it and it messes with the accuracy if I do.

 

With my target 7.62 the first shot always weems to go high and then after that it is consistent, I recently shot the intercounties comp at Bisley and that was about 80 shots over two days and I did not notice any difference shot to shot from saturday morning to sunday afternoon. It did however get a damn good clean when I got home.

 

Cheers

 

Martin

[Graham M]

With my target 7.62 the first shot always weems to go high and then after that it is consistent, I recently shot the intercounties comp at Bisley and that was about 80 shots over two days and I did not notice any difference shot to shot from saturday morning to sunday afternoon. It did however get a damn good clean when I got home.

 

Cheers

 

Martin

WHAT!!!!!!!

You mean the rifling didn’t fill up with copper and powder deposits.

G.M.

[pavman]

With my target 7.62 the first shot always weems to go high and then after that it is consistent, I recently shot the intercounties comp at Bisley and that was about 80 shots over two days and I did not notice any difference shot to shot from saturday morning to sunday afternoon. It did however get a damn good clean when I got home.

 

Cheers

 

Martin

WHAT!!!!!!!

You mean the rifling didn’t fill up with copper and powder deposits.

G.M.

 

 

, how lucky we are to have such a font of knowledge and what a pity theirs no humility to match

[Graham M]

OK I give up.

I’ve tried to fit in on this forum, but almost every time I post something I get a load of **** thrown back at me.

I can understand not wanting to read page after page of nonsense, but a couple of posts with a bit of humour……..Jeeze.

I’ll let you get back to reading about posts of ¼ inch groups at 200yds with a .22rf.

G.M.

[tulkyuk]

OK I give up.

I’ve tried to fit in on this forum, but almost every time I post something I get a load of **** thrown back at me.

I can understand not wanting to read page after page of nonsense, but a couple of posts with a bit of humour……..Jeeze.

I’ll let you get back to reading about posts of ¼ inch groups at 200yds with a .22rf.

G.M.

 

 

well said GM

[pavman]

OK I give up.

I’ve tried to fit in on this forum, but almost every time I post something I get a load of **** thrown back at me.

I can understand not wanting to read page after page of nonsense, but a couple of posts with a bit of humour……..Jeeze.

I’ll let you get back to reading about posts of ¼ inch groups at 200yds with a .22rf.

G.M.

 

 

well said GM

 

 

welcome to my greenhouse, bring your own stones!

Edited September 12, 2008 by pavman

[Dunkield]

That's all this forum needs - more sensitive little flowers