How many passes and/or patches?

R

Ricky Bobby

New member
I decided to give one of my rifles a thorough cleaning this afternoon. I did the normal wet patch with bore cleaner & then let it sit for probably a half hour. I then run a dry patch through with my jag tipped rod. I then run a bronze, caliber specific brush through it and then repeated the process of one wet patch followed by a dry patch. I kept repeating this process until I realized ... Holy Cow, how many patches does it take to do a normal barrel cleaning? I bet I ended up with a pile of 50-60 patches.

Now, I know that there are a lot of variables when it comes to something like this. Round count since last cleaning, type of bullet, type of powder, type of bore cleaner being used, and on and on and on.

My question is this:

How many passes and/or patches are you using in a normal cleaning session?

I would estimate that I had put anywhere from 200-300 rounds down the pipe since the last cleaning. I will always run the wet patch followed by the dry patch, with an occasional bore brush passing mixed in. I try to do this until I get a clean patch, but if I really want to be anal ... I can always find that little spec of residue or fouling that makes me want to run another patch or pass.

Do you just get to a point where enough is enough or am I possibly doing something wrong?

Anyway, I guess I just never paid to close attention to how many passes I've made in the past when doing a thorough barrel cleaning.

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You need to do a couple of things...Find a gun smith that has a bore scope and have him look at the barrel to see if there is really a serious build up in it...

I had one look at my CZ .204 and he found about eight inches of powder residue that was cooked to the barrel (I bought it used)...Took quite a bit of scrubbing to get it 'clean'...

Secondly, make a practice of wiping down your cleaning rod between passes, and/or changes of tips...You can get a transfer from the previous application of solvent/debris on the rod and then deposit it back in the barrel from the rod..
Especially if you are using a brass brush and copper solvent..It will drive you nuts trying to get it all out..
 
Kind of like asking, `how many licks to the center of a tootsie pop`...
I use strips of cut up t-shirt for applying bore cleaners, and patches for the jag...sooo, I could have maybe 40-50 total.
Half that many(or less) if I use the CR10.
 
i use KG products and i also use one caliber larger bore brush.i have never used more than about ten patches.i always run Kroil through at the end.the kg stuff really cleans and don't smell or hurt bronze brushes.i have checked with my electronic bore cleaner only to make sure the copper is gone.and i have had some rough barrels,
 
FWIW.
Just me but... why run a dry patch until I have run wet patches with cleaner UNTIL I am getting pretty clean patches then dry and oil or condition with your favorite product.
Also you might try a foam cleaner and let it soak for a while then run one patch and reapply until you have a light grey patch then brush and hit it once more and that usually does it for me. I will admit I probably clean too often so mine never go more than 20-50 rounds without cleaning but that may be a few months of shooting if during hunting season.
 
Thanks for the responses gentlemen!

I use either the Hoppes #9 cleaner or Pro Shot 2 into 1 cleaner & lube with brass jags or bronze brushes on the end of Pro Shot stainless 1-piece rods.

Venatic, I have never tried the foam scrubber/cleaners. I might give something like this a try, along with letting it maybe soak overnight. Also, I may just do what you're doing and try to clean them more often.

I wish I knew of someone in my area with a bore scope ... they'd have a new best buddy!
 
Originally Posted By: Ricky Bobby
Venatic, I have never tried the foam scrubber/cleaners. I might give something like this a try, along with letting it maybe soak overnight.

Wipe-Out foam, fill the bore and let it sit 4 hours. I did a pretty extensive test on Wipe-Out and plated copper pennies, and past 4 hours it wasn't doing anything.

About 5 of those 4-hour soaks and it had the penny de-coppered down to the zinc base.

Fill it, 4 hours, patch it out with a couple of patches and re-fill it. When the patches stop coming out blue/green, the copper's gone.

The money you save on patches and brushes will pay for the Wipe-Out fairly quickly, I suspect.

If you're cleaning a gas-operated gun, use something else, because that expanding foam will drive copper and crud into the gas block. On an AR you can flush it back out from the gas tube receiver end, but something like an M1/M14 or a Browning/Winchester, you don't have that option.

Do that once the bore is clean and you're good to go.

I'll never go back to Hoppes, brushes and jags after using this stuff, it's just too easy and gets the copper out faster. I quit brushing the bore on my D-Tech 3 years ago now, if this wasn't getting the bore clean I would have seen the results by now.

I rarely run 200 rounds between cleanings, but I've run 40-50 multiple times.

And no, I'm not a field rep for Wipe-Out.
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Edit:

Here's a link to the Wipe-Out tests I did. Since I'm hosting all those pics, might as well use the info.

Wipe-Out foam test
 
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What is really wierd is that you have layers of fouling to deal with, copper on top of powder on top of copper and so on and so forth.

The very best cleaning brush is only good for about 100 strokes maximum, then it is toast.

The tips of the brush do the scrubbing, if your brush is too large??????

Montana Extreme Bore solvent used in conjunction with their plastic brushes followed buy the Montana Extreme Copper killer will get your gun clean quick.

If you have a serious build up, then use JB bore cleaner on the plastic brush.
 
Purchase a chamber plug, fill the bore overnight with Kroil or a mild cleaner. Mix some ethyl acetate with kerosene and fill the bore; this'll strip carbon off the metal.
 
I'm surprised you didn't see a significant accuracy loss long before you got to 200 rounds.I usually clean with no more than 20 rounds fired.I'm surprised how much effort it takes to get my gun's clean even with that.
 
Quote:I'm surprised you didn't see a significant accuracy loss long before you got to 200 rounds....Just MHO, but I think that has a lot to do with the quality of the barrel..

I have a Douglas XX Match barrel on my .204 AR and it requires much less frequent cleaning due to accuracy degradation than some of my factory stock barrels...
 
Since Jack brought it up about five years ago I had a friend let me use his bore-scope for a few days so I got to see as Jack alluded to "what worked" and more importantly how quick.
I checked all my guns just to see what was actually going on. Most were quite clean but not all. I had two that had some hard carbon build-up in a couple of spots that took JB bore paste to remove as nothing else seem to work at least not very fast. I had not discovered foam at that time. These spots were due to rough spots in the bore but both guns were quite accurate. I think some of that also was related to the powder I was using. I had a Savage that looked like beavers actually gnawed the barrel out and it was heavy with copper and I tried a couple of cooper removers and they worked albeit very slowly so again JB took it out quick and I never let it get bad again by using foam and that gun shoots fantastic by the way. My shilen barreled AR's and my Oly barreled AR were slick as glass with nothing in them so my cleaning regimen for them or any AR for that matter is a good carbon remover on patches( I use Hoppe's Elite or MPro7 which is the same stuff) and then a couple of passes with a brush just to loosen any of the tougher carbon a couple more wet patches and I should be done except to run some Kroil/or CLP type rust preventive.
 
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Evil Lurker

Thanks for your info along with the link. I'd still love to scope this barrel before doing anything else, just to know what I've got and where I'm at.
 
I am sure you know this already but,a bronze brush will give you a dirty looking patch even if the barrel is clean.The solvent working on the brush you know.
 
Every serious rifle shooter owes it to themselves to buy a borescope. I really thought I knew something about cleaning rifle barrels until I bought mine. If there is just no way you can get one then invest in some JB Bore Cleaner as above mentioned by Venatic. I have tried them all and have to say two things...One: JB Bore Cleaner works and it works pretty quick. Two: the guys that swear by some type of solvent or other "bore juice" dont own a borescope.
 
Sure wish there was a MAGIC number of patches wet and dry, as I have spent over 3 hours trying to get the carbon out of a 17 HMR.
Go figure I just put close to 400 RDS thru it since it was cleaned last and there is no telling if I had it REALLY CLEAN from the last time I put close to 450 rounds thru it the last time. Could be it wasn't Completely clean form last years rat shooting trips.

Using Hoppees #9 bore solvent and a Nylon bristle brush.


DAB
 
Originally Posted By: Ricky BobbyI decided to give one of my rifles a thorough cleaning this afternoon. I did the normal wet patch with bore cleaner & then let it sit for probably a half hour. I then run a dry patch through with my jag tipped rod. I then run a bronze, caliber specific brush through it and then repeated the process of one wet patch followed by a dry patch. I kept repeating this process until I realized ... Holy Cow, how many patches does it take to do a normal barrel cleaning? I bet I ended up with a pile of 50-60 patches.
scared.gif


You can't get a barrel clean like that, cuz you are putting the dirty back in, and then cleaning it, then putting the dirty back in, then cleaning it, and on and on...

It is the brush that is making it dirty again.

I used to do the same thing and spent forever going through the same cycle - and easily would use 30 to 50 patches.

I always thought the black patches were carbon that the brush had loosened up again, so I continued until I reached the point of, "Well, that good enough!", cuz it NEVER got clean - at least in my mind!

My cleaning procedure was to soak the barrel in a copper remover, using a chamber plug (midway has them) for an hour or so, then scrub with a brush, and then patch , then brush, then patch, then brush, then... yadda yadda yadda...

I thought the brushing wa loosening up more caarbon, so I had to keep going.

Then, one day I was scrubbing the barrel, and patchin' it until the patches came out white, and then running the brush through "to make sure", which loosened up more carbon (so I thought)... and I quit for the night and was gonna come back and continue in the morning.

In the morning, all of the old patches were on the table and they were GREEN, not black. That didn't make sense.

So I thought about what I was doing, and figured that it was the brush that was re-depositing the brass on the bore, like a piece of chalk marks a blackboard.

So I switched methods and I soaked the bore, and then brushed it the normal amount, then I put the brush away... and I patched it until the patches came out clean... and quit!

I took a rifle cleaned this way to my local 'smith who has a Hawkeye, and asked him to look at it, and he said it was squeaky clean.

So, it was the brush on the repeated runs that kept re-depositing the brass on the bore - and why I couldn't get it clean.

It is also where the wives tale comes from about barrel fouling being like a layer cake - people think if they patch the barrel and then brush it and it comes out dirty, they must have loosened another layer of carbon - I mean, that's what I thought. But it's not carbon - it's brass that they just re-deposited.

To prove it to myself (and a doubting friend) last year, I got a new Kreiger barrel for a 20 Tac rifle. It had NEVER seen a single round through it - it was straight from the rifling machine.

I cleaned it with a patch and bore cleaner and the first patch came out chalk white.

Then I brushed it, and ran another patch with solvent - the patch came out black - the next day, that same patch was green.

So that is where the dirty patches come from.

So now, after letting the barrel soak for a while, I brush once. Then it is only patches until they come out white - then dry it, and quit!


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