Debunking Biased and Uninformed Advice on What and How to Maintain

Over the years I have heard, witnessed and read many opinions, demonstrations and guides on the topic of rifle cleaning and firearm maintenance overall. There are commonalities and apparently an even greater number of biased if not false recommendations on what to do and what not to do. Often, egos get the best of people’s expertise usually limiting oneself only to you know what you know.

I do recognize the generational gap on the subject of gun care. Older gunsmiths or end users still often rely on traditional products, many of which are either extinct or altered to no longer function let alone resemble as they did in their original form. This is a reality concerning changing chemical regulations, not to mention technological developments.

Then, there is confusion with terminology. When you want to describe a stronger cleaning products, there are several names that are interchangeable whether or not they perform on the same level, including:

Gun Solvent

Bore Solvent

Powder Solvent

Carbon Solvent

Gun Cleaner

Bore Cleaner

Carbon Cleaner

Take all of that and add other names you may trip over and try to ignore brand specific names to understand what this is, in general.

Next, try to weave through the many fallacies and myths that can sway your opinion regarding brands of chemicals, accessories and practices, such as:

• Don’t use a looped patch holder because you will contaminate the bore by pushing residue back and forth. That comment assumes you are using a gun cleaning rod the wrong way. Sorry. Wrong. The correct way to use these tools is to run the patch holder the same way you would use a bronze brush, by running it down the barrel (ideally guided with a bore guide) just once, followed by removing the accessory at the muzzle and re-entering the breech and exiting again through the muzzle. Repeat 8-12 times or as needed. Tedious but ideal. That way you are keeping powder residue moving outward.
• A gun cleaning rod will damage the barrel. Only true if you are careless.
  • First off, the chances of two polished metal surfaces sliding against each other are slim to none.
  • Bronze brushes, if not nylon ones, are used because it is a softer metal and should not be able to damage steel.
  • A coated cleaning rod should provide added assurance.
  • When you experience resistance when pushing a rod down a rifle bore, the rod may bow out and make contact with the bore. This is one reason why using a bore guide is used. Of course, you want to use these products with care. If you use brute force, you are causing your own problems and you will warp the rod.
  • Be more concerned with a bore cleaning rope because if not cleaned regularly, will consistently re-contaminate the bore.
  • The brush attachment is great, but you have other options will specific functions, like the cotton mop, the jag and then back to the patch holder. If you have resistance in the bore, try trimming down the size of the patches you are using.
• Don’t use a particular brand of cleaner or lube on preference alone, especially those sometimes justified by a negative comment on another choice. Almost always, these comments are once again based on personal opinion, a bias on behalf of another brand, or worse yet, having an expert intentionally or unintentionally not following the directions, assuming that they even used the product they slandered. In other words, don’t blindly trust one opinion. You should trust your own experience much more, reinforced with a consensus of opinions.
  • Do not assume that someone behind the counter at a gun shop is giving good advice. They can be poorly educated on the topic assuming that they even give it serious thought.
• Recommendations to use multiple products to do similar things. That is a perfect example of how people with bias, some of whom have a flavor of the month when it comes to cleaning products, can easily provide poor advice by trying to justify using inferior products. In other words, if a gun cleaner doesn’t do a good job, why would you continue to use it, not to mention doing so in conjunction with another product or two that clean in another way on the same surface. Why not use available singular products that achieve success in one pass. Because it’s not their personal preference. Makes you wonder how objective so called experts are. Sounds like bullheadedness is something to be proud of. Those opinions are a waste of your time.
  • I have heard this too many times, “use this cleaner or lube for this part, and then this other one for these others, and if that doesn’t work, use yet another product.”
• Save money and use engine oil, transmission fluid or common household or automotive products to achieve great results on a budget. I am always amazed at how someone can invest $1,000s on the hardware and suddenly get profoundly frugal over-spending another $5 to use a firearm specific qualified gun cleaner. Car engine products are engineered for completely different purposes, and your guns will not appreciate you going cheap at their expense. Even within the ranks of gun solvents and gun oils, things are NOT equal. There are many mediocre products and actually very few are truly manufactured by those gun care brands, but the best-in-class cleaning products deliver results that the others can only claim to.
• Watch this video of gun cleaners and see this side-by-side homemade lab test results. Don’t be fooled by these very deceptive parlor tricks often orchestrated by ignorant if not corrupted content providers. One of the oldest tricks in the book is to pre-contaminate the metal test plates so that the brand they are promoting comes out on top. I have seen bonafide great products get trashed by these revelations. Many years ago, a U.S. Military arsenal system test group actually tried to pull off the very same scam to protect their jobs. I wouldn’t have believed it if it weren’t true.
• Stay with the tried-and-true solvent your granddaddy used. I guess ignorance really is bliss. Not only do those products not exist in their current state, but those are the very things that create the mess if not the damage to firearm metal to begin with. Traditional solvents are very petroleum based and will gum up and causing gun failures. Add another cleaner on top of it and you will get an even bigger mess. Unless you are fastidious with those products, it will be a disaster. By its nature, solvent residue will turn ordinary powder fouling into a petrified forest in your bore. It just makes it more embedded and much harder to remove. Unfortunately, the traditionally just reacts by doubling down and piling on even more of the bad stuff. All of this can be easily avoided. It really is a mindset.

I was recently disturbed by a veteran gun writer’s step-by-step cleaning advice by listing the following steps:

Clean the bolt.

Apply powder solvent.

Scrub the bore.

Remove carbon fouling.

Apply the copper cleaner.

Remove the copper fouling.

This is nuts. The author literally repeated or duplicated the name of every step since they are often the very same action reconfigured in this work salad. This is what I am talking about. How about consolidating your thoughts into one line:

Clean hard fouling with a copper solvent.

What they don’t share with you are several important notations:

• If you only have light carbon fouling, use a milder cleaner or solvent.

• If you do have hard bore fouling from copper, most often, use a product specifically labeled copper solvent.

• Do not mix different chemicals since you do not know how harmful the chemical interaction can be. This is one of the reasons why you want to stick with one bore cleaner formula.

• Prep gunmetal surfaces by first wiping down parts with high percentage isopropyl alcohol aka rubbing alcohol, like the 91% version that you can buy at the pharmacy because it has less water content. This will remove pre-existing solvent residue, and it will evaporate quickly ahead of applying your dedicated bore solvent. If you notice any color to the cotton you used just, this will also confirm that there is something there.
  • This sample principle applies to removing solvent residue prior to applying lubricants to the same surface because you don’t want solvent residue to contaminate and counteract the benefits of the gun lube you are expecting to perform well. Remember, cleaners are inherently designed to eat lubricants.

• Best Practices:
  • Prepare gunmetal surface as prescribed above.
  • Apply bore solvent with proper tools.
  • Remove solvent residue.
  • Apply quality gun oil and gun grease to appropriate parts.
  • Don’t over-lubricate.
  • Enjoy your time in the field or at the range.
  • Repeat cleaning procedure.

Believe it or not, there are more stories and practical tips, but we have to end this story at some point. I am an expert because I have worked specifically in gun care for over 30 years, having absorbed so much information from so many people within the industry. So, be aware and clean with care.

#cleaningarifle #borecleaning #barrelcleaning #riflecleaning #riflecleaner