What products you recommend for general rifle cleaning maintenance or light restoration?

[Aaron N]

Afternoon Gents!

Im doing an order for cleaning supplies, and am curious what products you recommend for general rifle cleaning maintenance or light restoration.

I have some light rust that I’ll use bronze wool to tackle, but what oils and cleaners are the best for cleaning bores, and preventing rust.


Also, do you recommend brass or plastic jags?

Any help is appreciated!

 

[Aaron N]

@rookhawk I'm looking in your direction...

From what I’ve found on here so far
-Bronze Wool
- Kroil Oil
-Hoppes solvent and oil
-Nylon/bronze/tooth brushes
-Rags

What else am I missing?

As well, I have a Chilean sporter in 7x57 that was an absolute bubba job, so it will serve as my “practice” build. New stock at some point, bedding, new barrel, sights, bottom metal. The bolt has patina, and was wondering what is the best way to clear that up? Emery cloth? Bronze wool? At some point I will try and jewel it, but sadly, a drill press is the one tool I don’t have!

 

[rookhawk]

@rookhawk I'm looking in your direction...

From what I’ve found on here so far
-Bronze Wool
- Kroil Oil
-Hoppes solvent and oil
-Nylon/bronze/tooth brushes
-Rags

What else am I missing?

As well, I have a Chilean sporter in 7x57 that was an absolute bubba job, so it will serve as my “practice” build. New stock at some point, bedding, new barrel, sights, bottom metal. The bolt has patina, and was wondering what is the best way to clear that up? Emery cloth? Bronze wool? At some point I will try and jewel it, but sadly, a drill press is the one tool I don’t have!

JB bore paste. It can lap and clean up a gray bore.

Wipeout foaming bore cleaner. It might take you a month, but you can remove decades of lead, powder, brass, copper, and rust with it. Layers at a time, gently, layers at a time. Bad bores are usually just clogged, nasty, filthy bores. Few people will create a 30 day plan to bring them back to life. 4 MOA guns have become 1 MOA guns with this approach several times.

For cleaning, Fine (0000) bronze wool, kroil, and a light touch will clean a ton of nastiness off metal.

For wood, a soft toothbrush and some warm Dawn dish detergent will remove the decades of grease and sweat that filled the checkering grooves.

For engraving, a couple pink erasers are amazing. Makes a horrible mess, but friction and eraser will grab gunk out of the cuts of old engraving that actually is much deeper and crisper than it looks.

All my recommendations are honest, simple ways to clean things up. Not tart them up or give the illusions of clean, just to clean. Take note I never recommend cold blue, Dremels, or anything else that ruins the gun or deceives the next owner. You now know all my tricks and tips to conserve guns. Restoring guns is a whole different matter whereas what I recommend above honors the hypocratic oath for guns: “above all else, do no harm”.

 

[gbflyer]

The Bore Tech products are good to go.

 

[Shootist43]

I've used 0000 Steel Wool and Kroil to clean up bores and surface rust. For the bores, I wrap the 0000 Steel Wool around a slightly oversized phosphor bronze brush and a liberal dosage of Kroil. Let the Kroil soak the bore for a while, it helps loosen the "rust." All of the powder and copper fouling must be removed prior to starting work on the dark bore.

 

[rookhawk]

I've used 0000 Steel Wool and Kroil to clean up bores and surface rust. For the bores, I wrap the 0000 Steel Wool around a slightly oversized phosphor bronze brush and a liberal dosage of Kroil. Let the Kroil soak the bore for a while, it helps loosen the "rust." All of the powder and copper fouling must be removed prior to starting work on the dark bore.

BRONZE WOOL please, not steel. Steel wool is naturally harder and it can scratch. Further, you NEVER get all of it off. So in 10 years the microscopic hairs that fell all around the gun have been feeding rust.

Never use steel wool. It works fine in capable hands today, but it creates degradation of the gun in the future.

 

[curtism1234]

Where is the post about an old sock with 30 years of wd40, 3in1, and motor oil on it

 

[Bob Nelson 35Whelen]

@rookhawk I'm looking in your direction...

From what I’ve found on here so far
-Bronze Wool
- Kroil Oil
-Hoppes solvent and oil
-Nylon/bronze/tooth brushes
-Rags

What else am I missing?

As well, I have a Chilean sporter in 7x57 that was an absolute bubba job, so it will serve as my “practice” build. New stock at some point, bedding, new barrel, sights, bottom metal. The bolt has patina, and was wondering what is the best way to clear that up? Emery cloth? Bronze wool? At some point I will try and jewel it, but sadly, a drill press is the one tool I don’t have!

@Aaron Nietfeld
The bore cleaner I really like that is really good and designed for lazy people like myself is FOAMING BORE CLEANER. Spray it up the bore, leave it up to 24 hours and wipe it out. Easy. If needed repeat.
For stocks Gilleys gun polish wax is the ducks guts.
Bob

 

[shootist~]

The Bore Tech products are good to go.

100% agree. Bore Tech Eleminator is kind of like Wipeout, except it takes minutes instead of hours.

 

[Pheroze]

G96 gun treatment. This stuff is easy to use and protects.

 

[rookhawk]

100% agree. Bore Tech Eleminator is kind of like Wipeout, except it takes minutes instead of hours.

Yep. The nice thing about wipeout is that it is very slow. If you find a nasty british rifle with no bore left, usually its actually caked in layers of copper, gunpowder, rust, and lead residue. It's a real chore, but I've used wipeout every day for 30 days on a gun before followed up by JB paste. The layers surrender to the chemical, only to reveal a new layer. I had a Westley take-down mauser that was metford rifled (no cuts, just rounded off hills and valleys...not known for accuracy) that shot 4 MOA. After a 30 day treatment the bore was pristine and shooting 1MOA. That's saying something for any take-down rifle but especially one without cut rifling!

I love buying ruined bores on guns when people accurately disclose that. I've never had one that was actually ruined, just A.) Filthy and need of a 30-60 day cleaning, and B.) was long throated and needed the bullet OAL longer, and C.) Needed a neck sizing so it would headspace off the shoulder. Dog guns that were unusable turned out to be terrific guns. When a gun is unrestored and looks externally great, but the bore is reported to be shot out, it is almost always A+B+C above.

 

[Bob Nelson 35Whelen]

100% agree. Bore Tech Eleminator is kind of like Wipeout, except it takes minutes instead of hours.

@shootist~
Yes it does only take minutes but the good thing about it is you can leave it in the bore for a while like overnight muzzle down without fear of harming the bore.
Great stuff.
Bob