Best cleaning solution for lead removal

[dlbarr]

I've been using Barnes CR-10 for awhile and it works respectably. Just wondering if someone else has something they feel works as good or better.

[scottfire1957]

I've read that mercury works. That was my answer in the thread a week or two ago.

About this very subject. Read back a page or two.

[GSM]

Not a solution, but, copper Chore Boy and elbow grease. Sometimes Flitz.

Mercury? Them days are gone.

[MT Gianni]

Lead away cloth if you are getting lead splash on a revolver side plate. Proper lube and fit for heavy leading, any good cleaner for a light wash. Ed's red to Copper cutter all seem to work, the key is not to get a build up.

[Foto Joe]

I just went through this with my '94 Marlin shooting cast 44 Magnum loads for the first time. Long story short, Hoppes #9, ChoreBoy on an old bore brush and less than 5 minutes to scrub out 6" or so of very leaded up barrel.

[Old Caster]

The absolute best is Outers lead out but it is no longer commercially available. I don't know if you could still buy the electrical part of it or not but have read that it is possible to make the chemical. The electrical part shouldn't be too difficult either. The hardest part of this is that you would have to have a lot of the chemical to immerse the entire gun in a container. Do a search on this site and you will find things about the possibilities of making your own electrical device and chemical compound. I am sure that several people have done it.

[Dframe]

Lewis Lead Remover

[Bad Andy]

50:50 solution of Hydrogen peroxcied and White Vinegar. Plug one end of the barrel and will it up. Let soak for 20 min, drain and clean with brush and swab. I have done this with my Sig P229 .40 after I shot 50 rounds of unlubed cast boolits through it. I had to do three 20 min soaks to remove the lead (there was a LOT of leading). It cleaned it up great. The solution will fiz up a bit and I have been told to watch your barrel finish as it can remove it, I did not have this issue with my barrel.

[Cadillo]

50:50 solution of Hydrogen peroxcied and White Vinegar. Plug one end of the barrel and will it up. Let soak for 20 min, drain and clean with brush and swab. I have done this with my Sig P229 .40 after I shot 50 rounds of unlubed cast boolits through it. I had to do three 20 min soaks to remove the lead (there was a LOT of leading). It cleaned it up great. The solution will fiz up a bit and I have been told to watch your barrel finish as it can remove it, I did not have this issue with my barrel.

Have a new barrel on hand before you do this. I ruined a P220 barrel and it took less than twenty minutes to do it with this remedy. It pitted the bore beyond belief, and it took less than twenty minutes.

Before you try this, do some research. You will find not only that I am far from to first to suffer a damaged barrel, but also that the process creates a very nasty chemical that is easily absorbed through the skin. I believe that it is called lead acetate.

Some folks manage to get away with this cure, but it's an expensive **** game to be playing in.

Just let the barrel soak overnight in Hoppes, Ed's Red, or Kroil, or easier still, just shoot a few jacketed bullets through it, and then clean as usual.

[Blackwater]

I'm with Dframe on the Lewis Lead Remover if it's lead in the barrel, forcing cone or cylinders you're after. Also, throw in the Lead Remover cloths, or "miracle cloths," and a bit of Lyman's Lead Remover solvent, and you're good to go, and shouldn't ever find any lead anywhere that this won't remove pretty handily. We "moderns" are a bit spoiled when it comes to maintenance of our guns, and I fear we don't remember just how dang lucky we really are these days ..... if only we could get powder!

[Harter66]

I had a 9mm that leaded up pretty bad early on . I had access to an ultrasonic cleaner that would hold the bbl and was filled with Hoppes for cleaning aircraft fuel injectors. It ran about 20 min 4 times with just a few brush passes in between. It lifted the lead in chunks and I think it lifted the copper that lead into the leading in the 1st place.

[Harter66]

I will also mention that changing what you use will lift more goop off the bore . I've used Hoppes to a clean patch then run a Birchwood Casey patch through a bbl and it was black.

[blackthorn]

This is what I have collected with respectto vinegar/peroxide as a lead remover. For a long time I have been collectinginformation that will be passed on to my sons along with my casting equipment.Most of what appears below has been gathered from this site and/or othersources. Hope you find it informative!With use of proper precautions (N) Vinegar/peroxide (mixed 50/50) can beused to remove lead from the bore.With some salt or Clorox mixed in (not to be used in firearms) the mixture is often used toetch steel reproduction items to match original finishes. This mixture will ‘frost’ a clean piece ofmetal in 30 minutes or less to provide a finish that equals a hundred andtwenty years of rust and wear.While the same mix sans the salt or Clorox when usedas a lead remover is not as corrosive, you still must use extreme caution if youintend to use a vinegar/peroxide mix to remove lead from the bore of yourfirearm because it produces per-acetic acid.Per-acetic acid, while commonly used as a sanitizer onsome food processing equipment, is very corrosive to some metals. It is definitely not safe to use on brass orcopper alloys, and will damage both carbon and galvanized steel. When it breaks down it will leave an aceticacid residue on metal surfaces. When weuse this mix to remove leading from the bore of a firearm, in dissolving thelead deposits, it produces lead acetate (N) which is extremely poisonous (N). Hydrogen peroxide raises the lead valence from zero to plus two, so thata minus one from the acidic acid ion initiates a rapid lead ‘rusting’ process,making grey colored lead acetate which is not sticky and therefore bubblesout. It cannot be stressed stronglyenough that this grey liquid is pure (N) poison, so do this well away from areas where foodis (or ever will be) grown, prepared or stored and wear rubber gloves. The mixture can however be used to removeexcessive lead buildup from the bore of your firearm, if you arecareful. The first thing to do is toremove as much of the lead buildup as possible using (approximately) a thirtyinch strand taken from a ‘chore boy/girl’ pot scrubber wrapped round a worn outbore brush. Prior to pouring the mixtureinto the barrel, the barrel must be dry (no oil or other lube). To begin, clean the barrel with Ed’s red or asimilar cleaner of your choice and then use rubbing alcohol on a bore mop orrag to remove any residual oil. Thevinegar/peroxide mixture can be applied using a clean bore mop or it can bepoured in to almost fill the bore as long as the chamber is tightly plugged. The mixture must not be allowed to come intocontact with the exterior finish of the firearm, (either wood or metal)therefore, if you are pouring it in, do not fill the bore to the top as thestuff foams up and it will run over if it is too full. As noted above, this mixture has thepotential to damage the bore so allow a two minute maximum soak for the 50/50vinegar/peroxide mix to work and then wash out the barrel with tap water. Do not use distilled or deionized water. Under some circumstances using distilledwater will create lead (N) bi-acetate or (N) tri-acetate, either of which are deadly (N) poisons, so make sure the water you useis somewhat tainted. To be sure, add aquarter teaspoon of salt per quart of water. Under no circumstances let the barrel filled with the solutionstand for longer than a maximum of fifteen to twenty minutes. Pour out the liquid and remove the chamberplug. Run a bronze brush through severaltimes, followed by four or five patches. Pour some hot soapy water through the barrel and run several wet patchesthrough as you do not want any of the solution to be left in thebarrel. You may have to repeat the process a number of timesdepending on the amount of leading present. Run the chore boy through again and if the barrel is lead free, rinsewith really hot tap water. Use a hairdryer or other heat source to be sure the barrel is moisture free and then usea water displacing oil such as WD 40.

[Shiloh]

Stay away from mercury.
There are plenty more safer ways. See the above posts.

Shiloh

[Jtarm]

Have a new barrel on hand before you do this. I ruined a P220 barrel and it took less than twenty minutes to do it with this remedy. It pitted the bore beyond belief, and it took less than twenty minutes.

Before you try this, do some research. You will find not only that I am far from to first to suffer a damaged barrel, but also that the process creates a very nasty chemical that is easily absorbed through the skin. I believe that it is called lead acetate.

Some folks manage to get away with this cure, but it's an expensive **** game to be

Better yet, save yourself 20 minutes and install the new barrel.

[MtGun44]

Lead is not very reactive chemically, far less so than barrel steel, so I'd be EXTREMELY
leery of any chemical process other than the Outers Foul-Out electroplating process
which works wonderfully. Solution is NLA, but the correct formula is available and
the chemicals aren't extremely unusual, may take a bit of searching to find.

Lewis lead remover, a new bronze brush, an old bronze brush wrapped with
00 steel wool all work well and pretty quickly.

I haven't done anything other than 10 or 15 passes with a bronze brush in
at least 10 -12 years. Leading is a thing of the past with a few basic techniques -

1- Avoid undersized boolits - groove +.001 as a minimum size, more in
rifles, throat size (if larger than groove diam) in revolvers.

2 - avoid super hard commercial boolits and their Crayola lubes. Soft lubes
of known performance over a wide range of velocities like NRA 50-50 and
LBT soft blue are great starting places. Once you have this working you can
experiment with bear grease and Vaseline with a dollop of pig drippings or
whatever suits your fancy.

3 - Use a "known-good" design. Keith designs are never wrong for revolvers,
truncated cone and certain SWCs are great for semiauto pistols and the many
groove Loverin designs are usually reliable in rifles. Once these are working,
try that 'cool idea' design and see how it compares. Some will be better, but
many will be worse.

Fit is king, lube and design are the handmaidens.

Good luck, hope you never need to scrub out lead again.

Bill

[Cadillo]

Better yet, save yourself 20 minutes and install the new barrel.

Aren't you a smart boy?

I bought a Barsto to replace it after the witches brew incident, not before.

I find it interesting to note that given your IQ, you would replace a barrel rather than attempt to clean it first.

Yep. Smart boy!

[charlie3tuna]

Pb Blaster, the name says it all.

charlie

[frnkeore]

The BEST commonly available sovent to "wet" the metal under under the lead deposit and therefore release it is Xylene or Toluene or both in combination, such as carburetor cleaner. Look on the label to be sure it has both.

I've worked where we used both (seperately) for industrial cleaning of high vacuum parts. You should wear gloves and use it in a ventilated area but, they WILL loosen the lead so you can push it out with a jag.

Wet the bore well with a loose patch (use a under size undersize jag) and let it set for a couple minutes, then wet a tight patch again and start pushing the lead out.

Frank

[wlc]

Stay away from mercury.
There are plenty more safer ways. See the above posts.

Shiloh

Not arguing with you at all about safer things to remove lead with, but I would darn sure rather use mercury than the peroxide/vinegar dip. I've used mercury before in a lab setting, and in removing gold from black sands concentrates years ago when I had a gold dredge. If handled with proper care it poses little risk. Heck didn't you ever play with mercury out of a broken thermometer when you were a kid?