Old Model 94 with dark bore

[Remmy4477]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=107793&d=1402778183http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=107792&d=1402778113http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=107794&d=1402778260Winchester 94 in 30 WCF (30-30) MFG 1902. Been in the family since the early 20's. My Grandfather bought this when he was a youngin. This was his main rifle. He carried it and used this on everything, deer, elk, coyotes and the like all the way up to 1970, he passed away in 71. In my late teens my father drug it out of retirement and we both shot it a few times, good on milk jugs at 100 yards but even then my dad said the bore had about had it. My father passed away in 2011. I just brought it out of retirement a month ago. I gave it a good look over. Action is butter smooth and tight. Finnish, what finnish? Wood is still wearing an old revarnish my gramps gave it in the 40's, starting to look--?--ick! Bore is dark, brownish looking, rifleing is strong and grooves are deep, I don't see any pitting however. I took it out and did a little shooting with it (some of dads old reloads, jacketed boolits) It will still hit in a foot square at 100 yards. As far as the boolit history thats been fed to it, dad and gramps used jacketed boolits in it from the 60's up, prior to then I have no idea what were used. So to my questions. First off what can I do to brighten up the bore and get it looking better and possibly get it shooting better? Any sooper dooper cleaners or solvents? I use Hoppes on almost every smokeless gun I have. Also what can I do about the old varnish on the wood, in spots it gets sticky at times, I have no clue as to what he used but it's thick! Any input would be appreciated! Sorry guys, still having issuses posting with paraghraphs for some reason???

[Outpost75]

JB and Kroil to do a thorough cleaning.

[izzyjoe]

Wow, man you have beauty there, I would not change a thing about it at all! It took many years for it to get that look, no need to bother it now. As for the dark bore I wouldn't fret it none, just give it a good cleaning to get all the years of copper fouling out, and send some real boolits down that bore, and should shoot like a dream!

[TXGunNut]

Very nice. Add me to the list of folks who think that bore is one good scrubbing away from being a fine shooter. Hard to say about the varnish, tho. Bound to be a way to make it less sticky without changing it up much.

[Loudenboomer]

You have lots of good advice for your nice o'l Winchester. Mop the bore wet every morning and brush it good every nite for a few days. This will lift about all that's going to come out. finish the job with JB bore cleaner. And yes plenty of the rough bores shoot just fine.

[zuke]

Start firing paper patched ammo in it and that will polish it right up

[Jack Stanley]

I don't recall what is the most gentle way to remove Varnish or shellac , I think rubbing the this spots with denatured alcohol works some . I used to clean some horrible looking wood and it all came clean when submerged in laquer thinner . You would have to put another finish on after that though I forget what finish was used back then but you could make it look close .

I'm with the guys for cleaning the barrel , many rifles that looked bad have responded to getting cleaned every day and being left wet with Hoppes overnight . Those that don't get the electric bore cleaner treatment .

Jack

[dubber123]

A good scrubbing as advised would be a safe way to start. I am a huge promoter of firelapping. It's nothing to be scared of, and of the many I have done, I have yet to see anything other than an improvement, and sometimes a dramatic one. It won't ruin your bore in a few shots like some claim. (Always by those who have never tried it). The worst one I worked on was a 32 Wcf S&W revolver. It had a black bore with pitting. I firelapped that one pretty extensively. It now has a shine, still with pits of course, but also shoots lead without fouling at full power, and cut group size in half at 50 yards. Keep it in mind as an option.

Thats a great looking rifle by the way. :D

[Remmy4477]

Thanks guys for all the replys and Info! I think I'm going to keep jacketed boolits away from her diet. Zuke--paper patched, hmm something to think about. For right now I'm going to follow the advice on wetting it down then scrubbing it. See what happens. I think I'll start looking for a boolit mold for it and just use cast in her. I've always loved this old rifle from the first time gramps showed it to me when I was little. It just has that "look" to it. As far as the old varnish, going to think about that for a while, I know I don't want to strip her so she may just stay the way she is? Cast and lighter loads and she'll be around for the Great grandkids to enjoy!

[GhostHawk]

I had a Sheridan Bluestreak that the original factory finish was coming off of in strips.

Citristrip and 000 steel wool, and yes I'd get a steel wool pad full of orange strip and just worked it up and down the stock. Left it soaking for a few hours, came back and had a few stubborn spots, so back with the steel wool again.
A nice quick bath in water to remove the citristrip, towel dry, then let it dry for a day. Then back with 0000 steel wool just getting rid of any nubbys and making it silky smooth.

Finished with birchwood casey trueoil finish. It is a simple finish to use, pour a little in a dish, use your fingers to make sure every part gets just a little smear on it. Let it dry, steel wool, repeat.

As to your dark bore, setup a cleaning rod and twice a day run a patch of Hoppes #9 down it. Walk away, let it soak in. With my old Yugo SKS it took 3-4 days of hoppes, come back, run a dry patch through (it would come back dark gray) Hit it again with Hoppes, walk away for 4 hours, just stick with it, don't give up, and after a couple of days of hoppes soaking I'd scrub it with a bronze brush, run a patch, take an eyeball look at it. You'll see it when it starts coming clean.

With the rifling strong like you describe I suspect it just has a really good case of leading, and that lead has oxidized gray with time. Couple days and some elbow grease and it should shine again.

[bigted]

definetly dont use any scouring material in this old sweetheart!!!

believe it or not ... most of the dark should come out with some TLC ... take your copper solvent [something like shooters choice ...of butch;s bore shine] and do the wet [10 strokes with a dripping mop] soaked all nite followed with a good brass bristle brush [10 strokes with a dripping brush]. repeat this for a week [7 days]. next take the magic potion that most shooters dont know about ... pure spirit of terpentine ... now repeat the mopping 10 times and bristle brush the same 10 times followed by clean dry patch's till dry ... repeat this in the morning and evening for tha same 7 days.

this treatment will disolve ALL the old fouling that is making your bore dark ... leaving just the metal of your barrel to inspect for damage.

now that you have a nice clean bore free from all copper, lead, and powder fouling ... NOW is the time to shovel several patched boolits thru her to shine up that bore. after around 30 or 40 of the paperpatch boolits i would slug the barrel to see what the dimension is that will be needed for accurat shooting rifle. go to the "smokeless powder patching " section to get a great recipe for your patched boolit building and bore shining excersise.

till you do these things completely ... i would not worry too much about the accuracy of the rifle ... several things are coming to play here and till a thourogh cleaning is accomplished it will not give a good reliable indication of what is required for a truly accurate load.

that is a very nice old 94 and a family heirloom to boot. man that is tall on COOL.

[bob208]

bigted is right on with the cleaning. don't put steel wool or sand paper or anything else in the bore. other then cleaning patches and brushes.

I have seen a lot of the old rifles fouled so bad they would not keep on paper. it came about when noncorrosive priming came into use. after all you don't have to worry about rust now. I have made a lot of rifles shoot with nothing more then a good cleaning.

[MostlyLeverGuns]

i've found Butch's Bore Shine works faster than Hoppe's and can be left in the bore without problem. It might take a week or two soaking overnight, brass brushed, patched dry, wet and standing another day or two. I put a wet patch on a Q-tip in the chamber, swab the bore wet, put a loose patch in the muzzle, drip more bore cleaner onto the patch with a dropper and stand upright with a cloth in the action to catch drip through. This keeps the bore wet. It is really surprising how well some ugly looking bores will shoot. Fire-polishing is a possible solution if it won't shoot when clean. A barrel that is loose at the muzzle may need fire-lapping or hand lapping. Loose spots before the last couple inches of muzzle seldom affect accuracy for most purposes. A very tight patch on a good rigid cleaning rod can be used to find loose and tight spots. A soft lead slug or soft round ball, .310 round ball for muzzleloaders works in most .30's and can give you a feel for barrel uniformity better than a very tight patch.

[OverMax]

Old nickel steel barrels. Clean it up as best you can and just shoot as is. OR have it relined to the caliber it is this day by a competent Gunsmith OR send to Jes and have it re-bored to 35 caliber. (check out the Jes link provided.)
www.35caliber.com (http://www.35caliber.com/)

[smkummer]

I second the recommendation to shoot Lyman's 311291 and sized to .311 with a gas check if they will chamber, if hard to chamber size the bullet smaller but it shoots and feeds really well. My load of Unique is going out at about 1500 FPS and is cheap and accurate out to 200 yards. In the good old days, lots of linseed oil was used on wood. In places where its tacky or sticky, use turpentine to cut the linseed oil. In fact the recipe was to use 50/50 linseed oil/turpentine to finish the wood. After this sat for awhile, then one was to wipe off what did not soak into the wood. Pure linseed oil is a little thick to soak with cutting it.

[atr]

REMY4477,,,
I have one just like it...given to me by my dad..its a 1930's vintage....
the bore was dark but working on it slowly and over time I have got the bore to shine. I used a combination of warm mineral spirits and Hoppe's #9....and a bristle brush. Work slowly over time...don't abuse that barrel!

Mine is a good shooter with cast and J's

[Hickok]

I agree with the good cleaning of the bore.

My father in law who is now 90 years old, had a Winchester Model 70 .300 H&H mag. that he bought new in 1958. He said he thought it was starting to get "shot out" after all those years, and gave the rifle to me as a gift.

After three full days of cleaning with Sweet's 7.62 and Hoppe's #9, the patches started to come out without any "blue" color on them. This Pre-64 Model 70 now shoots 3 shot groups right around 3/4"-1" @ 100 yds. It also came with a steel tube Weaver K6 scope.

So don't give up until you can really give that barrel a thorough cleaning.

[nekshot]

that is a real sweeet rifle and to have it in the family simply makes it special! Thanks for sharing the pictures, now I am thinking which lever I have that needs a octagun barrel, and yesterday I reasoned with my self I don't need to put another dollar in firearms, boy is this sick or what!

[Remmy4477]

A reboring, hmm always wanted a 38-55. I don't have the heart to have it rebored unless the cleaning is a bust. I'm going to follow some of the recomendations given here and see how it works out. Honestly don't feel the bores aweful just yet. It will still hit within a foot at 100 yards, just nothing that looks like a group. I believe the cleaning then using cast Boolits in her will show she's a good shooter. The wood I'm still thinking about??

[jlchucker]

A few cleanings with patches soaked in Kroil will get out a lot of crud. Especially if you use a saturated patch the first time and leave that barrel wet inside overnight, and clean with more Kroil the next day. That stuff really works well.

[quilbilly]

Wish I had known all this when I passed up a '94 25-20 with a dark bore at a local gun show a couple years ago for $250. Sob!!!

[35remington]

Respectfully, one foot groups at 100 yards.......sucks. That's less than minute of deer, and it will miss anything smaller 100 percent of the time. If it won't group better than that......a lot better than that, after a thorough cleaning, it's rebore to 35/30 time.

[Bent Ramrod]

A foot at 100 yards does imply something more than cleaning or load development needed. You ought to slug the bore, concentrating especially on the muzzle end. I had a .32-40 Winchester barrel with dark but usable rifling that wouldn't shoot for sour apples even though barrels that were a lot rougher shot pretty well. I finally went over it with lead slugs and found the muzzle end was trumpet shaped from overly sloppy cleaning from the muzzle. Had to get it relined; no help for it. No blunderbuss ever shoots good groups. Incidentally, this condition was not evident by inspection. The rifling went to the muzzle and didn't look overly worn compared to the rest of the bore.

A good relining service should be able to restore your gun to its original caliber.

[flounderman]

Shoot a few paper patched bullets thru it and it will shine like a mirror. You can buy all the exotic cleaners you want and wear out as many patches and brushes as you want and you won't get the results you will get shooting some paper patched bullets thru it.

[Pirate69]

Lots of great advice above. My only advice is: don't worry about the bore. Give it a good cleaning. Cast/size the proper lead boolit and start shooting. The more you shoot the better the bore will look. And, I bet it will shoot groups that your Grandfather and Father would be proud of. With that rifle; don't do anything in a hurry. Just my 2 cents.

[Remmy4477]

Lots of advice guys, thank you on all of it!. Ok best I could do for checking the muzzle end was using my mic to measure ID, depending on how you held it I had measurements from .308 to .310. I know not an accurate way to get a fix on the end of the bore! Muzzle looks good, nice and round. Wish I could slug it but this mans got no lead in 30 Cal! So I think I'm going to see if I can muster up some .310 cast boolits for it and load them up and see how she does. Not wanting to put alot of cash into 30 cal unless I can determine she'll shoot straight.

[Geobru]

Several years ago, I resurrected a Model 1886 Winchester that my dad bought used in about 1929. It was a 40-82, so he never shot it due to lack of ammo, and it was in pretty tough shape. The bore was dark and pitted, and the wood was coated in thick black oil. When I started shooting it, I was lucky to hit a sheet of paper at 50 yards. I slugged the barrel and found out that the bore was .410 instead of .406, which isn't all that unusual for the old black powder rifles.

I reloaded the correct sized gas checked bullets, developed a few accurate loads, added a tang site, and shot a 100 yard group that was 2.5". After shooting 4-500 gas checked lead bullets through that old dark bore, it is still darkish, but it does have some shine to it that wasn't there for over 80 years. Some of the pitting turned out to be old leading, and cleaned up nicely with use.

It took a lot of hand work, but I cleaned up the stock with stripper, and used steam to raise the dents that were in the wood and I added a TruOil finish. The receiver was pitted, so I polished it. (Yep, I ruined the collector value of a family heirloom, but I figured if I did nothing, in a hundred years, it would still be an old pitted gun.) It is now in decent shape and is an exceptionally nice gun to shoot.

108401

This is the group from the first time I shot this gun at 200 yards.
108402

http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/gg193/Brugeo_4082/Gun%20stuff/1886%2040-82/004-1.jpg (http://s248.photobucket.com/user/Brugeo_4082/media/Gun%20stuff/1886%2040-82/004-1.jpg.html)

My advice to you is to shoot your gun with the proper sized bullets, and it will clean up. I am intrigued by the paper patch suggestion

Since the stock has been messed with, I would strip it, get some of the red stain that is available from Tapaderas Winchesters, and finish it with a good oil finish.
I'd go for a satin finish myself, but YMMV.
You have a really nice rifle, and you can do with it as you please. I made changes to mine knowing that I will never sell it, but I will shoot the heck out of it for as long as I can.

[Remmy4477]

Geobru---- Gotta love those old Winchesters! Thats a nice one. Funny, many moons ago me and my Dad took the 94 to a shooting range with us, just to run a few rounds through it. Dad fired 2 rounds down range and some guy came over and jumped all over us for fireing a collectable winchester causing it harm and devalueing it! My Dad asked him if he was spossed to hang it on a wall and let it just sit there? Guy said yes it would be better for it. Dad told him, well it's a tool and if I can't use it as such then maybe I should melt it down and make a different tool out of it I can use! Needless to say that ended the conversation!! Shoot the darn things!!!

[FromTheWoods]

Beautiful! and shot by your Father and Grandfather! Doesn't get much better than that.

In my late teens, I began hunting deer with my Great-grandfather's '73 .38 WCF. Many times it was fulfilling just to be carrying that rifle while in the woods--didn't matter whether or not a buck came home with me.

We have a few older Winchesters that have stove-pipe looking bores. With the right bullet for a one of them, and filler for two others (since they seem to throw all bullets to date), we have found each of them to be accurate shooters. Given the rifling you have and following the cleaning advice offered to you, chances are great that you will bring your non-groups down to three inches or less at a hundred yards.

"Thank you" to those who detailed the cleaning methods for old, dark bores. Some of my rifles will get the treatment.