Question about aggressive barrel cleaning, what to use...

[jimb16]

I've got an M1 carbine that I don't believe has been cleaned since it was made! I've spent more than 5 hours scrubbing that barrel with 4 different solvents and worn out 4 phospor/bronze brushes and the patches are still coming out BLACK! Any suggestions as to what might work better at clearing the crud out of that barrel? I've tried Hoppes, Hoppes copper remover, Quick scrub and another foaming cleaner. Or do I just have to keep working on it til my arm falls off?

[Winger Ed.]

I had a Garand like that.
I wasn't in a hurry, and just to see what would happen, every day or so I'd run a wet nylon bore brush in it.
Then a dry patch, then a wet one with Hoppe's #9.
( I use nylon bore brushes since they don't rot or trash out nearly as fast)

I had used almost a hundred patches before they stopped turning green.

Its not a method to use for instant gratification,,,,,,
But, the barrel sure came out nice, and there was no way I'd damage it doing that.

[country gent]

One thing is to fit the jag and batches to the bore so they are tight when cleaning. A lose patch jag combination dosnt clean or scrub as well. Use fresh brushes and don't reverse in the bore. On the solvents giving them time to work and loosen build ups helps. A mix I've really used a lot is kroil shooters choice mixed 50-50. Give time to work between applications. JB bore cleaner is a mechanical cleaner works well but requires a lot of scrubbing it gains nothing by soaking.

A lot depends on the fouling your dealing with jacketed carbon or a combination of.

[725]

For hard lead, I've used Char-boy on a rod, Creosote - mineral spirits, and copper - ammonia. Of course they all need the addition of elbow grease :).

[fiberoptik]

Following this theme, I’ve got an old 7x57 Mauser with a dark, pitted looking barrel....
Same suggestions??


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[Markopolo]

I am prolly gunna get in trouble here, but on really bad cases, and I see a lot of them, I have a cleaning rod that I chuck up with whatever cleaner I deem appropriate to the issue, and run it in my hand drill.. and I take a single patch and wrap it around the brush tight so the bristles poke through.. helps hold in the solvent. And I run it. Till it’s clean. Like was said before, no instant gratification. I also have a big pile of corks that I use to plug up barrels to let them soak. Clean, soak, drill, repeat.

[Gtek]

Carbine, I would if that bad first move full strip. Remove piston nut and piston, guess where extra crud goes? Invert (gas hole up) with muzzle slightly pitched down and just keep after it with the foaming. I hope you have some form of muzzle centering devise to eliminate knocking the muzzle out as you get to clean. I have recently been using the Bore Tech Eliminator and am very impressed so far, but I did not start that dirty it sounds.

[georgerkahn]

One (hopefully not me ;) ) could open not a can, but a vat of worms discussing cleaning recommendations. There are many, many cleaning recco's printed in books, on-line, and i magazines -- not to mention local lore you can get from persons at the range.
That said, I've become a fancier or the Otis-type pull through cleaning system, as it both enables breech to muzzle cleaning and almost eliminates the possibility/probability of doing damage to the muzzle.
In a few (military) firearms I've had through the years, I think (not "know"!) one of the major cleaning challenges is what I call "layering". To wit, there'd be a layer of copper "plating" the bore; then, above it a layer of other residue; possibly some lead, though doubtful unless a reloader was a prior owner of the firearm; another layer of copper; etc., etc., etc., etc... Hopefully, you get the concept :).
I "discovered" Butch's bore cleaner, which pretty much replaced my use of Shooters Choice M7. Using either of these two has done remarkable cleaning of a layer for me. Then, use Sweet's or JB. CLEAN with (I use Ronson cigarette lighter fluid) something to hopefully prevent cleaner "A" from having a chemical reaction with cleaner "B"!!! And repeat; repeat; and repeat. A labor of love -- but it does have its rewards.
Remarking again on chemical mixing -- I always keep in the back of my mind that Clorox is an ok over the counter product; as is Ammonia. But -- mix the two and you make a pretty deadly gas!
After successful cleaning, I coat my bores with a thin application of G96 or Ballistol.
BEST!
geo

[GhostHawk]

ATF with very tight patch's, followed by dry, then a very wet one. Let it soak for 4-8 hours. Repeat.

When you think it is getting close go shoot 20 rounds through it and clean again.

I had a pair of mosin's with very dark bores, very little rifling showing. By the time I was done it was clean and sparkling, with good rifling.

I also like 1% carnuba wax in my BLL, just because it leaves the bores clean, shiny, and with a very thin protective layer.

Same thing happened with my Yugo SKS, leaded it up with too small boolits and not good enough lube. Spent 3 days getting it all out. She shines now.

[Outpost75]

ATF is wonderful stuff. One of the primary ingredients in Ed's Red. 50-50 ATF and acetone is a wonderful crud cutter and rusty thread breaker, works the same as Kroil and less expensive.

[earlmck]

I've cleaned some really nasty old barrels, for which Outer's foaming bore cleaner has made my life much easier. I fill the bore, let it set several hours in the bore, run a couple patches through and apply again until they come out reasonably clean. But those patches are (after the first few) coming out blue, not black. Is that thing of yours leaded up rather than jacket-washed? That would explain lack of effectiveness of your foaming cleaner. I have read that somebody makes a foaming cleaner for lead -- I'd be looking for that stuff if I had a badly leaded barrel.

[Gewehr-Guy]

I'm with GhostHawk,clean, then shoot a few rounds,then more Ed's Red while the barrel is still warm and let it soak overnight,thenbrush and shoot again. Check for accuracy improvement, and quit when it shoots to your satisfaction. I think sometimes we can overclean, and actually hurt the accuracy potential of old barrels.

[30calflash]

The foaming bore cleaner works well on jacketed fouling, most commercial cleaners work well but some are slower than others.

Sometimes, and maybe it's just me, it seems to go better with the bore warm from firing. If the barrel is such that you cane see rifling in it I'd run a few rounds thru it at the range and start to clean right there, with the barrel still warm. It seems to go quicker to me.

[Conditor22]

Like outpost said, soak with 50-50 ATF and acetone
then wrap some chore-boy 100% copper pad strands around a cleaning brush then scrub and soak with the 50/50
https://www.amazon.com/Chore-Boy-Copper-Scouring-Pad-2ct/dp/B006K3XS5A

[ShooterAZ]

For my approach to "aggressive" bore cleaning I wrap a patch around a brass brush, dip the very end of it in Hoppes #9, then smear some JB Bore on the patch and brush, brush, brush. For a M1 Carbine be sure to use a muzzle bore guide. Then I will spray it all out with Gun Scrubber from the muzzle. Soak overnight with more Hoppes and repeat the JB treatment. It WILL come clean, and JB won't harm the bore...but it may take several "treatments". Thankfully the M1 Carbine ammo was never loaded with corrosive primers, so it's just fouling from both copper and powder. Gotta scrub the daylights out of it...

[higgins]

If you have any, or can locate any locally, try Wipe Out or one of the other foaming cleaners. All that scrubbing could damage the muzzle.

[redhawk0]

Here's what I'd do. Wet a patch with Kroil and run it through the barrel and leave it sit 24 hours. Clean with your favorite bore cleaner, then patch dry. Now do the 24 hour soak with Kroil again. Clean with cleaner/dry patch. Then use JB Bore paste on it. Keep repeating this process until clean.

Kroil has a way of "creeping" under fouling and loosening it from the barrel. Whatever method you use...its time consuming. There is not quick solution.

redhawk

[Outpost75]

JB and Kroil, or JB with the 50-50 ATF-Acetone mix works well for metal fouled barrels.

Also good (if you can find any) is the old fashioned cake Bon-Ami which we used to do windows when we were kids. Use this with hot water on a patch and work up a good lather, then clean with it as you would after firing GI ammo with corrosive primers. The very mild feldspar abrasive removes encrusted carbon, leading and metal fouling, but does not harm the underlying steel.

After using the Bon Ami or JB paste flush the bore well with Ed's Red or Mil-C-372B and leave wet. Then clean again daily for a few days until you get no more black out.

If you cannot find cake Bon Ami you can use the powdered Bon Ami or Bar Keeper's Friend by making a paste of this with ATF and use on a tight patch the same way you would use Brobst JB paste. Col. Maurice Kaiser of the USAMTU taught me this trick 50 years ago. He claimed to have learned it up from George Stidworthy at Camp Perry, having used it on smallbore target rifles once the old Stoeger and Parker-Hale X-ring paste were discontinued.
Bert Rollins and Clint Fowler of the VA State Team also used it on their DCM-issued M14s when shooting M118 ammo. Bruce Wincentsen told me the Marines used it cleaning their Winchester Model 70s in the early Vietnam sniper days before the Remington M40.

Apparently goes back a long way to the 1930s days of "tin can" ammo.

[Shawlerbrook]

Lot of good solvent choices above. I like to plug the bore and fill it up with your solvent of choice. Let it work for a few days then brush and swab. I would be very careful with abrasives as I have seen many bores ruined. Go slow and easy. It’s a lot like cutting wood as you can always cut more but it’s hard to put it back. And I have seen some pretty ugly bores shoot pretty good. Sometimes shooting it warm and then proceeding to clean softens up the crud.

[jimb16]

Thanks for all the suggestions guys. First, I'm not a novice with carbines. I know about gas vents in the barrel and know that you can't fill the barrel and let it soak unless you remove the gas piston. I have the tools to do that along with the equipment to chase the threads in the gas cylinder to remove the staking before trying to replace the castle nut. I've been rebuilding carbines for myself and others for years. Second, I do use a rod guide to protect the muzzle from rod wear. I know cleaning from the muzzle can destroy accuracy. Third, if I have to, I have the equipment (barrel vise and correct receiver wrench to remove the barrel and to replace it) to remove the barrel for cleaning from the breach end. Fourth, I do wrap the brush with a patch to hold more cleaning solution. Fifth, I started out with a good soaking of foaming cleaner and let it work for 4 hours before starting the cleaning process. Sixth, I've already gone through over 200 patches and 4 new brushes! I've never seen so many layers of crud in a barrel!
I do have some of the supplies that you guys have suggested using here like bartender's friend, acetone, Breakfree, Kroil, etc.... I'll give that approach a try. I'm not about to give up. That barrel WILL COME CLEAN! or I'll wear right thru the sides trying!
And Marcopolo, I use the method you suggested for getting the plastic residue from wads out of the chokes in my shotguns. I works pretty darn well. I'm just not sure I want to try it on rifling.

[samari46]

I had two problem children who's barrels wouldn't clean up. One was a 1895Win saddle ring carbine. No matter what I tried,solvents, brushing even Rem Clean wouldn't get the lumps out of the barrel. Made in 1915 probably had copper nickle (cupronickle) fouling and wasn't about to try any ammonia based cleaners. Soaked patches with Butches bore shine wet the barrel and scrub and got blue and black patches. Same with Hoppes patches let it really soak the barrel and got green patches. So every week or so wet the bore and let it soak. Just for grins and giggles used a 8mm bore brush with one episode and the lumps went away. The other one was a Canadian property marked BSA single shot 22rf martini. Got lots of bits of lead and they must have shot a bunch of copper plated 22's. Scrubbed and scrubbed no joy. I had bought another cocking lever as the old one was messed up. So took it outside and shot it to see where the firing pin hit the rim. Sometimes you have to mess with the horns on the cocking lever to adjust the firing the strike. Well the lever needed no adjustments but checked the fouling and the lumps were gone. cleaned it well and the Mark I eyeball could see no lumps. That one is going out to a smith that speaks SingleShots. Plug about 8 scope base holes, install steel picatinny rail,clean up the metal, bead blast and blue. For some funny reason I've become quite fond of a bead blast and blue job as the blueing comes out almost black and looks nice. And correct a problem with the breech block not contacting the extractor as it should. Will only pull the case part way out of the chamber. Frank

[john.k]

Worst barrel I ever had was a garand ,near new,fired corrosive and not cleaned.......just rust ,nothing else............anyway ,for old military barrels that have lots of metallic deposit,a good method is electrolysis.......the way this works is that with the correct polarity,microscopic hydrogen bubbles form under the edges of the fouling and force it off the steel.........you cannot damage the steel,but if too much current is used,you can plate iron back in to replace the fouling........the only other effective method are the so called "ammonia dopes" used by the military........any method cannot improve the condition of the steel bore......if it was pitted before,it will still be pitted........the only method to remove pitting is to remove some metal----increase the size .........this is quite practical ,and can be done using laps,.. a series ,not just one,or cutters.

[edp2k]

a good method is electrolysis ... you cannot damage the steel

NOT true, you CAN damage/remove barrel steel by overdoing/improper use of electrolysis, or use of the wrong chemicals.
Not something to mess with, especially with "home made" setups or home made chemicals.
Its a quick easy way to ruin your barrel.

FYI when using electrolysis, when the fluid turns black, that is evidence that you are destroying the barrel,
as the black is extremely fine particles of iron oxide (i.e. barrel steel) in the fluid.

FYI very old school ink (as in inkwells and feather quills) is black because its made of very fine particles of iron oxide.

Question: you say that the patches are coming out BLACK, not blue/green?
I take it that you are not talking about the first few patches, which of course would have black powder fowling/carbon.

BLACK makes me suspicious that it is iron oxide.
The question is,
is it iron oxide from barrel steel, or from something like steel residue from steel jacked ammo (i.e. russian and others).

[Tripplebeards]

I just did a two day soak of foaming bore cleaner about a month ago. Kept spraying in about three times in a row then scrubbed with a brash brush approx 20 Times and repeated till the foam came out clean. It was a mil surplus 303 British. Worst I’ve ever encountered. In years past I’ve hooked an outers rod to my electric drill with a bronze brush and spun away.

[Rich/WIS]

FYI: It is true that US 30 carbine is not corrosive, but other countries that acquired carbines from us also made ammo for them and it may not be non-corrosive. If the previous owner bought cheap surplus foreign ammo it could be an issue.

[ShooterAZ]

Elbow grease isn't always easy, but at least it doesn't cost very much!

[458mag]

For really fouled up barrels electrolysis works for me. Others like stroking their smoke poles. Id rather be shooting.

[country gent]

When doing heavy cleaning I use the heaviest rod possible for the bore size, this reduces flexing and rub down. A tight fitting jag patch combo and brush can really flex a light rod. Filling a bore with some solvents may not be as effective as wiping or coating them since no oxygen gets to them to make it work. For applying solvents in the bore a looser patch jag works well or a brush and apply. I have used a spray bottle also.

[M-Tecs]

With jacketed bullet fouling rifles that had never been cleaned properly the fouling is in layers of copper and carbon. Most products work better on one or the other. While slow the best I have found is milsup abused bores is https://sharpshootr.com/wipe-out/ It may take once a day for two or three weeks for the real bad one.

[truckjohn]

Thick heavy fouling isn't usually a good sign. My guess is that you have a pitted or rusted barrel and that's what is holding all the fouling.

I would try shooting it. Often it will start coming out as you shoot and clean.

[jimb16]

I soaked the barrel for several hours this morning then scrubbed some more for 3 hours this afternoon. Can still see "chunks" of fouling in the barrel. The fouling is so thick that the sides of the lands are slopes not sharp square corners. Barrel is soaking again with acetone this time and will get another scrubbing in a couple more hours. Plenty of meat on the lands but tons of crud surrounding them. Doesn't appear to be any pitting on the lands, but I'm not down to bare metal yet in most of the barrel. Tried a paste of bartenders friend and solvent on a patch. Seemed to help but there is just too much junk in the barrel to say how much. Looks like I'll still need to invest a lot more elbow grease before it gets clean.

[john.k]

Smooth(ish ) lands and pitting in the grooves is known as "guttering" and not uncommon in military arms fired with corrosive by civilians...........every army on this planet cleaned corrosive residue by boiling water asap after shooting..........

[truckjohn]

More soaking and less scrubbing is what works best for me.

Badly fouled barrels get a tight fitting patch of green scotch brite on a jag.
Slobber some hoppes or foaming bore cleaner down the barrel
Scrub 20 passes and stop.
Slobber more cleaning stuff down the barrel and let it sit overnight.
Patch it out with 1 patch the next day. If it's green - repeat.

This works better than anything else.

The scotch brite etches the surface of the oxidized metal and scrubs off the layer of carbon and allows the cleaning solution to do it's thing to the fresh fouling underneath.

Alternating cleaners also works - as the different chemical packages attack things a little differently.

I primarily use Hoppes #9 but also will alternate to Outers or WipeOut foaming bore cleaner when needed. These also don't corrode your barrels when you let them sit over night like some of the really aggressive copper solvents will.

Hoppes is probably the most effective with the scrub and sit method. For me - it works better than most others, and I have tried a LOT of cleaners on a LOT of bad barrels including Mosin Nagants, SKS, AK, and M1 Garand that were really really full of fouling.

And it's cheap and they sell it in the stores locally.... Unlike $10/can foaming cleaner that you have to mail order.

[jimb16]

I soaked the barrel over night with acetone then gave it a quick scrub with a brush then this morning I filled it with Hoppes #9 and let it sit for another 6 hours. Just finished cleaning it. The chunks of crud finally came out. The barrel has some minor pitting but nothing bad. The muzzle was worn fairly smooth, but the rest of the rifling looked deep and strong. I counterbored the barrel about 1/4 inch and the new ends of the lands are strong so I expect it will shoot with reasonable accuracy. Thanks for the suggestions guys. They did help. 300+ patches, 2 days of soaking and 8 hours of scrubbing finally yielded a clean if slightly pitted barrel.

[samari46]

I always used Dupont auto body red compound initially when cleaning a mil suro's barrel. Since the hewer trucks and cars have that protective covering on the paint Haven't seen anyone use it. I make up a semi paste with the red compound with some Hoppe's mixed in and use a tight fitting patch on the jag. This stuff will come out black on the patches. Patch out the residue then leave the bore wet with Hoppes and rub a patch the next day to see if there is any green. You can also use a patch on a tight fitting brush as well, and when done use the Dupont white or polishing compound also made up into a paste. Did this a few times on different barrels but the best one was a Swede 1896 mauser that was badly crudded up. Came out bright and shiny. Frank

[Kev18]

Hoppe's 9 wasnt strong enough for me. Everyone was telling me to let it sit with a plug in the barrel. Never worked. I bought Hoppe's foaming solvent from their elite line of products. 3-5 passes, and the bore came out as clean as can be!

I did this in a winchester 1886. It hadn't been cleaned in a few years. FYI : It was made in 1889.... ;)

[tangolima]

Let the chemicals and time do the work. Or let electricity do it. Electrolysis had been my killer cleaning method before I realized there were solvents much better than hoppe #9. Electrolysis really works, so does modern solvents based on principle of chelation. I stopped hand scrubbing like mad long ago. Now my nylon (not brass) brush is just a solvent applicator.

Taking about running patches down the barrel. A tight patch on jag does NOT work well. If you want the patch to absorb liquid well, you want it relaxed, not tight. Oscar cable pulls a relaxed big patch down the bore, so it works well.

-TL

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

[M-Tecs]

so does modern solvents based on principle of chelation. I stopped hand scrubbing like mad long ago. Now my nylon (not brass) brush is just a solvent applicator.


Yep. 90% of my cleaning is done with https://www.boretech.com/products/eliminator-bore-cleaner

It's a surfactant. Never tried a chelating solvent. What are you using?

[nueces5]

I had to fight with a mauser who looked like he had never cleaned himself. Always the end patch came out dirty.
I have followed the advice of an old shooter, of those who when firing there was not much variety of cleaners. What I did was to clean with different cleaners, one at a time, hoppes, another Argentinian sold here, ... and between cleaning I put several liters of boiling water. Be careful not to wet the wood. That way I found that my gun had a very good rifling.
The boiling water evaporates very quickly, and lifts the layers that say above.
Good luck!

[Abert Rim]

I've sure used my share of foaming bore cleaners, Kroil, Ballistol, Hoppe's, Sweet's 7.62, bronze brushes, JB Bore Paste, et al. I have never found the magic formula.
But I do agree with some posters here about shooting the firearm a few times. I had an ancient M 1867 Swedish Rolling block in 12.7X44R with a very dark bore, even despite those deep grooves the Swedes cut. I tried many of the products listed above and kept getting gunked up patches. Finally I thought I could do no more. Shot a few rounds of BP/cast handloads through her and lo and behold, she cleaned up really nicely with some light salt-and-pepper ahead of the chamber and bright lands and grooves on up the tube.

[edp2k]

Electrolysis had been my killer cleaning method before I realized there were solvents much better than hoppe #9. Electrolysis really works, ...

If its a commercial electrolysis system used, strictly adhering to instructions, with a correct commercial electrolysis fluid, you should be safe.

However, you need to be careful,
as you CAN damage/remove barrel steel and rifling by overdoing/improper use of electrolysis, or using the wrong chemicals,
or using "home made" electrolysis setups or home made chemicals.
Its a fast way to ruin your expensive barrel and get that sinking feeling in your gut that you just destroyed something good and valuable.

FYI when using electrolysis, when the fluid turns black, that is evidence that you are destroying the barrel,
as the black is extremely fine particles of iron oxide (i.e. barrel steel) in the fluid.

FYI very old school ink (as in inkwells and feather quills) is black because its made of very fine particles of iron oxide.

[458mag]

If its a commercial electrolysis system used, strictly adhering to instructions, with a correct commercial electrolysis fluid, you should be safe.

However, you need to be careful,
as you CAN damage/remove barrel steel and rifling by overdoing/improper use of electrolysis, or using the wrong chemicals,
or using "home made" electrolysis setups or home made chemicals.
Its a fast way to ruin your expensive barrel and get that sinking feeling in your gut that you just destroyed something good and valuable.

FYI when using electrolysis, when the fluid turns black, that is evidence that you are destroying the barrel,
as the black is extremely fine particles of iron oxide (i.e. barrel steel) in the fluid.

FYI very old school ink (as in inkwells and feather quills) is black because its made of very fine particles of iron oxide.
Never seen the fluid turn black, but have watched it turn greenish from all the copper crud that boiled up. Only black stuff was particles of built up powder fouling sandwiched between the copper fouling. As with everything GO SLOW and use moderation. I only use this method with BADLY fouled barrels and Im confident I am doing no damage. The fouling is usually atracted to the rod but some will be carried to the surface by the boiling action where it can be seen.

[goryshaw]

I've only used the electronic cleaner on a Mauser 1908 that nothing was getting the bore clean. Alternated 10 minute electrolysis sessions with Ed's Red patches. The steel cleaning rod came out covered with black on the first session, 2nd pass was less black and by about the 4th there was nothing. The patches started coming out relatively clean by about #5, the bore is still dark pitted, but at least you can see down the barrel now.

You can certainly ruin a barrel with EBC, and the black coating on the rod had me nervous. But I didn't have anything to lose with that barrel, and it did clean a barrel that nothing else seemed to have any affect.

[john.k]

Firstly......why would anyone be using electrolysis on a Hart or Shilen target barrel?........simple ,they would not.........so a lot of the horror is twaddle......its a method for removing crud from what is by any realistic standard a "scrap" barrel.............Now ,Ive heard all the nonsense stories of masses of fouling being removed to reveal a pristine 1895 Spanish Mauser bore.........and some are caused by confusion between what is fouling ,and what is actually dried and petrified preservative grease and dust........when you remove dried preservative,you often do get a pristine bore...........very,very rarely when the fouling is a combination of wear ,corrosion and metallic deposit.......So ,when I hear some newbie telling these tall stories ,I just look at the wall ,and roll my eyes.

[458mag]

Firstly......why would anyone be using electrolysis on a Hart or Shilen target barrel?........simple ,they would not.........so a lot of the horror is twaddle......its a method for removing crud from what is by any realistic standard a "scrap" barrel.............Now ,Ive heard all the nonsense stories of masses of fouling being removed to reveal a pristine 1895 Spanish Mauser bore.........and some are caused by confusion between what is fouling ,and what is actually dried and petrified preservative grease and dust........when you remove dried preservative,you often do get a pristine bore...........very,very rarely when the fouling is a combination of wear ,corrosion and metallic deposit.......So ,when I hear some newbie telling these tall stories ,I just look at the wall ,and roll my eyes.
Exactly. A Hart or Shilen or any of the other target grade barrels should never be allowed to reach the point of aggressive methods. That being said, I have some mil surps that cleaned up beautifully with the electro method.

[Abert Rim]

Need advice from some of the cleaning experts here. I came into a '98 Krag yesterday with a fouled bore. The seller said he used a bunch of Wipeout on it and couldn't get it clean.
I gave it a dose of Wipeout last night, and the patch at left is what came out this morning. The center patch is what came out this afternoon after another five-hour soak with Wipeout, and the final patch at right is a follow-up patch saturated with Break-Free CLP. Subsequent patches are coming out the same brown color, and when I look down the bore, I get that "this is worse than when I started" feeling. I have seen this before, and believe is is junk coming up out of the steel that has been in there for decades, maybe a century. I can't take my own advice cited above yet -- shoot the thing -- as I am waiting for brass and dies to arrive so I can make up some handloads.
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/47937536972_ae70d27b89_b.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2g35pC9)fullsizeoutput_1017 (https://flic.kr/p/2g35pC9) by ComeWatson (https://www.flickr.com/photos/93930283@N08/), on Flickr

[tangolima]

I'm no expert, and haven't used Wipeout.

Looks like all 3 patches have brown in the mix. I'm afraid it is rust. The blue in the left patch is copper. The black in center patch is carbon.

Probably Wipeout took away copper and carbon layers on the top, exposing rust streaks in underlying steel. I would keep scrubbing with ample of breakfree on brass brush, and relaxed patches in between.

-TL

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

[john.k]

When electrolysis solution has black crud floating on top,this is rust being lifted by the fine hydrogen bubbles....The method works solely by microscopic hydrogen bubbles forcing rust off the steel anywhere water/electrolyte is able to penetrate the rust ......this is why the process takes considerable time,the cleaning is only working in a small area.if too much current is used ,the process will plate iron onto the barrel,making a new lot of crud......so small currents ,and a current controll are required........more is not better,its worse...As long as current is flowing ,the electrolyte will not corrode the steel.....This process is used to protect marine structures in salt water......Theoretically,the process will not lift plating,but metallic fouling seems to be porous enough to work ok.

[Multigunner]

For aggressive cleaning of heavy metal and carbon fouling I plug the breech and using a coated steel rod with 7mm jag I run a loosely fitted patch of soft cloth lightly wrapped with 0000 steel wool down to rest against the plug then pour the bore about half full of sweets 7.62 solvent. I pull the patch slowly up and down then let it sit for awhile to give the solvent time to attack fouling exposed by the light scrubbing action, then repeat as many times as feels right.
I then pour out the solvent and swab out the bore, replace the plug and pour the bore full of solvent to work overnight. I repeat this process for several days. I then take the rifle out for a shooting session and repeat the process while the barrel is still warm.
Never use a tight patch if using steel wool. Its not meant to polish the steel its only meant to scour away partly dissolved fouling, exposing underlying fouling to the solvent.

Modern barrel steel is much harder than steel wool, older BP era barrels and .22 RF barrels are softer steel and easily damaged by steel wool.

[Abert Rim]

Happy to report that a dose of Wipeout given several hours to work followed by bronze brushing the Break-Free is making a world of difference. I think this old Krag bore will come right.

[Lloyd Smale]

yup black means rust not copper fouling. Chances are when and if you do get it clean its going to be pitted.
NOT true, you CAN damage/remove barrel steel by overdoing/improper use of electrolysis, or use of the wrong chemicals.
Not something to mess with, especially with "home made" setups or home made chemicals.
Its a quick easy way to ruin your barrel.

FYI when using electrolysis, when the fluid turns black, that is evidence that you are destroying the barrel,
as the black is extremely fine particles of iron oxide (i.e. barrel steel) in the fluid.

FYI very old school ink (as in inkwells and feather quills) is black because its made of very fine particles of iron oxide.

Question: you say that the patches are coming out BLACK, not blue/green?
I take it that you are not talking about the first few patches, which of course would have black powder fowling/carbon.

BLACK makes me suspicious that it is iron oxide.
The question is,
is it iron oxide from barrel steel, or from something like steel residue from steel jacked ammo (i.e. russian and others).

[Andy]

I think electrolysis cleaning is a real time/labor/money saver for this sort of thing. You can burn through $5-10 in brushes/cleaning solvent/patches before you know it on a bad barrel, while wasting hours of your time overall. If you look around online you'll find a few good articles on making your own setup very inexpensively (old cell phone charger etc.) I think the key is to just stick with a low power unit and not too aggressive a solution (make your own easily with household stuff), most of the manpower time in this sort of thing is in plugging/filling barrel/setup anyway so the power of the unit isn't too important & cuts your risk down to nil if you keep an eye on things. I pulled what had to be about a half ounce to ounce of lead out of a visibly clean/patch clean pitted enfield barrel with the one I made, couldn't believe it. Main investment is time learning how to use it and getting set up (rod, solution, stoppers, funnel etc), after that you reap the rewards of the setup/knowledge for life.

[GranddadsDadsMine]

I've got an M1 carbine that I don't believe has been cleaned since it was made! I've spent more than 5 hours scrubbing that barrel with 4 different solvents and worn out 4 phospor/bronze brushes and the patches are still coming out BLACK! Any suggestions as to what might work better at clearing the crud out of that barrel? I've tried Hoppes, Hoppes copper remover, Quick scrub and another foaming cleaner. Or do I just have to keep working on it til my arm falls off?

This past weekend I restarted my project to restore my Dads sporter Enfield SMLE, and I spent the cumulative amount of 24 hours over the course of Sat-Sun, scrubbing that bore. I made a 3 hour trip out of my city to get Hoppes #9 Benchrest copper solvent. It helped a lot compared to the regular old lead solvent. I scrubbed most of the afternoon on Saturday, trying just about everything and ruined 3 bronze brushes :D.

What did work well was running a wet patch or two through, then dry patches until they're coming out dry. Then a wet patch and then brush it. So on and So on. Saturday night I put the benchrest through on a cotton brush and let it sit over night. I like Hoppes because of this, its not a solvent that will ruin your bore if you leave it in. In fact it recommends on the bottle you leave it over night. Anyway, after all my patches were coming out relatively clean Saturday, leaving the bore wet overnight changed that. The first pass I made sunday morning came out bright green! Now its the cleanest its ever been. Still got a little to go yet though. More than anything I think it just takes that undeniable elbow grease!

P.S I have an order on the way for Sweets 7.62 to get an aggressive solvent in there, and JB non embedding bore cleaner coming to hopefully soften the edges of the pitting. The pits aren't particularly deep anyway.

Good Luck!

[abunaitoo]

Foaming Wipe Out works great.
I spray it in. Let it soak for an hour Brush it with a stainless brush. Patch it out. Repeat.
I use stainless because sometimes the bronze will give a wrong color to the patch.
Brush needs to be tight. When it gets loose, I wrap some stainless Chore Boy around it.
Takes some time, but it cleans everything out.

With a M1 Carbine, you want to use a bore guide.
Don't want to put any wear on the muzzle.
With rifles I have to clean from the muzzle, I don't really worry about the patch color.
I clean it until the bore looks clean and shiny. Shoot it and see if it improved.
If it did, I'm done.
Can do more damage to the muzzle, by cleaning to much, than getting the bore sparkling clean.

[tangolima]

Let the chemicals do the work. Plug the barrel with solvent and leave it overnight. Repeat till it comes to senses.

Let the electricity do the work. Electrolysis works great and fast, but you need to know how to do it.

Use nylon brush instead of bronze. It is solvent applicator rather than scraping spatula.

Loose patch absorb better than a tight one. It picks up dirty solvent from the bore way better.

-TL

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[john.k]

Years ago,I used to see some really nice US military stuff that had fired a few rounds of surplus,and put away uncleaned......mint outside ,sewerpipe bore ........no fouling just rusted steel .

[stubshaft]

put me in the Kroil and JB bore paste category, it's worked in EVERYTHING I've used it on (EXCEPT pitted bores). Getting the copper out is only part of the equation, there is the carbon fouling that is a real chore to remove. I've been using a product called Free All to help remove the carbon.

[john.k]

There is another kind of pitting in barrels caused by white hot gas vaporizing the steel...........when you see a barrel sectioned,the pitting at the throat is often quite marked.....One barrel I have has fine pitting right to the muzzle ,and the throat is about 8" long.....at least thats how far a bullet will drop down....probably the result of 10,000 rounds + of military ammo.

[samari46]

Remember the Dupont red and white polishing compound used on cars to remove the oxidized paint and restore the shine??. At one time I had a rifle that had a hazy bore. Made up a paste with Hoppe's and the red rubbing compound. Patch wrapped around a bronze bore brush and covered with the rubbing compound with Hoppes. Stroked that barrel about 20 times back and forth. Then cleaned the barrel. Looking better. Same with the white polishing compound with Hoppe's. 20 strokes each way. Then cleaned the barrel. Barrel shone. Now use JB bore compound and the JB bore brite. Frank

[414gates]

We're resurrecting an old thread here, but for what it's worth, a good penetrating spray and a bronze brush will remove carbon buildup.

Solvents on their own can help remove carbon layers, but the bronze brush is what gets the carbon moving.

[nueces5]

Once with an old mauser, I discovered that to remove old dirt it was best to use different methods.
First I gave him two liters of boiling water, then a kind of cleaner, which I had lying around. Finally hoppes 9. Between each cleaner, a stainless steel brush, with very hard hairs, that I bought a long time ago on ebay, that was the best method.
Some friends leave the barrel one day with mercury inside.

[jimb16]

It took me a couple of weeks of scrubbing with hoppe's and wipe-out along with 7 8mm brushes but it finally came clean. Over night soakings then wire brushing finally did the job. That old Turk mauser has a moderately good barrel but it took an awful lot of work to uncover it.

[higgins]

Wipe-out removes jacket fouling better than anything I've used. Just don't get it on the stock. Remember that many of these old military rifles were never cleaned with an effective jacket fouling solvent unless it was done with some mercury concoction by an armorer in a depot. I believe the bore cleaner issued to the troops was more of a powder and corrosive primer residue remover than it was a copper solvent.

[Cosmic_Charlie]

I don't think a brass brush will hurt your barrel. I use Ed's Red with conventional methods and it has worked well.

[Geezer in NH]

Kroil, Ed's red, Sweets 7.62. Used cleaning surplus barrels in my shop. No foam, no bronze brushing till your arms hurt.

Wet bore with Kroil let sit a day and dry patch out. Wet bore with Ed's red let sit couple hours wipe out with patch. Sweets 7.62 wet bore well with a soaked mop. Let sit 1 hour wipe with Ed's red. Keep applying sweets for the rest of the day every hour. End of day soak with Kroil leave till next day.

Repeat with ed's red and 7.62 treatment. It never took more than 3 days of this for the worst barrel.

Sounds like a lot of work but I did 12 guns at a time. Fixed 8 out of twelve to great bore every time. The other 4 would sell at 20 bucks off.

[BLAHUT]

i have used borteck eliminator, wet patch, Wate 5 minuets or so, scrub with nylon bore bush, wet patch, dry patch, till dry< repeat, only thing i will use >> copper melts out, lead just falls out>>

[Milky Duck]

mates 6.5x55mm had a very dark bore,I blocked the muzzle with a rag and squirted crc 5.56 into bore till it was pretty much full and left it overnight..... it scrubbed up rather well afterwards,I figgure the crc had eaten into/dissolved all the oils etc that were in there and softened up anything else.
the old SMLE .303brits used corrosive primers so pouring boiling water down bores was an often done thing with them...Ive dont that a time or two with other rifles too..its amazing how much crud will come out,just be very careful not to get water into stock/bedding area and careful as metal work will get very hot very fast.

[dogmower]

jb bore paste and kroil. old school and works great. will get junk out even after the patch turns clean with other solvents.

[higgins]

The best copper remover I've used is Wipe-Out foaming cleaner. It's good on powder fouling too, however, I believe something like a soak in Kroil followed with a bronze brush would speed up the process.
Remember some of the blue stain in the Wipe-out will be bronze brush residue. The last time I cleaned a neglected bore I used the Kroil overnight soak and brush first to get the loose stuff out of the way.
Then start the foam treatment for copper fouling. Alternate until it comes clean.

[goryshaw]

Remington 1917 alternate Patch out with Eds Red still came out black until I tried home made electrolysis alternating with Eds red i finally got it clean, i kept elecytrolysis around to do other rifles if needed.