I could use some bore help

[xtratoy]

I have a old 7mm mauser that shoots J word boolits ok but it has a dark bore that just won't clean up. I started shooting cast through it and have had erractic results. I looked closely down the bore and the rifling looks great but the lands were grey-black and rough looking and I have been trying to shine and smooth them up. I tried lapping the barrel to get to shiny metal, no luck. I have shot 30 cast lapping bullets ( .289 dia cast rolled into valve lapping compound with the lube grooves full of compound in front of 10 Grs. of 2400) no luck. Today I tried a 50-50 mix of vinegar and 3% peroxide and soaked the barrel for 10-15 minutes then ran patches and a bore brush with #2 steel wool, no luck. I soaked the barrel at least ten times today and every time I pored the compound out it was a reddish brown color but doesn't appear to be rust. The first patch comes out with dark gray- black fouling but no indication of the reddish brown mix. It looks like water when I pour it in. I have spent 8 hours working on this today and ran at least 100 patches. here is a picture of the once clear solution and a couple of patches. I think I could do this for the next 10 days and still have the bore be dark . It looks almost as if I am trying to shine up pencil lead.here is a pic of solution as it comes out of the barrel. After all that I relapped with lapping compound and It looks the same as when I started!! Do you think the reddish color is a chemical reaction with some old corrosive primer compound? http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k184/xtrayoy/50-50borecleaner004.jpg

[wiljen]

Looks like rust from barrel pitting to me. I would bet the lands are full of little pits which is why it is taking forever to come clean. Do any of the gun shops around you have a bore scope you can use to really see what is in that barrel or what kind of condition it really is in?

[xtratoy]

None that I know of for a bore scope.. Are you thinking that the solution is penetrating the fouling and bringing out the rust? If the vinegar-peroxide is getting down below the fouling why doesn't the fouling come out? I was blocking the chamber with a case and the bolt but the solution was acting like a copper solvent on the case and after the red came out, the mix in the case would dribble out and looked like I had used a potent ammonia copper solvent. I had previously soaked the barrel for 7 days in a mix of Eds Red and it didn't even effect the bore fouling.

[docone31]

It will come out.
I use paper patching to clean out the bores.
I use a little valve lapping compound on the patches, with a full tilt load. Accuracy does not matter at this point. Just the cleaning, and shineing part.
A Chore Boy now comes in handy.
It will clean up. Have patience.

[xtratoy]

What is the process for the paper patching ? Do I have to use a smaller bullet or wrap a bullet I am using now? How do use seat the bullet without ripping the PP off? Currently using a Lee 130GC Boolit that has been Leemented to .289

[Frank46]

Not a chemical engineer by any means and never stayed at howard johnsons. But for what its worth here goes. Vinegar is an acid called acetic acid. You can use this by itself to remove rust. The hydrogen peroxide can cause pitting in a barrel. Years back there was an article in precision shooting about the blue goop that some benchrest shooters used to clean the copper out of their bbls. I believe the stuff was made up of ammonia, hydrogen peroxide. Photos did show pitting on lengthwise sawn bbls. If the pitting and rust are easily visible then I think your solution is eating away at the rust or corrosion present in your bbl. Hence the reddish color shown in your post. Vinegar will remove some of the rust in and by itself. I'd try making up an electrlyitic barrel cleaner. surplusrifle.com has the instructions in their gunsmith section. Hope this helps. Frank

[xtratoy]

No rust or pitting visible looking down the bore. After the mix has been in the bore and poured out the rifling is shiny and not showing any signs of the mix attacking it., but I still can't see the bottom of the lands to see if there is pitting there. What gets me is fine pieces of the steel wool that I wrapped around a bore brush can sit in that reddish liquid and the solution doesn't even bother it. It was sitting in it for over an hour and nothing happened to the steel wool. Any thoughts of something I could fill the bore with that might soften up the fouling so I could scrub it out. I need to find something that will soak in and not eat whatever is left under the fouling. Some thing that I can leave in for a week or two. I am wondering if this fouling is a product of corrosive primers that has just been ironed into the bore over years of shooting. What do think about filling the bore with Kroil or some other penetrating oil? Has anyone ever tried Brake fluid in their bore and let it soak for an extended period of time? I thought about the electrolytic course of action but thought that was only for either lead or copper removal depending on the solution used. I didn't know it could pull the type of fouling I have out.

[MtGun44]

Rust. Probably digging it out of the old pits, but you are also likely to be rusting the
bore with the vinegar which is an acid. I sure wouldn't leave vinegar in my bore
any time at all. Certainly rusting the steel wool, too.

If you don't believe, try putting a drop of vinegar on a bare piece of steel.

Bill

[xtratoy]

MyGun44, I believe what you are saying as Vinegar is an acid. I am just reporting what I have seen after having steel wool in contact with the solution I am using. I have been dipping my bore brush in fresh clear solution and then scrubbing back and forth in the bore trying to clean it up. The steel wool doesn't rust even if soaked in the solution and left to sit for an hour or more. It must be pretty good steel wool cause I have got a few drops on some steel plate and while it did not rust, it either darkened it or caused it to be real clean when I wiped it off. I am done with the vinegar and peroxide and looking for a new angle of attack.

[Bret4207]

Steel wool is oiled to prevent it from rusting. Spray your wool with carb cleaner and shake it off good, then set it in your mix. It will rust. That's why you have to degrease steel wool before using it on bluing projects.

I'm betting you're dealing with some rust and jacket fouling. It may have been caused by corrosive priming not being cleaned years back, but the compound itself isn't the issue. Keep doing what you're doing.

[jonk]

Three words: Foaming bore cleaner.

Spray in. Walk away. Come back 24 hours later. Run a brush through it, then a patch. Repeat until clean.

Also could try an electric bore cleaner. You can make one for abou $5, google the plans.

In scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing, you can actually appreciably wear the bore.

Also don't overlook boiling hot water and soap. Pouring a quart of this through the bore and following with a brushing will be a good start. Then put the muzzle in the hot water and pump a patch back and forth from the breech in a piston siphon action. Once the bore is too hot to touch, then quickly dry and run a brush with solvent and a few patches through. This will remove carbon, rust, fouling, etc., as the heat helps open the pores in the metal and adds energy to the system- energy you now don't have to apply with your own muscle.

[atr]

make an electronic bore cleaner and use that in combination with standard household amonia cleaner.
I have a very old M93 7x57 mauser and it took ages to get it's barrel clean...then I found the pitting.....
another reason for the erratic shooting may be a excessively long throat causing the bullet to have to "jump" before it engages the rifling

[xtratoy]

I decided to go camping. I have the Bore soaking in Shooters Choice bore cleaner for now and will see if that loosens thing sup. Thanks for all the helpful tips. Bill

[Bloodman14]

FWIW, I soaked an Enfield barrel in Hoppe's No. 9 for a week, alternating that with Hoppe's Copper Solvent for a week; you should have seen the fouling that came out! The bore has a mirror finish now, it actually reflects light so well that I can see the opposite side of the bore in the lands of the side I'm looking at. No joke. Give yours the same treatment.

[DIRT Farmer]

I think the old 7x57s were made with dark bores from my experience. I have had good luck with three guns now using a cast that fits with a gascheck and the standard soft M/L lube 50% bees wax and 50% Crisco. just hand lube and in my 7x57 10 grns of Green Dot, after about 30 rds the bore was shiney black. After several hundred now it is getting brighter. The pits don't seem to be a problem as I do not get any leading and it shoots as close as I can hold. I started with the usual boer cleaners, you could not see any rifling in the center of the bore due to fouling. The last time I cleaned it to check there was no copper fouling on the patch. When I started shooting it I was still getting blue patches.

[Bret4207]

I have a 93 that has a barrel that might charitably be called "rough". Mine had, still has, what I can only describe as "lumps'. I don;t know exactly what the stuff is, whether it's baked on grease and jacket fouling or high spots left while the rest corroded away. But it there. Nothing seems to touch it much. It shoots fair considering the condition and jacketed it shoots great.

[stephen perry]

My solovent blend will get it out. Briefly as I have said it before blend 3 cans GM top engine cleaner, 1 can 8 oz of Kroil oil, and fill the rest of a 64 oz glass bottle with white household ammomia. After you run several wet patches leave in and run several wet patches of JB/Isso through. Follow all this with several stiff brushes of Old Hoppes. Do double and triple cleaning let the barrel sit overnight with wet Hoppes patches after each cleaning. I would even use Sweets, liquid Drano, and naval jelly. After all the cleaning always run a couple wet patches in the bore after your shooting and cleaning.

Do the cleaning right the first time and never look back. Should be a fine barrel for you.

Stephen Perry
Angeles BR

[MtGun44]

I have found that with milsurps the plating type of cleaners takes out an amazing amount
of crud. It comes in layers, and there were insulting layers that stopped the process until
scrubbed out with brass brushes and then cleaned with acetone so the water based
deplating solution would wet the surface again. Then you deplate again. I got rust in
some layers, extremely nasty smells in some, some give a yellow cast to the solution (nickel?)
others blue (copper), some black.

Plating is much faster than chemicals and scrubbing. I'd avoid the acidic type of chemical
cleaners, and make sure to put down a good wet layer of Hoppes #9 after each session
ends.

Bill

[xtratoy]

I put an electronic deplater together this morning and will see how it does. Its bubbling away and I will see how many times I have to run it to get down to the bore. Thanks for everyone's help.

[JIMinPHX]

My guess would be that you have some real old baked in cosmoline still in there. When that stuff dries out from age, it gets tough as nails. You would think that it would shoot out, but it doesn't. I've fired 50 rounds of ball ammo, cleaned the barrel normally, then repeated that combination about 10 times with no change in barrel condition, not realizing that cosmoline was still in there. Later, I tried everything from steam to Hoppies, to acetone, to Purple Power cleaner, to amonia. Each one took out a little bit. All that stuff, 3 weeks & about 20 bore brushes finally got me back down to actual bare steel. The barrel now slugs about .004" bigger than it used to.

[corvette8n]

Be careful with your homemade bore cleaner it will take out some of the bore if used to long or too much.
I had a Carcano that looked like a sewer pipe, used my homemade bore cleaner in two 15 minutes sessions. You should have seen the junk come out. Bore is still not perfect but it does shoot cast as long as I size my bullets to .269/.270 it will keep them on paper.

[xtratoy]

I ran the EBC several times and would get little black flakes ( looked like pepper) when I would dump the ammonia out of bore. Then I would scrub with patch and get more dark smear on patches. I have used up a shoebox full of patches so far. Soaked the bore overnight in Seafoam Carb and manifold cleaner because it appears that the GM Top End cleaner has had the formula changed and isn't as strong any longer. I got some more black gunge out and went back to the EBC and was getting pepper flakes out again with an occasional glimmer of copper. I tried the Vinegar and ammonia together and got the original red color liquid out of the bore. rinsed the barrel with carb cleaner and went back to straight ammonia and no more red colored liquid came out I think that the red color is a reaction to the vinegar but not necessarily rust from the bore since I don't seem to have come close to the metal under the fouling yet. . I dug around and found an old can of military bore cleaner for corrosive ammo and now have the bore soaking in it. I can't believe that there could have been so much **** packed into the lands. It does explain why I could not slug the barrel with one of my cast bullets poured with pure soft lead. I tried to drive through from the chamber and it barely made it past the throat. I had to go get a 1/4" steel rod to beat it out. It was tight. I don't know how long this will take but I have too much time invested to quit now Sooner or later I will find the metal in the lands. It looks a lot better now but I want to see a patch without black on it. The battle continues.

[.45Cole]

your vinegar and hydrogen peroxide soln may be eating your bbl. hydrogen peroxide is a strong oxidizing agent (per-oxide means an extra oxygen: H2O2 rather than H2O) and vinegar is an acid as said before, metal oxides aren't very soluble in water solns or oils I assume either. Maybe what is happening is that the old soft steel used is very much iron in nature w/ little nickel/antimony to make the steel a true steel. You are oxidizing the iron w/ peroxide and then making it soluble in the soln you are using with the acid (metal oxides are more soluble in acidic solvents) hence the reddish color (Fe2O3 or FeO) Try letting your red color dry on a piece of paper or put a strong field magnet under the bucket to move the color particles.
But...... your peroxide bottle is only 3%-5% h2o2 and your vineger is only about 30% acetic acid so maybe not.
This is a very good experiment to find the best way to clean out anything and maybe should be archived somewhere when you find the best method.....sticky???

[xtratoy]

Dumped the Mil-surp bore cleaner out today and it was darker and thicker than it went in. I got more black streaks on the patches and shot some carb cleaner down the bore than more patches. still coming dirty. I tried the EBC again and this time just used 50/50 ammonia vinegar ( no Hydrogen peroxide ) and got my reddish-caramel colored fluid coming back out. Its about 95 degrees here so I poured it into a container and let the sun dry it out. Scraped the residue it left and ran a powerful magnet over it. Nothing stuck to the magnet. Doesn't that rule out some type of iron oxide as causing the reddish color? Running the EBC some more. When I pull the rod from the bore and wipe it off it leaves dark gray-black steaks on my rag and when the rod dries it is a dark matte gray color compared to the bright shiny way it looked before I used it. :confused: The saga continues............ Just dumped the last batch out and it was darker and dirtier than usual. This stuff was actually looking like I may be making headway. I put the magnet on the outside of the plastic dish I had poured the 50/50 mix into and this time I was able to attract a small amount of Iron sticking to were the magnet was. It may or may not be from the steel wool covered bore brush I have been swabbing the barrel with. Maybe I have made a breakthrough on the fouling. I am going to run a fresh batch of mix and the EBC than go back to straight ammonia as it seems to have little affect on the barrel itself.