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Properly cleaning a rifle barrel has always been complicated and takes much longer than cleaning a muzzleloading longrifle.

Just a few years back, not many rifle barrels were cleaned down to the steel which is a necessity for proper breakin in the first place. Seems the norm is for someone to buy a rifle then go out and shoot off a box of ammo - handloads or more often, factory ammo to 'see how she shoots'. the guilding metal picked up by that first box of ammo has never been cleaned from the bore and is probably still there. Those who actually clean the rifle, run a patch or brush with solvent down the tube - maybe once in 20, 50 or several hundred rounds, then patch it dry and continue shooting.

The end result is that proper cleaning takes time. Back in the 90's, maybe 1996, "Precision Shooting Magazine" did a comprehensive article on barrel cleaning with the "Cleaning Question" going out to select the members at that time - the best of the BR shooting community. Many cleaning methods were similar, but there the similarity stopped. Everyone has his 'pet' method - this proved that none are wrong as these guys are the winners more times than not however they were all slightly different, showing there is a lot of leeway in cleaning. What the various methods did show is that proper cleaning constitutes an extensive cleaning regime. As custom barrels get better and better, we see the total absence of guilding metal fouling - something the 'ol '06 can't do. Getting the coppering(guilding metal) out calls for even more elaborate methods or better solvents. I've found Wipe-Out to work, but as with most solvents, it leave a dry bore afterwards, which must be lubricated prior to that first, fouling shot. As noted, I use a solvent with kroil added. The oil in the kroil helps to lubricate that first shot, even though the solvent'kroil mix is patched out with 2 dry patches, falling off at the muzzle. With the use of good solvents, I've found brushes are a thing of the past - I don't use them in any bore now.

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Daryl

"a gun without hammers is like a Spaniel without ears" King George V

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