For those who NEVER clean their bore, or almost never

[Tac-O]

Absolutely not. 3m pads are aluminum oxide (same as sand paper), way more aggressive than jb or iosso. The sharpness in a throat is important to accuracy. You will smooth it out very fast doing something like that and shorten the barrels accuracy life drastically. I measure the oal to touch in all of my rifles every time I reload. So I am checking for throat wear every 10-50 rounds down the barrels. I know exactly how much they wear and when it happened. Solvents and brushing will not move a throat. You want to do that as much as you can. Eventually you will need to get after some hard carbon with JB compound. When you JB the barrel you will move the throat a couple thousandths. I would bet you move it .005" if you used a 3m pad easy. Its not reducing the fire cracking, its sanding it out. Even jb or iosso should be used only as needed, for longest accuracy life. Thats some terrible advice to be honest. I hope its out of context somehow.

Nope, it is not out of context. He's stating that you use the maroon 3m pad and then JBs to keep the steel's pores closed in the throat, every 100-200. You're not supposed to go crazy... 10 strokes one way (or twenty counting back and forth). He does not mention anything about moving the throat forward doing that, but states that it DOES increase barrel life. Whether that has to do with removing fire cracking or the fact that it would be removing a carbon ring you've built up from not cleaning for 200 rounds, I don't know.

I actually didn't know those pads use aluminum oxide for grit!! That being said, I see how it would actually remove throat material.

This thread is really testing my resolve to keep going on my "no bore cleaning" experiment

 

[keithcandler]

Not cleaning is like not changing the oil in your car or truck. Also, measure the COAL with an ogive gauge constantly to maintain the distance into or away from the lands the barrel likes.

 

[TobiasPA]

This thread is really testing my resolve to keep going on my "no bore cleaning" experiment

Sure made me feel guilty for not cleaning one of my 308s. I was 125 rounds into that experiment before I caved. Factory barrel, accuracy was fine, velocities were stable, handloads using BL-C2 and RE15. All going well, right?

Cleaned the poor thing yesterday. The first few patches did feel like being dragged across 60 grit sandpaper. I have never seen so much crud coming out of a barrel. Should have taken before and after pictures.

I guess cleaning frequency is a personal choice; depending on barrel, caliber, powder and application but I'm back to cleaning after each range session.

 

[ButterBean]

I want to make a quick update, I got feeling guilty so I blew the dust off of my cleaning supplies and cleaned everything, My whim is now over, Even though I had no accuracy loss after three evenings, two gallons of KG1 and KG12, three brushes and a bag and a half of patches I will be cleaning every 100 rounds or so, The first patch that came out of the 270 looked like Pennsylvania Crude Oil, It embarrassed me and I was the only one there
Bean

 

[shootallday]

Anything I buy used or new gets cleaned to bare metal. After that everything is stored in a rust blocking case and never cleaned unless accuracy (groups) falls off.

Exactly what I do. I'll run a lightly oiled patch after deer season but that's it.

 

[North Idaho Hunter]

@TobiasPA & @ButterBean we've all been there, I like to think of it as a controlled variable in the big scheme of precision shooting.

Check off one variable that we as shooters can control - the less things we have to scratch our heads with when our bullets don't land where we aim!

 

[ButterBean]

I'm gonna give another update, I shot the 308 last night, 25 rounds loaded with Varget, Just to see for myself I ran the KG carbon cleaner through it, the first 4 patches looked like coal dust and even though I have proved to myself that accuracy was still good after 400 + rounds I will now be cleaning at every outing, by the way it was dead on after 1 fouler

 

[Tac-O]

I've been working on learning a bit about a certain load I've been shooting with a new magnetospeed. I'm so very tempted to clean my bore to steel after nailing down my load to see how long it takes to get back to the same speeds. I have quite an arsenal of cleaners to attack that carbon if I do!

PS: I have to clean my kid's 7mm08 Savage tonight. That one is really bothering me... maybe that will get the need to clean out of my system for a bit

 

[keithcandler]

I hope you guys will buy either a Teslong or Lyman bore scope, 100 rounds of varget....holy cow...that stuff does not come out easy, R#15 either, while C2 cleans pretty easy. Good Bronze bristle brushes, JB, patches on tight punch type jags.

Small groups abound!

 

[ButterBean]

I hope you guys will buy either a Teslong or Lyman bore scope, 100 rounds of varget....holy cow...that stuff does not come out easy, R#15 either, while C2 cleans pretty easy. Good Bronze bristle brushes, JB, patches on tight punch type jags.

Small groups abound!

Explain to me why I need a bore scope

 

[blueprairiedog]

Explain to me why I need a bore scope

You haven't seen the patient until you see the hole patient.when you do everything you can and still have a issue a bore scope might show the problem

 

[ButterBean]

You haven't seen the patient until you see the hole patient.when you do everything you can and still have a issue a bore scope might show the problem

I understand what your saying, I just wonder how did we ever shoot any kind of accurate groups before a bore scope, I know I'm old school and I have said before I'm sure it is a useful tool but not necessary and I don't need one, I was taught to feel what your bore is telling you, If you pay attention you can feel carbon deposits, You can feel if its shot out and needs set back, If you get a bore scope and you see fire cracking what are you gonna do about it?????? Change powder sure but there aint no fixing that. If you will read back away's you will see I ran 450+ rounds through my 308 without touching it, felt guilty and cleaned it, Lead feels great, Throat is as smooth as silk with no absolutely no noticeable change down the tube, shot the exact same group as the prior 450 rounds so in my old school frame of mind, I don't care what it looks like, Just my two pennies

 

[blueprairiedog]

I understand what your saying, I just wonder how did we ever shoot any kind of accurate groups before a bore scope, I know I'm old school and I have said before I'm sure it is a useful tool but not necessary and I don't need one, I was taught to feel what your bore is telling you, If you pay attention you can feel carbon deposits, You can feel if its shot out and needs set back, If you get a bore scope and you see fire cracking what are you gonna do about it?????? Change powder sure but there aint no fixing that. If you will read back away's you will see I ran 450+ rounds through my 308 without touching it, felt guilty and cleaned it, Lead feels great, Throat is as smooth as silk with no absolutely no noticeable change down the tube, shot the exact same group as the prior 450 rounds so in my old school frame of mind, I don't care what it looks like, Just my two pennies

Yep I get what you're saying but in my case I shot low velocity loads at a known distance and 2 friends started shooting at 1000 yards give or take so I switched from imr4831 to H4350 to get my velocity up to go shoot with them and brass was starting to get hard to extract before max charge so we went to a friends house and bore scoped and found a place near the shoulder that was scratched when it was reamed I polished it out myself and it solved the problem I wasted more Berger Bullets then the Amazon bore scope cost but I still have 20 other rifles that have never been bore scoped just old school feel

 

[blueprairiedog]

Yep I get what you're saying but in my case I shot low velocity loads at a known distance and 2 friends started shooting at 1000 yards give or take so I switched from imr4831 to H4350 to get my velocity up to go shoot with them and brass was starting to get hard to extract before max charge so we went to a friends house and bore scoped and found a place near the shoulder that was scratched when it was reamed I polished it out myself and it solved the problem I wasted more Berger Bullets then the Amazon bore scope cost but I still have 20 other rifles that have never been bore scoped just old school feel

And we still haven't been to either one those long range shoots thanks covid 19