TargetTalk

Hi again.
I am trying to become a more disciplined shooter, and I have read about the importance of cleaning my smallbore rifle barrrel, as it apparently contributes to better grouping. I am using the cleaning rod, after every training session (approx 150 rounds) with both solvent and patches (vfg). I have noticed, however, that my groups in prone have deteriorated instead of improving, as I was hoping.
I remember long time ago a Cuban coach once told me not to use solvent before competing, but only clean patches, as it takes "a while" to get the barrel performing optimally.
Anyone knows on average how many rounds you have to shoot before getting your barrel back in good shape?

Hello, You picked a bad topic if you wanted a direct answer. If you ask 100 people how to clean and what not, you will get just about 100 different answers.


Well i think you should clean about every 300 rounds or so. Also make sure you are using a one piece coated cleaning rod and a bore guide.

Solvents are ok, but i recommend you use some kroil oil. Dosnt hurt anything and works great for smallbore barrels.

The groups you are seeing after cleaning are normal to most smallbore guns that i have seen. You need to put some rounds down the tube before it groups well. some take 5 rounds some take 105 rounds. it really depends on your rifle. My personnal smallbore, i clean it, i shoot it and it just shoots good no matter what. but thats not in all cases, you really just have to test it out to see how many rounds it takes.

I have seen some take 50-75 rounds to get back to shooting well. but since your rifle is taking atleast prone to get back to shooting well i would clean every 300 rounds or so.

I clean mine when i will have 1 one day of practice before a match to get some lead down the barrel again...i would clean it really well and then have an easy practice...won an ncaa championship doing that...figure out how many rounds your gun likes before your grouping is nice and tight and how many is to many and yhr groups get nigger and clean it before it gets to that point...but always run a clean patch though the barrel after practice to get all the junk that is in it from shooting it and then a littel bit of oil on a patch. that way you dont have as much carbon build up.

Brain

do not use solvent, just oil. You will not loss your grouping. it will still leave the wax in bore.

There is never any wax left in the bore anyway, only carbon, lead particles and the remains of the primer compund. The wax on the bullet is vaporized as soon as the explosion occurs when you fire the bullet. The only reason the wax is on the bullet is to stop the lead oxidizing in the packet.

So, the oil is after passing a few clean patches, so to leave it there for next training session?

This is my current process for cleaning my .22 rifle

At the start of the session

one wet felt (currently using 009 solvent)
one wet nylon brush, little scrub but gentle one
dry felts until clean - i use VFG felts, i will put the wet one through at the end of the jag and from the 2nd dry felt i will tighten the felt up in the jag making it expand and fill the rifling grooves

At the end of the session i will push dry felts through the rifle, the first being loose and the remainder being tight

the reason i do this way is because

firstly at the start, i once heard someone saying how solvents left in the barrel could cause corrosion, thats why i use solvents at the start of the shoot

Plus i am removing everything from the barrel to start with so i have no risk of leaving anything in there and damaging it and to do this means leaving the rifle stripped down more or less so i am putting everything back on then like a fresh start so nothing can go wrong (at least down to user error)

At the end of the shoot, the debris left in the barrel can also corrode the barrel so it is important to remove all this, it is usually unburnt powder and carbon deposits left from the shoot.


With regards to the Wax, this is only applied to the bullets to aid inserting the round into the breech, nothing else (one of my best friends works at Eley)


so there you go, this is how i clean my rifle, obviously using a rod guide!!!

Last two english matches i shot were 599 & 598 and 3x20's 578 & 586 so it works for me!!!!


hope this helps!