How Often Do You Have To Clean a Gun (Really)?
BY Herschel Smith
2 years, 6 months ago
I clean my muzzle loader every time I shoot it. I’ll let an AR-15 go several hundred rounds before I even ponder whether I should maybe think about planning to plan to clean it some time in the future (but not today).
I know a guy who proudly stated to me that “The sun won’t got down on me before I clean a gun I shot that day.” The only reason I didn’t tell him he’s wasting his time is that he shoots CommBloc guns with corrosive ammunition.
On October 5, 2021 at 11:13 pm, X said:
With rare exceptions (stainless handguns and .22s, nitrided guns like Glocks) clean them every time. Gas burns oil off the chamber and bore. Humidity can and will make them rust. Salt in sweat and fingerprints will make blued guns rust. Powder fouling can cake onto moving parts.
I learned the hard way. Early in my shooting career, I had a Swedish Mauser that I didn’t clean for a week and the chamber started to rust. Thankfully it did not pit and I was able to scrub it out. I shot a match 20 years ago with my first AR, and didn’t have time to clean it before I went camping for a week. I though “It’s a military gun, it won’t rust!” It did. When I got back there was rust on the forward assist and I had a difficult time getting the bolt out of battery. When I finally got it to move and I broke it down, I found that the tail of the bolt had begun to rust inside the carrier from humidity. I scrubbed it off with steel wool and oil, but it had pitted.
I have seen Garands that were not cleaned, the chambers got pitted and the owners got stuck cases the next time they tried to shoot them. I have heard of Mini-14 actions getting stuck when the charge handle block rusts onto the gas piston.
Unless you live in a very arid place like Arizona or are shooting stainless guns, clean and oil them every time you shoot them and oil them every time you handle them.
On October 6, 2021 at 10:19 am, Factions Speak Louder Than Herds said:
After a few hundred rounds. AR’s have the chrome lined barrel and some pistols as well and they don’t need to be cleaned so often.
Never use the cheap subpar Eastern Bloc ammo unless the weapon prefers it.
On October 6, 2021 at 11:20 am, Fred said:
OTOH, if you think hyper inflation, government seizing the means of production, or a violent commie revolt, or total market collapse, or dollar goes to zero globally, or etc. could could happen overnight then perhaps keeping all of your gear tip top would be wise. Although the warning signs for these kinds of events sometimes appear years or decades in advance of the actual event of collapse into chaos is very very sudden.
And one thing is for sure, when the premil dispos are raptured out of here, then you’ll know it’s too late to clean your weapons.
On October 6, 2021 at 12:31 pm, Whynot said:
I’ve had a unit guy (retired) tell me he only cleaned the chamber of his weapons. A 2Para guy who is now a civilian instructor who stated he never cleans his ARs, only keeping them well-oiled.
I’ve had an AR(AeroPrecision) that was cleaned twice (before and after simunition) and was replaced after 13k rounds….nitride-barrel.
One difference for me is whether the ammo used is corrosive or not.
On October 6, 2021 at 12:40 pm, RHT447 said:
As we old guys like to say, “Depends”.
Everything gets wiped down before being secured if only because I seem to have a body chemistry that will rust everything from plywood to platinum.
Anything shot with corrosive propellant gets cleaned same day without fail. Some years back something came up and I had to let an SKS sit for a few days. Thankfully it wasn’t any longer than that.
Anything else goes over a hundred rounds gets cleaned soon. It’s a compromise between convenience and letting it get so gummed up it HAS to be cleaned, right when you HAVE to use it.
When I shot Bullseye Pistol competition, if a gun was running and winning, we left well enough alone until in began to malfunction.
When I shot NRA Highpower Rifle, I tried out molly coated bullets. I ran a 308 bolt gun somewhere past 400 rounds without touching the bore. Molly lived up to it’s claims and accuracy held. I ran a patch down the bore and felt a rough spot in front of the chamber where there seemed to be some carbon build up, and decided it was time to clean the bore with Kroil.
On October 6, 2021 at 12:53 pm, Georgiaboy61 said:
The question dovetails with the legalities of self-defense and defensive firearms use. If there is any possibility at all that you may be called-upon to prove that your FA was not fired – then it is only sensible to keep such a firearm clean. In particular, its bore and chamber.
Advanced chemical-physical techniques are now available which can distinguish between “old” bore resides and new, i.e., such as neutron-activation analysis and other advanced analytical chemistry methods, but it is best not to count on those. If you take your self-defense/CCW handgun to the range, then clean it afterwards so that you won’t be caught upon the horns of this particular dilemma.
It is fairly rare to encounter now, but corrosive primer salts can ruin a barrel and chamber if left unattended in the aftermath of use. Windex or other ammonia-containing compounds work to remove such residues, or failing that, warm soap and water followed by your usual cleaning regimen.
Opinions vary as to how often gilding (copper) fouling needs to be removed from the barrel. Many authorities recommend cleaning metallic fouling each time the FA is used, but others say only when accuracy begins to degrade. If you are someone who needs consistent performance from shot-to-shot professionally, such as a police or military precision marksman, then SOP would be to clean the barrel down to the bare metal each time the rifle is used, followed by one fouling shot. That way, the cold bore behaves in a similar manner from one use to the next.
Anecdotally, certain firearms seem to perform well-enough when dirty, and others do not. There is no hard-and-fast formula for determining which is which, just experience. Modern bore/chamber coatings have done wonders to extend the interval between cleanings, for such things as AR15s.
On October 6, 2021 at 1:00 pm, JoeFour said:
A bit off topic but in the ball park …
“Conrad Waddington was assigned to Coastal Air Command during WW II and asked to find out why their B-24 Libertators had such a high rate of downtime. What he discovered was rather non-intuitive, to Engineers and mechanics.
“The airplanes were by and large reliable, but after every 50 hours of flying time, they were scheduled for a series of routine maintenance procedures, designed to increase reliability of the aircraft. What Waddington discovered was that after these preventative maintenance procedures, the aircraft were actually less reliable for a while, as systems that were disturbed by the mechanics in maintenance required further maintenance to repair.”
http://livingstingy.blogspot.com/2011/03/waddington-effect.html