What do you use to clean lead out of a barrel? "Elbow grease" I know.

Hoppes makes brownish goo that upon soaking frees Pb chamber rings from revolver cylinders. One needs to follow directions and work with it outside. The organic smell of this stuff is overwhelming, worse then plastic model plane glue.

Start by running a few jacketed bullets loads through the gun before you leave the range. Then, Kroil, Ballistol or whatever gun oil, a brass brush with some copper chore boy wrapped around it, and scrub.

Is the Lewis lead remover still made? Hoppe's may have sold them under their brand for a while. It looks like a brass screen from one of those 70s era head shop pipes with a hole in the middle that fits over a rubber plug & gets pulled thru the bore. Works well. The device is also adjustable for use on forcing cones.

There's always mercury if all else fails.

Lead-Away cloth wrapped around a jag to fit the bore tightly will work. I don't know if that's even still available though.

There's another product that works but I cannot recall what it is called. It is a soft metallic material shaped like those foil icecicles we used to hang in Christmas trees. Wrap a bronze brush with a few strands of that stuff and clean like you normally would (Hoppe's No.9 for me).

Hoppes tornado brushes always work for me... takes some elbow grease, but the the lead comes out.

Lewis lead remover. However, experimenting with other cast bullet diameters and lead hardness could reduce your leading situation.

This:

[img]https://www.smithandwessonforums.com/attachments/image-jpg[/img]

Whoops! Not sure why the picture isn't showing. Oh well, just click on it.

Damn! Clicking on it doesn't work either.

What I'm trying to show an image of is the Lewis Lead Remover Kit. Available at Brownells.

That right there is the quickest and easiest way - both the jacketed bullets and copper/brass scouring pad.

A standard brass bore brush with a few strands of the scouring pad wrapped around it - it doesn't take much - will pull crumbs of lead out with each pass. Easy peasy, no more elbow grease required than normal cleaning. The pad material will break apart as well, but you use so little of it that one pad will last a very long time.

Not sure which brand I use since I threw the packaging away long ago, but it looks just like this. I cut off about a 2" individual strand and wrap it around the bore brush.



The Lewis Lead Remover also works very well. I've had one for decades but honestly, strands of copper or brass pad wrapped around a standard bore brush works just as well and is easier to use. If you want to try the Lewis, Brownell's still sells them. You can get the whole shebang for $39.99 or just the working parts for $19.99.

https://www.brownells.com/tools-cle...es-mops/lewis-lead-remover-handgun-kits/

https://www.brownells.com/tools-cle...ches-mops/lewis-lead-remover-rifle-kits/ - it says rifle kit but as far as I can see it's just the same handgun kit and you supply the cleaning rod.

The Big 45 pad looks like a coarse scrubbing pad but it’s a metal that is softer than steel. A few strands of it around a bronze brush will pull lead out really quickly and won’t hurt the barrel steel.

A soak in Kroil plus pure copper chore boy wound around a worn bore brush. Make sure you get pure copper (Amazon has it). Most of the grocery store stuff is copper coated steel and you don’t want that.

That's the stuff I was talking about. I'd forgotten what it looks like in the package because I've been using the same bore brushes wrapped with that stuff for any lead removal for many years. I guess they've lasted so long because I've lucked into the right alloy and the right sizing, so leading just isn't much of a problem for me anymore.

Thanks for the replies. I stopped at the local grocery store and got pure copper a Chore Boy pad. The other ideas will be tried too.
Dave

Pair it with a *good* penetrant soak. It will get under the lead and help lift it off. It is amazing what will come out of a heavily leaded bore. I have a .22 that leaded badly with poor ammo. A brush wouldn’t touch it, but Kroil and the copper chore boy sent curls of lead out of the barrel shaped like rifling. It took a couple rounds of soak and scrub to de-lead the barrel. Thanks Winchester Wildcat.

I use Hoppes #9, Kroil, copper scrub pads wrapped around bore brushes, tornado brushes, lead wipe away clothes, and time.

The Kroil is very good stuff.

Shoot jacketed before leaving range + Lewis Lead Removal tool

Some of us have deep seated prejudices against jacketed handgun bullets.

Brass brush and kroil for me.
Jacketed bullets don’t do it.

Lewis lead remover, been using one for years. I made a flat steel plate to replace the t-handle, put the plate on the floor and stand on it pull the lead remover thru the barrel using the revolver as a handle. Works really well for me especially when using new brass screens that haven't been thru the bore yet.

How often do you guys clean for lead? It’s occurred to me that I have some revolvers with hundreds of rounds of cast bullets through them since I’ve last scrubbed with copper. I do occasionally shoot jacketed bullets in them so maybe that works at least some?

I never felt that shooting jacketed bullets in a leaded bore helped clear the bore of lead residue. A properly sized and lubed cast bullet is actually pretty clean shooting.

+1 on the Chore Boy. Two is pretty close to a lifetime supply. Should cost less than $10 at the grocery store. Or you may already have one under your sink.


Okie John

I don't have any that really collect lead but Kroil has really worked well for me.

Lead Away patches worked for me.

Used my last ones on a gunked 686.

So went to store and bought more, in case I ever need em.
The 686 wasnt mine, was a buds. He didnt believe that stuff could be better than all the elbow grease he used previously

Made a believer out of him.

Problem was sticking mag cases in cylnder. Prev owner must have shot a lot of lead 38 spcl

For me, the best investment to do away with leading in revolvers was investing in a set of pin gauges for all my revolver calibers. After determining the throat diameter, go find bullets of that diameter. No more leading.

Lead away patches will also remove bluing, so be careful with them. And pin gauges and marching bullet diameter/appropriate hardness, etc are all well and good unless you are shooting a .22.

exactly what I've said for years all it does is Polish the lead .. and the last couple years I've actually used a borescope to confirm this...
even mentioned this a couple times somewhere in these forms and usually take a beat down for it because nobody will listen to that..

I don’t think there is a man alive with more knowledge and understanding on lead bullet performance and solving lead bullet problems than Veral Smith of Idaho. To those who are serious about shooting cast lead bullets at velocity his book ‘ Jacketed Performance with Cast Bullets ‘ is the Bible. Honestly I don’t even know if the book is still available cause for years it wasn’t. Life has been a series of hard climbs for this man from having been hunted down and imprisoned for some politically motivated IRS infractions. Then he survives and restarts his mold and other accessories business when his entire shop burns down. You can’t keep this man and his Wife down. So don’t write them off. I sent them a check a few years ago for not a lot but thinking anything will help.

Anyway there is so much more than casting lead bullets, lubing and shooting. Barrels that lead up generally have a problem where hot gases are hitting the bullet base and the bullet design and size is allowing the high temp gas to escape around the base causing the lead to melt and smear the barrel. With softer lead and softer loads like Bullseye the bullet base obturates or upsets from the pressure wave hitting it. This generally forces the base of the bullet into the grooves so that it is fully engraved into the rifling and seals off and prevents escaping gas and smearing. To handle more velocity the bullet alloy needs to be harder or stiffer. Veral Smith explains and likes to harden or temper in the oven but that is beyond this post. Most of us just drop hot cast bullets into a bucket of water that quenches and hardens. Actually bullets will harden with some age. So the faster you go with your lead bullets the more the BHN hardness becomes critical. After alloying it may be your bullets and their base design need gas checks, another step but checks work and with a few of my SA revolvers improve accuracy.

Bullet design which is where a good mold comes in is so critical that lead, lube and everything else means zilch without a properly sized and designed bullet for your gun. A good mold maker will walk you through much of this but slugging your barrel, letting him know what kind of shooting you’re doing and some details about your revolvers and what weight and type of bullets you are shooting is all very important if you want a mold to drop an accurate bullet.

Then lube which since the early Schuetzen days is a well guarded secret made from all kinds of things no longer found. Anyway all bullet lubes have temp ranges and other characteristics that lend the recipe to different types of shooting, bullets and velocity. This subject and the ingredients will make you dizzy but it’s entertaining. Veral Smith covers all in his writings. I have to say this guy is an absolute encyclopedia on cast bullet performance and no matter whether you touch all the technical bases just his basics will improve things dramatically.

The Lewis Lead Remover was developed back when cast lead bullets were king. Why, cause it works

Rick

If it's real bad I use bronze bristle tornado brush and hoppes bore cleaner.

Lewis Lead Remover for me since the 80's.

^^^This^^^

Been using it for years when shooting cheap, soft swaged lead bullets.

I will add that properly sized hard cast bullets do not creat a lead build up in my barrels.
Not even on my Glocks, contrary to typical Internet Bullschitt.

Used to use that years ago before I discovered the products mentioned in my above post.

Veral Smith’s LBT bullet designs and molds are the best produced bullet molds I’ve ever owned or used. Barr none!

A good solvent like Hoppes #9 for a soak and then Remclean (I think it's called 40x now) or JB bore paste on a patch wrapped around an undersized brush. Works great on heavy copper fouling too.