Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Removing copper fouling from barrels

DMB, thanks for your "Welcome aboard".
This seems to be good site with interesting topics and has so many people offering info and ideas, and I appreciate all the responses.
It is also great to have gun writers such as Mule Deer pitching in with his well respected opinions as well.

I have used Wipe Out, along with a few others, but was hoping to find something even better, and you have given me some other cleaners to try that I haven't yet, such as Ultra Bore Coat and Montana Extreme.
Thanks to one all for your help.

Wipe Out.
I have trouble find it available at retailers around where I live, and ordering it online makes for expensive shipping. Oh well it's worth it.

Most of the stores around here carry the Gunslick foaming cleaner- have no idea if it is as good, better, or whatever, than Wipe Out, but I have had nothing but good results with the Wipe Out product.

John, are you using the Montana Extreme bore solvent, copper cream, or the 50 BMG solvent?

Thanks,
Ryan

I was just composing a reply asking the same thing.

Have gone to the store looking for "Montana Extreme" to replace my Sweet's and JB compound but ended up walking away shaking my head over which one to get.


Actually, I have the UBC kit but haven't gotten around to cleaning any rifle down to absolute bare metal yet to apply it.

Just a quick note. Ultra Bore Coat isn't a cleaner but a barrel treatment to keep your barrel from fouling excessively. I wasn't sure if you realized that from the way you worded it.

hey i got turned onto a product call ed wipe out it the best money can buy its a foam and you just spray it in the barrel let is stand for about 20 minutes and presto its done and dont get the wife mad about the smell eitherits made in kansas and you can contact them on the net @www.sharpshooter.com it kind of har to get from sporting good store i dont understand it maybe they need better marketing or something but its the best i have found and it really taking holdin the benchrest circles as a matter of fact as soon as i get off here iam going to ordera case tired of running out and having to orfer a few cans

Wipe out is a real mess to use when I have tried it. I still have two cans of the origional.

What technique do you use?

In case you missed my earlier post, Bore Tech won't harm bores, is non-toxic and works fast with nothing more complicated than using patches. I can't recommend it enough. I don't see it in many stores, but it's easy to order online.

I plug the bore with my bore guide, lay the rifle horizontally on it's side and give a small squirt of Wipe-Out into the muzzle.
You learn fast not to use too much or it doesn't seem to ever stop expanding.
The bore guide is already in so you just run a patch through it and push all the fouling out the muzzle.

Azar...thanks for the heads up about Ultra Bore.

That may be the kind of product I will try after getting these bores clean again, as I am getting tired of removing the copper

Kentucky Windage...thanks too for the info on Bore Tech...will check and see if it is available here in BC.
Glad it works so well for you...hope it does the same for my guns, as it sounds pretty simple to use.

Patch-Out is the same stuff as Wipe-Out but in a liquid form instead of a foam. You short stroke a patch with it in your bore and it foams right up. Let it set 1/2 hr and dry patch it out. The same results on copper without the mess.

Ryan and Jim,

I use the Montana Extreme bore solvent.

The 50 BMG is good if you want to get copper out right now, as it's one of the more aggresive solvents. But I don't put up with bores that really copper-foul anymore, instead installing UBC. So my bottle of 50 BMG has gone unused for a while now.

Just keep running saturated patches thru till they come out white. If you want to speed it up, use a nylon brush -- not bronze, as it will impart the same purple/blue color to the patch. Seldom takes me more than half a dozen or so patches. Your mileage may vary depending on the degree of copper buildup.

Since I last posted I have been to the suppliers here in Kamloops, and found that none of Montana Extreme, Bore Tech or UBC are available here.
So I will be giving the Patch Out version of Wipe Out a go.

Also, of the products available here, it is what is most recommended by the guys in the shops here.

Thanks guys for all your suggestions !

90%Kroil/10% JB's for 10 strokes with a bronze brush, followed by 2 patches of Kroil and 3 dry patches. If it still looks a bit dirty, I repeat, then follow with Butch's or Montana extreme. After all that, all the carbon has been removed. This will get you shooting again. If I'm finished for the day, then I do all of the above, plus Wipeout or Foamout. This gets the last of the carbon and all the copper.

For a truly fouled bore, after all the above, I keep running Wipeout through the bore until it no longer shows color. For one 6.5X55 I worked on (probably hadn't been cleaned since 1915), it took 3 days of Wipeout application. Afterwards, it came out clean and shot like a charm.

An old benchrester told me about a 3:1 mix of Shooters Choice and Kroil, and I haven't really switched since then. I may have to modernize at some point. I dislike having to do the JB scrub in the bad foulers, but there are only two of those. I scrubbed out a new Savage tactical .308 and applied UBC before taking it out yesterday. Gotta run a couple patches through and see how it worked.

I just mix some JB in a small dropper bottle with Kroil. Its no more difficult to use, IMO, than your run of the mill solvent. For my better barrels, a few strokes of this stuff is enough.

I should try UBC. I inherited a badly pitted .30-06 that, for sentimental reasons, I would like to leave as-is. It has to be cleaned every 10 rounds, or it starts to pattern, rather than group.

UBC is directly ordered from their website. You won't find it on shelves.

I'm surprised at all the people that have found wipe out to be so messy. I wrapped a plastic straw with masking tape to the diameter of the neck and insert it in the chamber end and squirt two half second bursts (wait a little between squirts) into the barrel. Wait long enough for the foam to expand before pulling the straw out, set the rifle in a cardboard box with some V notches cut in it so that the barrel points slightly down and put a rag under the muzzle. Done. No mess.

It's by far the best copper cleaner I've used and I just haven't felt the need to try anything else since finding it. I clean the powder fouling first with some Hoppe's #9, probably for sentimental reasons more than anything, patch that out, foam the bore and let the wipe out do it's thing.

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