Would kerosene and liberal amounts of elbow grease yield the same result as would some fancy-assed cleaner? Is there a cleaner I can mix up at home that will allow me to get the greater portion of crap out, then go in for the kill with a commercial cleaner?

Mix up some Ed's Red. I've used it, works pretty well for regular cleaning. Doesn't do much on copper fouling.

Formula:
http://home.comcast.net/~dsmjd...mjd/tech/eds_red.htm

Hello,
Ed's Red is a good choice, but as mentioned before not suitable for copper removal. Several of us in my area us GM Top Engine Cleaner which can be purchased reasonably at any GM/Chevy dealer parts department. Am told same as Shooter's Choice and less money as well.
Have used it for some 10 plus years in my match rifles and works fine. Hoppe's No. 9 is very good commercial solvent as well. Half Kroil, half Top Engine Cleane is good combo. Just a suggestion.

martin

I have been operating under the impression that Top Engine Cleaner is no longer available to the public in the pint-can size. I last bought a can over two years ago. Is it still to be had? Or have I been had?

The original Top Engine Cleaner has been discontinued by GM. The new, replacement for it appears to be a 2 part venture. I was fortunate to have purchased a quantity of the old stuff before it disappeared. Haven't had a need to try the new stuff.

Well, you may well be correct that Top Engine Cleaner as I knew it is not available?? As mentioned, have not had a need to buy for couple years myself for last batch I bought was through friend who owns auto garage and bought a case of the stuff-life time supply so to speak. Do have a quart of the old Hoppe's NO. 9 still around and did hear that it is no longer the same concoction?? "Change" seems to be the operative word these days!!

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:
Would kerosene and liberal amounts of elbow grease yield the same result as would some fancy-assed cleaner? Is there a cleaner I can mix up at home that will allow me to get the greater portion of crap out, then go in for the kill with a commercial cleaner?

When you really think about it, how much do you really spend on a good gun cleaning solvent? And isn't that a fairly small price to pay to protect and maintain your firearms?

I use KG products and while they're not cheap, they work great on my minor collection of 14 long guns and three handguns.

I'd rather pay a little more and know I'm doing the best for my guns.

quote:

Originally posted by Shof:

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:
Would kerosene and liberal amounts of elbow grease yield the same result as would some fancy-assed cleaner? Is there a cleaner I can mix up at home that will allow me to get the greater portion of crap out, then go in for the kill with a commercial cleaner?

When you really think about it, how much do you really spend on a good gun cleaning solvent? And isn't that a fairly small price to pay to protect and maintain your firearms?

I use KG products and while they're not cheap, they work great on my minor collection of 14 long guns and three handguns.

I'd rather pay a little more and know I'm doing the best for my guns.

I'm with this guy.

quote:

When you really think about it, how much do you really spend on a good gun cleaning solvent? And isn't that a fairly small price to pay to protect and maintain your firearms?

I tend to slop the stuff all over the place when I clean, which is always outside before I leave where I was shooting. I want a cheap cleaner that doesn't cause me to wince if I were to tip the bottle over and watch $20 spill out onto the ground. What's the cost of the commercial guncleaners per gallon-- 20, 30 or 40 bucks a gallon? See what I mean?

quote:

tend to slop the stuff all over the place when I clean, which is always outside before I leave where I was shooting. I want a cheap cleaner that doesn't cause me to wince if I were to tip the bottle over and watch $20 spill out onto the ground. What's the cost of the commercial guncleaners per gallon-- 20, 30 or 40 bucks a gallon? See what I mean?

Buy it by the quart or gallon and watch the unit price go down, those little 2 or 4 oz bottles are expensive.

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:
I tend to slop the stuff all over the place when I clean, which is always outside before I leave where I was shooting. I want a cheap cleaner that doesn't cause me to wince if I were to tip the bottle over and watch $20 spill out onto the ground. What's the cost of the commercial guncleaners per gallon-- 20, 30 or 40 bucks a gallon? See what I mean?

I don't know how to say this without sounding like a jerk, but good lord, JUST BE CAREFUL! How hard can it be to watch what you're doing and not spill?

And if you're using a quality cleaner, cleaning your firearms on a regular basis, you won't need gallons!

Why use cleaners SPECIFICALLY designed for guns, that might be more pricy than bulk products....

Because MY guns are worth it.

quote:

cleaning your firearms on a regular basis

I never was for obsessive fastidiousness...

quote:

How hard can it be to watch what you're doing and not spill?

I'm outside. I'm not as careful outside where I can tip over the bottle and not have it destroy the carpet...

I make my owne "Ed's Red gun cleaner.
Use equal parts of:
K-1 Kerosene
Varsol/Oil paint thiner [About $2 a gallon at Wal*Mart]
Dextron 2 or 3

quote:

I make my owne "Ed's Red gun cleaner.
Use equal parts of:
K-1 Kerosene
Varsol/Oil paint thinner [About $2 a gallon at Wal*Mart]
Dextron 2 or 3

Now, that's an easy recipe! Everything there is easier to get than is the exotic stuff like acetone, mineral spirits and iguana blood...

quote:

Originally posted by MADISON:
I make my owne "Ed's Red gun cleaner.
Use equal parts of:
K-1 Kerosene
Varsol/Oil paint thiner [About $2 a gallon at Wal*Mart]
Dextron 2 or 3

I use the same, but with an equal part of acetone also.

quote:

use KG products and while they're not cheap, they work great on my minor collection of 14 long guns and three handguns.

I'd rather pay a little more and know I'm doing the best for my guns.

In the past 40 years I have tested just about every cleaner there is and KG is by far the best for Rifles and Pistols. Ed's Red is the best for Shotguns.

While on the subject...what about Kroil as a solvent? I have been using that exclusively for a while. Is it NOT a good solvent?

I clean first with Kroil. Then with Sweet's. Then some Kroil again. Occasionally I use some JB's on some rifles.

But not to get off subject...what about Kroil as a cleaning solvent???

Kroil is a penetrating oil. After I clean a Rifle Barrel I run a patch with about 3 drops of Kroil on it thru the bore to keep it moist.

I have used your method, but believe me KG is faster and cheaper in the long run. You will use fewer patch's and be done sooner.

Thats what I use kroil for when done cleaning I run some down the bore and then run a clean patch after! Its suppost to creep in and maybe make it easier to clean next time! But I think it helps with the accuracy of the rifle also!

I clean anywhere from 1 to 15 firearms a week on a regular basis. I use Simple Green for 99% of the work, going to copper or lead specific cleaners if necessary. The stuff is safer to use than petroluem based solvents, smells OK, and does not wreck the skin. I do have some Ed's Red on hand for the really bad ones when I need to soak one for a week. You be the judge!

Herei s a link to all kind sof homemade solvents

http://www.frfrogspad.com/homemade.htm#Bore%20Cleaner

Home brew,
It is a cold hard truth and fact that far more rifle bores (accurate or not) are ruined by incorrect or bad claning methods than are ever actually "shot out". Most of this incorrect cleaning stems from gun owners eithor not knowing or not willing to learn how to clean their rifles correctly as well as not being willing to invest $200-$250 or so dollars in a high quality gun claning kit that if used and cared for properly will last as long as any rifle will. I am willimg to bet alot of guys have any where from $3000-$4000 worth of firearms and to not be willing to invest less than 10% of the money you spent on rifles, slug guns, shotguns and scopes to keep your rifles in tip top shooting shape is just plane stupid.
I mean just add up what I have in rifles, bolt action slug guns, muzzleloders,shotguns and handguns and I am waaaaaay past $4000.

About 7 or 8 years ago I made myself 5 gallons of "Big EDs Red" and still have about 3.5+ gallons left even after giving away 1 gallon to my partner. IMHO Eds is basicly home made Hopes #9.
I shall refer to Big Eds Red from this point on as "BEsR"

I mixed all five gallons for less than $25.00. I use BEsR for all my non copper fowling removal and general gun and gun parts cleaning and it works as well as anything I have ever tried abd its extreamlty cheap. I reclaim used BEsR as much as I can by filtering used/dirty BEsR through coffee filters. Do the same for my Hopes #9.

I shoot a great deal and hunt as much as i can so i am cleaning guns about 9 months out of the year so i had to come up with a cheap gun cleaning solvent.

I use BEsR to remove all fowling except copper and then use Wipe-Out for that.

In my muzzleloders and bolt slug guns that I shoot 100% sabot ammo with, I start with BEsR till all the carbon fowling is gone then I use Shooters Choice MC#7 as it is the best I have found for getting platic sabot fowling out.

For copper removal in my rifles I use Wipe-Out only.

I use after market new never used empty WD-40 pump spray bottles to apply all my non airasol claners so they can not spill and last a looooong time.

I can not say for certain but a bottle of Wipe out lasts me about one season of cleaning rifles. A 4oz bottle of Shooters Choice MC#7 will last me 3 and a half to almost four years. If I feel my rifles are badly carbon fowled like in the throat of the bore, I will clean one time with Birchwood Casey 2n1 bore claner as it has worke excellent for me in removing stubbern built up carbon fowling. I bought on a 2for1 sale two 16oz plastic pump bottles of B/C 2n1 cleaner about 12 years ago and still have both, although the first bottle I used is down to about 3-4ozs. My cleaning rods are all Deweys and they all are over 15 years old and all still in excellent shape despite heavy but carefull use.

The way I get my solvents to last so long is simple as it gets. I just exercise great care in using them and store them all in spill proof plastic pump bottles. The beauty of a pump bottle is it allows you to almost surgicly control the amount of solvent you use. Solvent that is left on you glove covered hand or runs out the end of your bore or winds up any where besides your patch or bore is simply waisted.

Another device that allows you to get the max use of your solvents and cut the solvent waist to the bone is a bore guide with a solvent port in it. The one I use has a solvent port so you can first incert your patch and then apply the solvent, so with a little care you litteraly waist zero solvent.

The way I look at it is I have rifles that are worth at todays replacement costs with optics over $1000 each rifle/scope combo and consider that I have been blessed with far more than my fair share of luck in terms of how accurate my rifles are I would be a penny wise and dollor foolish idiot to not take excellent care of my rifles bore.

In short if you add up all the money I have invested in fire arm cleaning equipment and supplies it is most likely around $3-400 dollars, and that includes the $$$ I spent on a life time supply of cleaning patches for all my firearms. That still is not even the cost of a new bolt action rifle with out optics. My non-solvent cleaning equipment and supplies should last me untill I no longer need to clean my firearms.

It kinda like investing $30,000 in a new shiney 4x4 pick up and not being willing to spend $15 every three months or around $60 a year to change the oil.

quote:

For copper removal in my rifles I use Wipe-Out only.

I have never used a copper remover. My barrels are all stainless, save for the AR carbines-- and I never clean those, anyway. Well, that's not entirely true. They get it, just not as thoroughly and with as much love as my stainless barrels. But back to cleaning...

I have found that just cleaning with Top Engine Cleaner and liberal amounts of elbow grease gets the crap out. After the brushing, I run four wet patches down the bore. The fourth one comes out pretty clean. I never see much in the way of copper residue on the last patch. Then I run a dry one to check for whatever might be in there. At last, I run a wet one to leave a thin coating of cleaner in there and into the case the rifle goes until next time...

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:

quote:

For copper removal in my rifles I use Wipe-Out only.

I have never used a copper remover.

I had a friend that said that. I got him to look in his barrel with a borescope. He started using copper remover.

If you haven't looked with a borescope you don't know if you have copper or not. GM-TEC will not get copper out. It's good for carbon. Period.

Fitch

Windex type glass cleaners with ammonia clean well including the copper fouling. Of course it needs to be used in conjunction with a good rust preventative. Additional thoughts: Hoppes #9 isn't very expensive in the larger containers, stainless needs some cleaning, and I haven't found a good cleaning regimen that doesn't require a fair amount of elbow grease.

The mane reason I went to Wipe-Out was I was looking for a way to clean my barrels that compleatly eliminated using phosforus bronze brushes that would haisten their demise.

I gave Wipe-Out a try for copper removal and have not looked back since. That was over six yeras ago and I have not bought a bronze bore cleaning since then eithor. I use and recomend Nylon bore brushes made my Isso and Montana Extream.

I rarely take more than 30 shots each with my rifles per range trip so I usually do not have to clean them while there. The only draw back to Wipe-Out is it is slower than most other cleaning solutions, but I like the "foam and forget" aspect of Wipe-Out.

The mane reason I like the home brew of Big Eds Red is as I said cost. A quart of Hoppes #9 is at least $20 I can make 16 Xs as much or five gallons of Big Eds Red for around $25.

Like I said, it makes no sence for me to invest $690 in a M700 and $350 in scope only to refuse to spend in compairison a few $$$ to buy a cleaning kit that contains the equipment and solvents to ensure I clean my investment properly. To clean my beloved rifles half a$$ is simply being cheap to the point of follishness.

Bottom line is thus: You must use a copper cleanor whos chemical make up actually will soften and then allow you to remove copper build up from your bore. Cleanors like Hopes#9, Big Eds, and so on will remove carbon, but you will be there untill your old if you use them to remove copper build up in your bore, and in the end you will still have alot of copper left in your bore.

Do this test one time only if you doubt me.
Shoot your rifle 15-30 times. Go home and clean the sh!t out of the bore using Hopes #9, GM-Tec or any solvent that is not by design formulated to spacificly remove copper build up in your bore. Clean it until you are certain there is no copper left in your bore.

Then clean it with Sweats-69 or Barnes CR-10 or any other top of the line copper remover, making sure to use a nylon brissle bore brush and trust me your pathches will come out deep indigo blue from all the left over copper fouling being removed.

I finaly was able to eliminate any false posatives I was getting from patches still coming out blue by buying the new Tipton nickle coated bore jags and no longer use brass ones, as the brass ones would react with the copper cleaners and get blue on my patches.

The first rule of a job well done is having the right tools to do a good job in the first place.

A personal observation, if you will:

I got the bug to shoot Hunter Class Benchrest many moons ago. The gunsmith built me a tightneck FL 308 that would stack 150gr MKs under a quarter-moa out to 300 using a Leupold 36X scope. I finished in the top five in every match I shot for three years. Finished seventh in the country the second year. He said "never put any kind of brush down that Lilja barrel. A patch with the GM top engine cleaner, and deprime/necksize your brass. Another wet patch, and reprime, charge your cases, a third patch and seat your bullets. A dry patch or two, and get back to shooting. Always use a boreguide, and a little Sweet's every couple hundred rounds". 3200+ rounds thru that rifle in three years, all at BR competition; and it still shot under 1/2moa out to 300 yards. I won the Oregon State HBR Championship the third year. I only had to discard three of the fifty cases I had due to case neck splits. Never a loose primer pocket. About 41 grains of H4895.
I'm a pretty good shot, and the guy I sold the rifle to a couple years later won a few 300 to 600 yard matches in Washington the next decade or so. Set a couple world records one summer.

Rich

30% wd40
30% ATF (doesn't matter which)
30% k1
remainder can be , Seafoam, Kroil, or Top cylinder lube, etc ... whatever you like the smell of that day... this is a general oil/lube, NOT a bore cleaner...

smells good, sticks to a rag, doesn't evaporate easy, and you can add your 10% back if it cooks off... oh, yeah, seafoam (naptha) is BAD for rubber

i love foaming bore cleaners, and the smell of hoppes.. btw, hoppes is pretty good stuff on an antbite

barnes copper solvent ROCKS for a copper fouled bore... sweets is pretty good stuff...

Idaho Sharpshooter,
Your post is a near mirror reflection of my rifle bore cleaning philosify. I rarely post what my thoughts are as when I do I have been harshly critisized and I do not have your credentals to back up my beleifs and counter my critics arguments.

About 15 or so years ago I met a guy at the gun range who was shooting better groups at 300yrds than I could AT THAT TIME (not so sinse) at 100. I asked him if he was willing to share with me how he shot so well. He did. But one thing he realy stressed was his cleaning philocify as well as his cleaning methods and rueteen.

I will not bore every one with all he told me but I will say this.
What shocked me the most was his absolute belief that:
#1-over cleaning and incorrect cleaning of a rifle bore will wear it out and or ruin it meny times faster than proper shooting ever could.
#2-You should never ever use phosforus bronze brushes to clean your bore. It took me a while to adopt this policy but I did, and have not used a bronze bore brush in well over a decade. I only use nylon bore brushes made my Isso or Montana Extream.
#3-You simply do not need to get a rifle bore 100% clean and free of all copper and doing so every time you shoot will greatly shorten a barrels usefull life and will not make it shoot its best or better.

He went on to tell me that a barrel in his opinion has a kind of sweet spot it gets from being dirty and once you find out what it is, leave it dirty and only clean it enough to maintain this sweet spots requierd dirtiness.

I have adopted this policy with all my rifles and have been rewarded with not just excellent accuracy, but CONSISTENTLY excellent accuracy.

The few times I have repeted this cleaning philosify I have been subject to some quite harsh correction, so I keep it to my self 99% of the time any more. Your post made me feel comfortable in stating it once again.

My most accurate rifle is a stainless steel composit stocked factory M700 in .338wm. It is most accurate when I have shot a minimum of 10 rounds and a max of around thirty. After thirty rounds I stop use a good carbon remover to get all carbon out and eithor give it one quick cleaning with Wipe-Out or a single cleaning with CR-10 per instructions on the CR-10 bottle.

I last time I shot that rifle from the bench at 200yrds my groups averaged ever so slightly under 1 inch and under 2" shooting off of Stony Point shooting sticks. Last time I was in Wyoming back in 08 I was shooting to 400yrds as that is the max I can shoot with my scope by using the different sized sections of my horizontal cross hair as a aiming point. I was able to keep 8 of ten shots in a colman fuel can, and even the two that missed the can would have still been in the vitals of a deer let alone a elk.

Now I know meny reading this will say that they get the best accuracy from a spotlessly clean bore and I hvae no doubt that is true FOR THEM. Nore do I say anyone should change the way they clean their rifles in favor of my way, because I am not. All I am saying is what works best for me and always keep an open mind as you might just be surprised what you will learn.
I certainly was.

Thanks for reassuring me Im not off the deep end with my cleaning methods.

Be well,
Arthur.

I have collected the ingredients for Ed's Red, minus the acetone. I have ATF, kerosene, brake fluid and the mineral spirits. I decided I do not want to use acetone, or I may get a bottle and add a spot when I actually go to do some cleaning. I read that the stuff attacks some kind of plastic and evaporates through that kind of plastic, so I decided to sit back on it for a while. My question tonight is: What kind of plastic is suitable for Ed's Red minus the acetone? I have an empty, one-gallon powder jug; black, HDPE plastic, a "2" inside the triangle. Is this a good vessel to keep the stuff? Thanks...

I use 8oz of white ammonia, 1 can Kroil, and fill the remainder of the gal. glass jug with the old time GM Top Engine cleaner. I still have a lot of the top engine cleaner. I use about a gal a year. Did somebody say a bronze brush will hurt a barrel, I don't think so.
It is important to use a good rod cleaning guide. I use polished tool steel cleaning rods. A coated rod embeds with all the crap from cleaning and is hard on the bore.
Wipe Out is a very good product. It is available now in a liquid instead of foam only.
I do have a borescope and monitor my barrels carefully. I let my barrels tell me what they want in cleaning. Most of my 6PPC get cleaned after every group. I have a new 17twist 30BR barrel by Rock Creek that looks good after 75 rounds without cleaning. I have never had a barrel do that for me.
Butch

quote:

Did somebody say a bronze brush will hurt a barrel? I don't think so.

I don't think so, either. I bought a 12-pack of them from Sinclair. I doubt Sinclair would sell something that would ruin a barrel. Their reputation would go down the swirler in a really big hurry. I trust what they sell. I have tried the nylon brushes. Maybe they do a good job, but I just never cottoned to them like I did to bronze...

Homebrewer;

Ed's Red original formula of ATP/mineral spirits/kerosene/acetone works extremely well as a basic CLP type product. I make the stuff up by the gallon and donate it to my pistol club for members to use to clean their firearms in the safe area before they leave the range.
The acetone is not really necessary for pistols or rifles but it helps with plastic fouling in your shotgun if that is a problem.

The original intructions say not to store it in HDPE containers and that mistake has been repeated ever since.

I have tested the stuff in different plastic containers now for years and HDPE is fine, the common problem plastic is PVC which dissolves into a mess in a few weeks.

Acetone is often supplied in HDPE so the manufacturers are reasonably confident it will last at least a couple of years. Mind you I have purchased 4 litre metal containers of paint thinners, the ones with a pullout plastic cap and pouring spout and found a sealed container had lost most of the thinner through the plastic over a couple of years in a hot garage.I suppose there are problems of incorrect labelling and different qualities.

Personally I store my bulk Eds Red in metal or glass containers and decant into smaller HDPE pump bottles when needed. Some of those containers have been going years now with no softening or leakage.

Brake cleaner is not part of the original formula. Brake cleaner is useful for blasting parts clean but is not necessarily a good bore cleaner. Depends exactly what it is chemically.

I am now using a modified version of Eds Red which seems to work even better for me. Equal parts of ATP/MEK/Xylene, a little less volatile but a bit more expensive. Have been running tests with different plastic containers for about 6 months now and again no problem with HDPE.

Homebrewer; just noticed you said brake fluid not brake cleaner.

Not sure how brake fluid fits in the scheme of things.

Homebrew, I use a all metal five gallon gas can for long term storage of Big Eds, but use smaller (well made top quality ones) 1 and 2 gallon plastic gas cans for storing Big Eds and keeping it handy for taking it to the range or for refilling.

All of my plastic gas containors are at least five years old and show no sighn of having reacted with Big Eds, or allowed any evaporation. I do store it in my basemment which is reasonably climante controlled.

Like I always say, what works for me might not sit well for you. I do not use bronze bore brushes any more as good well made nylon brushes have done a great job for me in removing carbon fouling. If you ever make the mistake of using a phosforus bronze bore brush while using a copper removing cleaner, you will NEVER EVER get your patches to NOT come out with traces of blue on them and there fore not be able to tell how close your bore is to reaching the level of clean you want.

How meny times have we all heard the old saying that if you ask 25 bench rest shooters whats the best bore cleaning method and the one they use, you are lible to get 25 different answers, none of wich BTW is wrong, only different.

Anyone who is concerned with coated rods becoming imbeded with crap and dammaging their bores need only give Dewey's coated cleaning rods a try. Mine are all way over a decade old, and still are smooth to the touch. Yes they have a few, make that very few nicks and scrapes, but are still 100% crap free and smooth to the touch. They remane one of the top choices in cleaning rods of the worlds top bench rest shooters, so they are more than good enough for my rifles.

The way I look at it is this. It has to be nearly impossable to dammage or shorten the usable life span a stainless steel barrels bore cleaning it with nylon bore brushes, and I am more than satisfied with the cleaning job my nylon brushes do VS my past experiences with PH/Bronze.

And lastly I am of the strong conviction that to get the best accuracy out of some rifles you should never clean 100% of the copper out of them, you need only to maintain as I posted prior a sort of cleanleness sweet spot.

Just my opinion, and your results (and opinions) may differ.

Art,
If you don't have a borescope you don't know what your cleaning method is doing. You could be cleaning when you shouldn't or may need more cleaning.
You are righr, opinions are like A$$holes, we all have one.
Butch

quote:

Originally posted by butchlambert:
Art,
If you don't have a borescope you don't know what your cleaning method is doing. You could be cleaning when you shouldn't or may need more cleaning.
You are righr, opinions are like A$$holes, we all have one.
Butch

As Butch says--------no borescope then you are just guessing. One test is worth a thousand expert opinions and the nylon brush takes over twice the number of strokes than the PB types and even then the tough areas are not ever completely clean (lands and groves meet). Gave up on the nylon when the scope showed them to be marginal except when using the blue Iosso ones with Iosso!!!!!!!.

quote:

Homebrewer; just noticed you said brake fluid not brake cleaner.

Not sure how brake fluid fits in the scheme of things.

Hmmm. Maybe I misread it somewhere up in the thread. Thanks for pointing that out. I will go back and read it again. Is brake cleaner available in screw-top cans? I only know of it available in aerosol cans...

:
:
:

Well, I don't see brake fluid anywhere in the thread regarding it being an ingredient. Good thing I waited for more posts from the more knowledgeable herein. I have mixed nothing yet. I see HDPE will be just fine to hold whatever I mix up once it is actually done. OK-- scratch the brake fluid. I want to avoid using acetone. It's flammable, correct? I don't smoke so there's no danger of self-immolation when cleaning, but I do plan on storing the mixture outside on my balcony which faces due East. It gets pretty hot out there in the summer heat. The jug is black-- another concern. We could always just throw a reflective covering over it, but it still gets hot...