I have a couple of severely gunked up rifle barrels to clean. Someone recommended hosing the bore with brake cleaner. I have a ton of carb cleaner. Is there any difference in the two?

Not sure it'll hurt anything but the stuff will destroy some plastics used in cheaper guns so be careful. It may also be very harsh to the stock finish!

Why not just use an ammonia style copper solvent and phospher bronze brush.....I've not seen such badly gunked up barrel that stuff won't clean.

I've used both brake and carb cleaner to clean bores. Neither hurt anything, but they didn't clean any better than Hoppes.

I agree with vapodog, start with the stuff made for guns and if that doesn’t work you can always try something else.

Carb cleaner is great for removing carbon deposits but it doesn’t do much for copper.

Whichever route you choose to take you’d be smart to remove the barreled action from your stock first.

Carb cleaner can be harsh on finish, metal and stock, as mentioned.

However, I just used some break free stuff in a yellow can to remove a stuck retaining pin on a motor shaft, this was about 4 weeks ago I think. Damn that was incredible, never had a penetrating oil work so well before. I think it is called liquid wrench but can't remember off hand. amazing. I guess if you had a build up of crud it would work in a gun barrel.

I personally recommend Blue Wonder.

Red

Thanks for all the replies!

I tried carb cleaner last night. Worked only fair.

Then, back to alternating Sweets X20, Blue Wonder x20 and JB Compound.

I think I've got it worried now. Pushed some clean patches through her and then coated with FP-10. We're gonna rest 'til this evening!

On trigger groups and recievers,especially in shotguns, i use b12 chemtool and it works great. It will bothr some type finishes. van

quote:

Originally posted by michauxii:
Thanks for all the replies!

I tried carb cleaner last night. Worked only fair.

Then, back to alternating Sweets X20, Blue Wonder x20 and JB Compound.

I think I've got it worried now. Pushed some clean patches through her and then coated with FP-10. We're gonna rest 'til this evening!

Get a can of Kroil and use it by itself or mixed with JB and try that. Let it sit for awhile before you scrub it out. That stuff seems to be about the best thing around for getting into and under gunk of any kind to loosen it up.