I was just given a mess of SS cleaning brushes. Mostly for pistol but some for .224 and .308" rifle.
Are they harmful to barrels?? I can imagine the idea of SS was to stop aggresive cleaners from eating phosphur brushes. But are the SS brushes TOO HARD? Can they damage a barrel??

FN in MT

Frank
I have always been told not to use them. Two people in particular. The firearms instructor for the local sheriff's dept. and my gunsmith, who is a fairly well known guy.

Now for my thoughts. I would use them as a last resort. Say on really really bad copper fouling.
Only on something that I had lost all hope in. Even then I would have tried all the chemicals I could find and maybe find a foul out machine.

God Bless
Shawn

I use a set of nylon brushes from Tipton.

Frank, I deal with Hart, Krieger and Shilen on a fairly regular basis and they all say to NOT use SS brushes in Stainless barrels.. Have heard of ss brushs ruining SS barrels in one "cleaning".

As far as CM barrels I don't know but why risk it. You can buy a dozen brass brushes from many of the vendors for $10-15....
Pat

Steel on steel does not make since to me..I use brass brushes in some instance but mostly Nylon these days.

Paul Hart from HART barrels was over today and told me to "Throw those damned things in the garbage."
I have a ton of brushes, they are cheap in bulk from Brownells. But like I mentioned these were freebies and I have a mess of them. Oh Well.

WHY do they make the darned things if they are damaging to a barrel??

Thanks for the replies...... FN in MT

Work good for cleaning inside the necks of brass cases.

Hart

I have used the stainless Tornado brushes in many guns, never ruined a barrel.

I have heard from many gunsmiths that SS brushes are bad in SS barrels but OK in CM barrels because CM steel is harder than stainless..

well... to admit to doing something stupid.. I used a stainless brush on my 22 K-Hornet barrel.. it literally scrubbed steel shavings out of it.. I thought it was really removing some heavy build-up the first few strokes, then finally figured it out. It left the bore pretty heavily scraped.. I tried to polish it back out with JB Bore compound, which helped somewhat, but the accuracy just hasn't been quite the same since. It's ok, just not as good.... I have used stainless brushes on my .45 Ruger with no apparent ill effect. I think the reason it scrubbed the .22 is that the bristles are so much shorter (and stiffer) on the .22 brush than the .45. I'm still pretty sick about damaging my 285 dollar barrel, and I won't use a stainless brush on any gun anymore... it's just not worth the risk.