Is your rifle clean

**RockIsland** · October 20th, 2020, 11:25 AM

No, but my gun is.

**buxbandit** · October 20th, 2020, 11:30 AM

My Drill Instructors standards were tighter than mine.

**ExFlyinguy** · October 20th, 2020, 12:31 PM

Originally Posted by Gripsafety

A properly fouled barrel is a reliably accurate barrel. Once you clean it, count on 30-50 rounds of ammo to get it back where it was. Barrels do need to be cleaned at some point, but fouled barrels are the norm in precision rifle. I've learned to just blow a box of ammo through my long range rifle after cleaning the barrel before I even think about looking at how it's grouping. It just about always comes back to my familiar zero after about 30-35 rounds and stays there for thousands of rounds. When it starts to wander, it's time to clean the barrel. YMMV. I know precision rifle guys who never clean their barrels - when the accuracy becomes unreliable, they get a new barrel. That's insanely extreme, but I do understand the thought process that says you can do nothing but harm. I shoot at steel for fun; they do it competitively.

Keeping the chamber and action cleaned and lubed hasn't been a problem for me. My zero comes back after just a few rounds, but reliability goes away quickly if I don't keep after it. Again, depending upon your equipment, YMMV.

If a real world functional rifle passes that inspection, it fails as a real world functional rifle.

You know for the longest time, I always suspected that the wear & tear that the service weapons received in my Army units was in part due to the extreme cleanliness that was expected to pass inspections. I mean guys would use very high grit count emory cloth to clean carbon from surfaces, but hey I was 18 years old and when in Rome you do as you're told.

Fast forward to my last 10 years of really delving into the firearms world, and I have seen/heard from what I expect are really knowledgeable and experienced shooters repeat what you say above ^

In contrast I have recently started following a pro-shooter (F Class) named Eric Cortina. He uses CLR on his stainless steel parts, and cleans his barrels using a borescope to ensure cleanliness. (Crazy stuff)