Cleaning a Marlin

[Joseph Dawson]

I have a Marlin 1894 CSBL and I just gave it a good clean after not cleaning it for a month. I took the lever out and the tip was all black and the black stains wouldn't come off no matter how much rem oil I put on and wiped it. Is it normal to have black stains stay on the lever and a bit on the bolt? This is my first lever action so I don't know.

 

[gotboostvr]

You'd probably have better luck cleaning with a solvent and lubricating with an oil instead of trying to do both with just oil.

A little fouling shouldn't effect it much, I don't worry about getting it to bare metal too much.