Corrosive ammo cleanup

[elktrout]

I recently bought a Mosin Nagant, but the only ammo locally available is Polish milsurp, corrosive. What do I have to do to clean the gun after using corrosive ammo like this?

 

[me26245]

corrosive ammo

The best thing to clean corrosive ammo residue from your firearm is hot water, you can add some soap if you like. Other options are windex, GI bore cleaner (only the stuff from WWII works).

You have to wash out the corrosive salts from the powder/priming mixture. If you don't clean out the salts they will collect moisture and cause rust.

After cleaning with hot water, do a normal cleaning with the cleaner of your choice then oil for storage.

 

[Deus Machina]

At the range, I spray some Windex down it. Then when I get home, I have an ammonia solution from the grocery store, that's a diluted ammonia with a surfactant.

I, personally, believe the ammonia helps neutralize the salts, water will do that on its own, just not as quickly. I use the ammonia with surfactant (soap, essentially) because it cleans up powder residue decently. Then dry it all with a towel and patches, and run an oiled patch down the bore.

 

[nicholst55]

Salts cannot be neutralized; they must be washed away. That's simple chemistry. I have been told that the ammonia in Windex performs as a surfactant, and does actually assist in removing the salt; I dunno.

I use either plain water or water with a bit of Murphy's Oil Soap in it, whichever is more convenient. Dry, then clean with a normal powder solvent, then oil. It isn't alchemy or witchcraft.

 

[Cpt. America]

I use WD 40 mostly when cleaning my guns. I have several mosin's and haven't had any issues with rust. If the gun is really dirty I start out with some Simple Green degreaser.

 

[rmuzz]

Corrosive ammo sounds worse than it really is imo, good chance thats all your Mosin has ever seen used. The only non-corrosive stuff I own for mine is brass cased SP ammo I plan to use on Deer. If you treat your rifle with respect and clean it promptly using the advice you get here no reason to sweat using corrosive mil surp.

 

[GBExpat]

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=449989

 

[elmerfudd]

Corrosive ammo is nothing to worry about. Prior to WW2 virtually all ammo was corrosive and there are plenty of great guns left from that era that survived just fine.

Just wash your rifle out with water within a few hours of shooting and then clean as you normally would. Sooner is better of course, but I've found that as long as I start cleaning within 4 hours or so there doesn't seem to be any damage done. Your gun will still be fine if you stop and get a bite to eat on the way home from the range or do a couple chores first, so don't sweat it. Just make sure you get it cleaned that day and don't put it off until tomorrow.

One method that I've found works well is to fill the bottom of a small bucket with warm water, add a squirt of dish soap, dip the muzzle in the water and run a swab or patch up and down the bore about 10 times with the muzzle submerged. The swab acts as a piston and sucks the water right up the bore as you do it. This takes about 2 minutes total including filling the bucket.

Afterward, just clean the bore the way you normally do.

 

[briansmithwins]

Water is what you need. What you don't want to do is use a soap or other water based cleaner that strips oil and then ignore the rifle, it will rust worse than if you did nothing.

What you have to do after firing corrosive ammo is dissolve the salts that are in the primer residue. Those salts absorb water out of the air and that's what causes rusting. Normal gun cleaners don't work very well, if at all, for corrosive ammo residue.

Most people don't like pouring cold water on their guns. The alternatives that I've seen used or used myself in the past are:

1) Use hot water to rinse all the parts with gas fouling off.
Pros are it's cheap and it's pretty easy to get to.
Con is I don't have a teakettle at the range and my guns will start rusting by the time I make it home.

2) Ballistol mixed 1:10 with water.
Pros are it works very well to get the residue off and it still protects the steel. Ballistol is a pretty good lube and protectant also when used unmixed. Ballistol also smells halfway decent.
Con: It's another thing to buy.

3) Soapy water. This works because the soap cuts thru the grease and the water washes away the salts. Available as a premade solution like Mpro7 (which I've used a lot) or Simple Green Extreem (Simple Green w/o the nasty odor and coloring).
Pros: Can be used anywhere, at any temp above freezing. Also works great to remove old lube and carbon.
Cons: Mpro7 and Simple Green Extreem really do remove all the old lube, leaving behind unprotected steel. You must (MUST!) relube immediately after using this type of cleaner.

I'm on my 2nd case of corrosive Yugo M67 ball and have had 0 rusting problems since using methods 2 and 3. You can't (unless you live in a fricken desert) not clean you weapons the same day after using corrosive ammo. Chrome plating will only slow the rust down, it will not stop it. I have a Chinese SKS which is proof of that. BSW

 

[PAPACHUCK]

When it's time to clean the mil-surps, I soak a patch in Windex and run it thru the bore. I repeat that 'till it comes out clean. I then run a patch soaked in Break-Free thru the bore and clean the rest of the weapon with the BF, then run a dry patch or two thru the bore and put the gun away.

 

[Average Joe]

Just wash with water, then clean and oil as usual.

 

[ARNETT44]

I have used a transmission filler funnel, wedged into the bore and the end of the barrel, using warm water first then followed by some simple green, then a brush, patch more warm water, patched dry and oil, oil, oil. Punch the tube before next shoot, just to get the excess oil out.

 

[boneman_66]

I guess I'm confused. If you first clean with a patch treated with solvent (e.g. Hoppes Bench Rest), then dry with patch, then a bore brush with solvent, then patch until clean is there really much of a chance that corrosive salt is still in the barrel? Where and/or how? Is it because the water breaks down fine salt residue that would be missed by solvent and or a bore brush?

Thanks,
Boneman

 

[lipadj46]

At the range, I spray some Windex down it.[/QUOT

People say windex because it used to contain Ammonium Hydroxide which is basic and that will "neutralize" the corrosive salts. The problem with this though is that salts are salts and need to be washed away with water not neutralized. Also windex does not contain ammonia any longer. Use hot soapy water.

I guess I'm confused. If you first clean with a patch treated with solvent (e.g. Hoppes Bench Rest), then dry with patch, then a bore brush with solvent, then patch until clean is there really much of a chance that corrosive salt is still in the barrel? Where and/or how? Is it because the water breaks down fine salt residue that would be missed by solvent and or a bore brush?

I don't think most gun cleaners are water based or polar (which is needed to dissolve a ionic salt). I could be wrong though.

 

[flyboy1788]

Windex bottles still say they contain ammonia. At least the ones ive seen do.

 

[lipadj46]

I'm looking at a bottle now. Some of the the generic stuff does but google the MSDS for Windex and see for yourself.

http://www.scjohnson.com/msds_us_ca/windex.asp

Chemical Name CAS-No. Weight %
Water 7732-18-5 60.00 - 100.00
Isopropanol 67-63-0 1.00 - 5.00
Ethyleneglycol Monohexylether 112-25-4 0.10 - 1.00

 

[flyboy1788]

last weekend I used a blue bottle of windex brand window cleaner and there was a little thing under the windex logo that said : "with ammonia-d". Just like the one in this picture. eta: sorry about the large picture, but I dont know how to make it smaller .

 

[lipadj46]

Very strange, there is no windex around here with ammonia (my wife buys the generic stuff because she does not like the new windex without ammomia). Like I said there no ammonia listed in any of the MSDS sheets for any windex on the SC Johnson website. Unless it is a regional thing like the soap without phosphates.

 

[flyboy1788]

It could be a regional thing. I believe what you are saying, but in the midwest here, it seems they have ammonia...try going to a different store than you usually do, perhaps they will have the ones with ammonia.

 

[lipadj46]

I can buy generic window cleaner with ammonia but my original point was that ammonia does not do anything besides clean the grime. People also like using windex because it has alcohol in it that makes it evaporate faster. If I were to make up my own corrosive salt cleaning solution it would be 9 parts hot water, 1 part isopropanol, a squirt of dish detergent (and if you'd like a drop of blue food coloring).

 

[RSVP2RIP]

Windex was reformulated in 2006, prior to that, it was made with from .05% to 28% ammonium hydroxide. The MSDS you are reading is for the new formula which is more "green". Pesonally I use Ballistol neat after regular cleaning. It's what I use for blackpowder also, after cleaning with hot soapy water and I have yet to have one of the smokepoles get rusty. Ballistol is also midly alkaline which is said to neutralize corrosive salts, but the bottle says "neutralizes acids", not corrosive salts. Because it is alkali it is a great surfactant and will get all the salts out just as if you were using soap. Yes it's another thing to buy but worth every penny if you ask me, and if you just want to use it for bore cleaning and follow up with a separate rust protector, you can dillute the ballistol up to 20:1 with water and still it will work great. Smells like....nothing else I can think of, but it is not a good smell, but it does go away quickly.

 

[BBstacker]

I don't shoot corrosive ammo. But I use saltaway to get the salt off my boat and wash my motors out with it. I should work on guns as well.

 

[Douglas34474]

Chemically, the ammonia does nothing to the salts; it's the water in he Windex that does the work.

Many believe that the ammonia works because of the old 'AMMONIA DOPE' used to remove cupro-nickle fouling years ago. It can ruin a barrel in short order. It does nothing for the potassium salts from the corrosive primers.

Hatcher wrote that the cleaning regiment of hot, soapy water should be used three days running, with normal bore solvent cleaning and oiling used also.

Corrosive ammo was used through WW11 and Korea. Just clean the right way and it is not a problem.

 

[lipadj46]

I don't shoot corrosive ammo. But I use saltaway to get the salt off my boat and wash my motors out with it. I should work on guns as well.

I'm not sure about saltaway, that stuff is midly acidic (either acetic acid or Sulfamic Acid) and probably should not be used to clean a firearm (or anything made of iron) unless you rinse it well with water after.