Dremel

[Wolfy]

Do you use a dremel to clean your guns?

 

[vis35]

No! It is a good tool for many tasks, but cleaning is not on that list. Rust removal perhaps, but that is way beyond cleaning.
Jeff

 

[Dave R]

No. Hadn't thought of it.

Have polished a few feed ramps, and fixed some "Century assembly by drunk monkeys" issues with it, though.

 

[jsalcedo]

I put a cleaning rod in my dremel and used it to polish a rough chamber.

 

[Standing Wolf]

I can't imagine letting a gun get dirty enough to justify using a Dremel tool to clean it; modifying the stocks, however...

 

[JohnBT]

"Most of the time I say, "Drop the Dremel Tool and step away from the pistol." " - Jim V on TFL in 2002

 

[MikeIsaj]

Used mine to polish a revolver before re-bluing. Never used it for general cleaning, just doesn't sound right. On the other hand I do have those stubborn carbon rings in the .357 cylinder. Might be a good idea.

 

[landon74]

I've done some stock work with mine and polish some parts, but that's the extent of it....

 

[RevDisk]

General cleaning? No.


On the other hand, I have used Dremel tools to polish feed ramps and certain other metal-on-metal sliding parts of an M16. Worked rather nicely. Didn't sand anything, just ultra-fine polishing.

 

[chris in va]

I clean mine all the time with the sanding drum. Works great for getting off all that powder residue from 5000 rounds. Sometimes you *really* gotta jam the sucker into the chamber and ream all that crap out.

I don't get it though, my gun seems to be getting smaller...

 

[Ky Larry]

Saw a post on this forum that said:"There are no gun problems that cannot be made worse with a Dremel Tool."

 

[Sunray]

"...Do you use a dremel to clean your guns?..." Judas priest! NO! A rotary tool, Dremel is an expensive brand name, is not for cleaning firearms. Getting rust off with a brass wheel ok, but not regular cleaning. The sanding wheel will remove bluing and abrade the rifling as a minimum. Regular solvents that are allowed to do their job will not. Swab the bore and leave it sit for half an hour will give it time to work. Then just run patches through until they come out clean.

 

[brickeyee]

Not for cleaning, occasionaly for polishing with Cratex points/wheels.
A rotary tool is a dangerous weapon in the wrong hands.

 

[MikeIsaj]

I'm a novice Dremel user. What is a cratex wheel?

 

[J Miller]

I have an old Ruger Standard .22 Auto that the previous owner polished the outside with a Dremel tool.

Can we say boys and girls? It will take a trip to professional refinisher or the factory to make it look right.

It shoots fine, so I haven't bothered to get it refinished. Maybe someday.

Because of that, my two Dremel tools never get near my guns. No way, no how, nyet, nine, zip, zilch, and absolutly no.

Joe

 

[HSMITH]

Mike, Cratex is a brand name for abrasive tools to use in a rotary tool. They are unique and work VERY well. Probably the easiest way to describe them is like a hard eraser with grit embedded throughout. They come in various grits, denoted by color, and all sorts of shapes.

If you have a rotary tool they are by far the best bits made.

 

[LiquidTension]

I guess you could use the buffing wheel to clean some parts, but there's no reason to. It'd ruin the wheel pretty quick, and they're way more expensive than patches.

I'm about to polish the ramp on my carry gun, and I used the cutoff wheel, grinding stone, and polishing wheel to fix the trigger slap on my SAR. Oh, and I used a cutoff wheel to get the hunk of receiver off of my FAL barrel when I got the parts kit way back when.

There are plenty of legit uses for a Dremel on a firearm, but general cleaning isn't one of them.

- LT - Proud member of WECSOG

 

[MikeIsaj]

Thanks HSMITH. I'll have to look for them and add to my arsenal of dremel stuff. That's almost as expensive as shooting.

 

[Ivy Mike]

I use my dremel for polishing small parts and fixing "oops" issues on new guns. I had to dremel the base of the mag well in my CZ75B to get mags to insert/extract smoothly.

The one thing I learned is to hold parts in a vice or vice grips when polishing. A dremel will chuck a small part under a heavy appliance faster than you can blink.

 

[SouthpawShootr]

No. Mr. Dremel is reserved for working on things I'm willing to screw up. No gun gets so dirty that you have to resort to power tools. The only advantage I can see would be a quicker cleanup time. I never clean guns when I'm in a crunch for time, so I'm never worried about cleaning them quickly.

 

[Navy joe]

No for cleaning, but I will periodically polish the chambers in my 625 with a felt and a little JB. I do lots of dremel work however. As a metalworker though I must say that if you do not know what you are doing drop the Dremel and step away from the gun! I've done much feedramp and chamber polishing, chamfered the charge holes on the 625, polished every moving thing in a Glock several times, Chamfered the loading port on my 870 so I could reload quickly without ripping my cuticles off etc. Mainly stuff that shoulda been done at the factory if guns were made well.

I'm into a project 1911 right now, used the dremel in conjunction with a tig welder, files, and belt sander to fit a magwell, polish out many years of dings, refit the rails etc. I will have the world's most expensive Sistema when I'm done, but the chance to tinker on a piece of metal at night is relaxing.