How often do you clean your 22?

[SquirrelNuts]

Next to never.

 

[Magichelmt]

Like wise, if I am going to shoot again the next day I will not clean it. Other wise I disassemble my 22/45 after every range trip and my 10/22 gets the bore cleaned after every trip, and the entire gun disassembled every other trip. I do not run a metal brush down the barrel of my .22's. Plastic brushes and weed eater string with patches do a good job for me. I do not remember where I got the no metal brush idea from but I have never had a metal brush in any .22 of mine. Must have gotten that idea off of one of those crazy gun sites I visit.

 

[deputy tom]

I used to clean mine after each range session.This went on for forty or so years but no more.I read on one of the forums that over cleaning wears out .22's faster than anything so from that point on I will not clean mine until they quit working.tom.

 

[.38 Special]

For real?? I've never heard of this. (NEVER scrub the barrel on a .22. There is no reason to do it and you will only do harm) What's the basis for this?

Well, despite what some folks may claim, it's essentially impossible to cause damage to a .22 rimfire bore by not cleaning it. Unless you've gotten into some extremely funky ammo, the bore of a .22 will have only a slight amount of (non-corrosive) fouling suspended in a uniform coat of (rust preventing) wax. It can be left indefinitely without fear of damage.

So the only real reason to clean the bore is if accuracy deteriorates. In many guns, this simply never occurs. A smooth bore, in conjunction with good quality ammo -- ie. not the bulk pack stuff you picked up at Wally World -- will be "conditioned" by the first few dozen rounds and then after will remain in that same condition forever and ever. Each round scrapes out a bit of fouling and wax and replaces it with the same type and amount of fouling and wax. So if accuracy is unaffected and the bore is at no risk of damage, why would you clean it? At best it will have no effect, and at worst you will damage the barrel with that chintzy jointed aluminum cleaning rod Wally World threw in with the cheap ammo. Realistically, all you'll accomplish is to "decondition" the barrel, meaning the gun won't be accurate until after you fire a few dozen more rounds through it. And the point was?

Now, a lot of .22s will start to show deteriorating accuracy after a few dozen/hundred/thousand rounds and so will benefit from a bore cleaning. They only way you find out if this is true in your particular gun is by finding out if this is true in your particular gun. Which is why I think both the "Never clean the bore!!!" and "Always clean your bore!!!" camps are, generally speaking, wrong.

HTH!

 

[Blue .45]

I clean my .22 revolver after every range session. However, I run a bore snake through my rifle after 250rds. or so.

In addition I open the action and spray the inside with Gun Scrub, then apply a few drops of oil.

I've heard others say they only clean their rifles when accuracy falls off.

 

[dirt_j00]

Thanks .38. Interesting information.

 

[Floppy_D]

About every 4 bricks worth of ammo, or when I start getting malfunctions. I own 22s that have had nothing other than external wipedowns.

 

[nulfisin]

Depends on the gun

My Marlin Model 60 is finicky. A wonderful gun. When it gets dirty, though, it stops cycling rounds.

My Ruger really couldn't care less. I clean it out of habit more than anything else.

 

[Tequila Mockingbird]

Maybe once a year...maybe.

 

[longbeard48]

Back when I shot a lot of silhouette, I became unable to chamber cartridges in my 541-S in the middle of a match.

I brought it home and put a brush on my electric drill and ran it a few seconds in the chamber. It cured my troubles and the gun has never given any trouble since. It was as accurate as ever.

I have never "scrubbed" any of my my .22's.

 

[WoofersInc]

For me, I wipe them down after use. A good detail cleaning happens once problems start to occur. This is different for all my other guns which get a complete clean after every use.

 

[rugbyer81]

I clean out the action and lube it a little whenever I get the feeling it could use it. This is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of every 500 rounds or so. I have never cleaned the bore and have not noticed any loss of accuracy. Only ammunition I use is the Federal bulk hollowpoint stuff. Rifle is a Marlin 60.

 

[xbox360]

any gun, I clean first thing after I am done shooting, I dont care if its copper/lead/metal, paper in my barrel, IT WILL BE CLEANED

 

[jerkface11]

For real?? I've never heard of this. What's the basis for this?

The rifling of a .22 is so shallow that it's easy to damage it. You don't get bore fouling anyway unless you're shooting really awful ammo so it's pointless.

 

[Mr.510]

I was starting to feel bad about having put a few thousand rounds through my 10/22 without cleaning it until I read this thread. Thanks guys, I feel much better now! Actually, a thousand rounds or so ago I started having weird failures to feed and/or fire. I discovered there was so much waxy crud built up that the bolt would not close all the way. The little notch for the extractor had so much wax in it that it would sometimes leave the spent case in the chamber without even touching it. In thirty seconds the Leatherman can opener from my range bag fixed it up better than new! I do find that the custom-by-Dremel trigger job gets notchy if I don't spray out the trigger housing with brake clean and re-grease it every once in a verrrry long while. For the record, the bore has never been cleaned in the 25 years I've owned it.

 

[bigfatdave]

My Ruger mkIII pistols and Walther P22 (all 22LR) also get the extractor notch on the side of the chamber gunked up. That's why I tossed a handful of toothpicks in the cleaning kit. If I'm only doing a wipe-down and action check, I'll get a toothpick in there if I see anything with the light.

 

[Bart B.]

For all you folks who think cleaning rimfire 22 rifles and pistols is a bad thing to do, don't ever, watch the Olympic team in action. Or any other smallbore rifle match. Their frequent cleaning of their precision target arms with bore cleaner and bronze brushes may give you reason to get very upset. Especially when some of them clean after every 40 or 60 shots when using the least-fouling rimfire ammo available.

 

[.38 Special]

I shoot international free pistol, which is an Olympic sport. Most of the fellows I compete with never touch the bore of their pistols. Those that do use only a patch on a cord. Mention a brass brush to any of them and they'll look at you like you've got two heads.

In the BR-50 game -- which is even more precise than the Olympic sports -- cleaning habits were all over the map, at least when I was participating. Some folks cleaned almost like they were shooting centerfire benchrest: every 20 rounds or so. Others cleaned only when they noted a loss of accuracy, which in some cases was never. Few used brass brushes.

The truth is that there is no absolute when it comes to cleaning your .22, even if you are an Olympic competitor.

"I believe the often iterated saying from the small bore rifle shooters that 'more .22 bores are ruined by brushing them than by shooting them.' You should never have to use a brass brush on a .22 rimfire bore - patches should be all you ever use." Nygord's notes

 

[10-Ring]

after every use, my 22s get really finicky if they aren't clean

 

[springmom]

.22 handgun or .22 rifle? My answer is the same: "somewhere in between" always and never (and the .22's are the only ones I no longer clean after every shoot, I would add...everything else gets cleaned every time). BUT.... I find that handguns are more likely to get stupid if they're not kept pretty clean. At least that seems to be the case with our Trailside; the Mk III, not so much. So they may not get cleaned every time but I keep a lot closer eye on things and am more likely to do so after a couple or three outings (besides, I usually take them along with other guns which I'll be cleaning anyway, so while I have the stuff out...)

My Scoremaster and my 10/22 couldn't care less if they're dirty, and having had so many people say "you don't need to clean them" I started not cleaning them much, and lo and behold, yup, they're fine.

Who knew? (Everybody but me, apparently! )

Jan

 

[alde]

I have a S&W 617 who's accuracy suffers if I don't clean it every 7-800 rounds or so. I think the forcing cone gets fouled. The chambers also get stickey after a few hundred rounds.

I never clean the bores on my .22 rifles. Just wipe out the action with a bit of solvent on a patch and apply a bit of oit. I always wipe down the exterior metal with a thin coat of oil. Nothing bothers me more than seeing any signs of rust on a gun.

 

[spartywrx]

I shoot the cheap bulk stuff out of the 10/22 so I clean it each range trip. I'm usually cleaning 3-4 other guns at the time so it just gets added to to pile to clean while I have the cleaning supplies out.

 

[Feanaro]

Wait, people clean their .22s?

 

[dullh]

I've had my Marlin model 60 since 1982. Fired it a bunch, let it sit for about 20 years! Picked it up one day after it had sat and it jammed every other round! 20 years of crud cleaned off with solvent and a flat screwdriver blade to scrape it off, runs like new! Now I clean it every 3rd or 4th trip out to shoot, since it fouls up so bad it will fail to eject, etc. When it's kept clean it's slick and reliable.

 

[wyohome]

I never use a brush on my rifles, but run a rag with solvent through them followed by a slightly oiled patch. The only weapon that get the 22 brush is my K-22, and that is just to remove the ring in the cylinder. The area that holds the rim also needs to be cleaned to prevent misfires.