Overzealous cleanin?

[Lupinus]

I hear often that to much cleaning can affect a gun negativly just as much or more in some guns then not cleaning it enough.

Just what could overzealous cleaning do to rifle? I'm curious to know.

 

[rust collector]

If overzealous means the same as careless, I agree. Letting the cleaning rod or pull-through accumulate a bunch of grit or rub against the throat or muzzle of the gun will likely damage areas that are critical to good accuracy. I suppose frequent use of abrasive or ammonia-laced bore cleaners could mess things up as well. If proper technique is used with the proper tools such as bore quides, I doubt that a lot of damage is inflicted regardless of frequency.

If overzealous means too often, meh, I don't think it hurts to keep the bore clean and the copper fouling to a minimum. I think the real message is to care enough to do the job right and don't substitute quantity for quality.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

Some of the things I would consider overzealous that I've seen:

Drenching the gun in solvents not designed for guns in order to get it spotless.

Chucking a cleaning rod in a drill to hit the chamber and bore

Heavy use of abrasive cleaners in a bore

Most of the time, I see this when people want a gun that is white-glove clean; but don't want to spend the several hours a day for several days that it takes to get a gun there with traditional cleaning methods. If you know what it takes to get your gun to a functional clean, and then do that. I don't think you'll have much trouble from overcleaning.