Why are cleaning patch so popular in the U.S.?

I smell a few people in this thread who probably clean their guns too much.....


Like Atmay says you can clean them... plus I use it more as a device to just wipe out whatever leftover cleaner/lube/whatever might be left at the end of the process. I've never heard of one "damaging' a barrel.

Some of you guys are wrapped waaaaaaaay too tight about cleaning guns.

-Mike
Yup - I guess it's a sort of "out yourself" thread.

"Clean" vs Museum quality clean" - there's a lot of in between range...
 
Seems like chopping up old shirts would be a PITA. Patches are cheap enough, especially when compared to all the other supplies.
Nah get electrician or emt snips... go through shirts like butter. Never used it for a gun patch. But cut up plenty of heavy cotton as bandaids before.
 
I use a copper brush, spray clp, and fire.... clean.

The usual cleaning method I use is a rod... usually somthing that will damage a barrel driving out stuck projectiles....to me that’s cleaning.

I’m pretty dumb about a year ago I tried using .223 projectiles to unstick a .30 cal projectile because my rod wasn’t long enough and got like a dozen projectiles stuck...so I’d take my clean advice with a grain of salt.
 
Yup - I guess it's a sort of "out yourself" thread.

"Clean" vs Museum quality clean" - there's a lot of in between range...

It’s kinda like the oil in your car’s engine. Sure, the more often you change it, the cleaner it’ll always be, and theoretically the better your car will run.....but every 5000 miles / 3-6mos is more than perfectly adequate to keep the vehicle operating as designed.
 
It’s kinda like the oil in your car’s engine. Sure, the more often you change it, the cleaner it’ll always be, and theoretically the better your car will run.....but every 5000 miles / 3-6mos is more than perfectly adequate to keep the vehicle operating as designed.

I get it, I know what you're saying but I don't rub 'n tug my safe load every 3 mos because the "recommended mileage" has tripped...add some common sense. If I haven't shot in 18 months do I need a full bore cleaning?

You do you and best wishes - I'll be over here doing what I know works for me. It's not like I am a highly revered person on this board anyway.
 
When they don't cycle, or go into battery. It's kind of like the low fuel light on the dash. [laugh]
This is my system for my 22s.... It does not take me any longer to clean my 22s after 200 vs 3000 rounds. So its a old oily rag wipe on the metal to prevent rust until time to clean.
 
I smell a few people in this thread who probably clean their guns too much.....

Some of you guys are wrapped waaaaaaaay too tight about cleaning guns.
It’s kinda like the oil in your car’s engine. Sure, the more often you change it, the cleaner it’ll always be, and theoretically the better your car will run.....but every 5000 miles / 3-6mos is more than perfectly adequate to keep the vehicle operating as designed.

Like most things in life, it is a matter of degree. I hate the idea of putting dirty guns in the safe, and especially hate the idea of not cleaning a carry gun. Sure, if I only put 50 rounds through a rifle, it's not a huge deal, especially an AR. But a stainless revolver? Or a carry gun? I am going to clean those as good as I can, every time.
Also if I don't shoot it often. If it is going to be 2 years until it sees the light of day again, it's going back in the safe clean.

For me, it's more like clothing than engine oil. If I wear a suit for 2 hours to a wake, it goes back into a garment bag, not to the cleaners.
If I wear a T shirt to the gym or doing yard work in the summer, it's getting washed. Unless you live in Texas. Then it gets warshed.

Yup - I guess it's a sort of "out yourself" thread.

Maybe it is kinda an out yourself thread, but I am with Sprocket in this one. I like my guns clean. At least wipe them down real quick before they go back in the safe. New Years day, I pull everything out of the safe, function test and wipe with a little rem oil.
 
Fair enough. I enjoy it cleaning my guns so to me its not a waste.

If you just said that at the beginning... :) I get it, some people like doing it, they have ocd, etc. But please don't tell us our guns are going to break for not going FR on every gun every time a speck of dirt appears.
 
Like most things in life, it is a matter of degree. I hate the idea of putting dirty guns in the safe, and especially hate the idea of not cleaning a carry gun. Sure, if I only put 50 rounds through a rifle, it's not a huge deal, especially an AR. But a stainless revolver? Or a carry gun? I am going to clean those as good as I can, every time.
Also if I don't shoot it often. If it is going to be 2 years until it sees the light of day again, it's going back in the safe clean.

For me, it's more like clothing than engine oil. If I wear a suit for 2 hours to a wake, it goes back into a garment bag, not to the cleaners.
If I wear a T shirt to the gym or doing yard work in the summer, it's getting washed. Unless you live in Texas. Then it gets warshed.


Except that clothes often stink and are unusable or even uncomfortable when dirty. Many somewhat dirty guns still work just fine. Most gun cleaning neuroses I've heard about are like scrubbing the deck of your lawnmower after every mow to get the green stain off it, that nobody will see and that doesn't affect performance...

Maybe it is kinda an out yourself thread, but I am with Sprocket in this one. I like my guns clean. At least wipe them down real quick before they go back in the safe. New Years day, I pull everything out of the safe, function test and wipe with a little rem oil.

I have a few guns that get cleaned more often (Like my DW Specialist, and my Shadow, and carry guns that are in rotation) but even then, there's nearly always dirty guns in the safe. I have a mixmaster 1911 and a 22 pistol in there that haven't been cleaned in over 3 years... don't care. Meh, whatever. They've mostly sat there unused for that long anyways. They'll only get cleaned if I was to sell them (unlikely) or they stopped working... although I would bet money with a couple drops of lube both would work fine. I have some others that are 100% clean but only because they were guns that exceeded my interval and they actually needed it, and the only reason they're not dirty in the safe is only because I haven't fired them since that cleaning cycle. I have a fleet of range toys that literally will be lucky if they see solvent or a full cleaning once a year.

If I had a bunch of family heirlooms in the safe of course they would be treated differently than the other guns ... but to me the overall neurotic behavior of "clean all the guns all the time" is like polishing a hammer after you use it.. It took me a good several years to break that habit, too.

-Mike
 
Ha! I love the boresnake haters, maybe try washing them once every couple years. Or worse, pry some nickels out of your wallet and buy a new one.

Cleaning a boresnake is like cleaning a toilet brush. No lazy guy is going to clean his boresnake. I have them too, but I always thought of it as just a convenient, better than nothing cleaning tool or a quick and lazy attempt at cleaning.
 
Cleaning a boresnake is like cleaning a toilet brush. No lazy guy is going to clean his boresnake. I have them too, but I always thought of it as just a convenient, better than nothing cleaning tool or a quick and lazy attempt at cleaning.

I'm about as lazy as they come and I clean my bore snake. Just hose it down real good and hang it on a nail to dry.
 
9 out of 10 items will always work better when clean. Ill take my chances "wasting" time to keep something clean. No matter if its my car, gun, sump pump, the inside of my computer, or even my lawn mower. I know that if i maintain and keep them clean that my chances of failure is decreased. Time is better wasted than money.
Some guys shoot 3 times a week though. Sorry......I'm not cleaning my fire arm after a Thursday night pin shoot when I'm going to be running it again on Saturday morning for steel challenge. I come home at 9pm and in the safe she goes. I clean most of my guns about once every 2 months. If I spent all that time you suggest keeping them super clean.....I'd never shoot because of the time I'd have to spend cleaning my stuff multiple times A WEEK. All of my 20 plus fire arms.....are rust free.....and work perfectly. My 1911 that I use the most......has NEVER had a jam. Shoot multiple times a week.......clean it every other month.


I typically find the "Uber cleaner" comments that are preaching to the guys that run dirty guns don't actually go to the range much. How many times a week do you shoot?
 
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I get it, I know what you're saying but I don't rub 'n tug my safe load every 3 mos because the "recommended mileage" has tripped...add some common sense. If I haven't shot in 18 months do I need a full bore cleaning?

You do you and best wishes - I'll be over here doing what I know works for me. It's not like I am a highly revered person on this board anyway.

I’m definitely not saying there would be any sort of timeframe on it, but that letting guns be a little bit dirty is perfectly fine. They’ll still run.
 
Some guys shoot 3 times a week though. Sorry......I'm not cleaning my fire arm after a Thursday night pin shoot when I'm going to be running it again on Saturday morning for steel challenge. I come home at 9pm and in the safe she goes. I clean most of my guns about once every 2 months. If I spent all that time you suggest keeping them super clean.....I'd never shoot because of the time I'd have to spend cleaning my stuff multiple times A WEEK. All of my 20 plus fire arms.....are rust free.....and work perfectly. My 1911 that I use the most......has NEVER had a jam. Shoot multiple times a week.......clean it every other month.


I typically find the "Uber cleaner" comments that are preaching to the guys that run dirty guns don't actually go to the range much. How many times a week do you shoot?
No need to appologize. You do it your way, i do it mine.
 
This is a weird thread. Do people really care that some people clean their guns more or less than they do? Seems an odd thing to get worked up about.
 
even refusing to take out "dirty" guns again on the next range trip until they were cleaned.

That explains a lot. I clean, but I don't spend a lot of time on it, and I definitely don't want to clean any gun that's going back out on a range trip anytime soon. The main reason I clean is for storage, in case I don't get back around to that one for several months.
 
This is a weird thread. Do people really care that some people clean their guns more or less than they do? Seems an odd thing to get worked up about.
I'll admit it's all about ego.

For me I get my dander up when a guy that shoots like 6 times a year goes on a rant about how everyone should keep their guns sparkling clean or they somehow abusing them.

It's all dependant on how much you use em. For me......3 times a week I'm at the club......I'm putting em away dirty and sometimes still warm......and I'm not abusing them for doing it that way.
 
So....you didn't answer the question.....how many times a week do you shoot?
Life gets in the way. In a good month i go to range 2-4 times. When i was younger and didn't have a family/home, i would go about 8-10 times a month. Even at that point i would clean every time. Not sure why you are going on offense. My original comments were to those who were criticizing those who cleaned after every use as if that was a bad thing. I could care less how many times you clean your guns. Just didn't understand why so many were against cleaning after every use. None the less this is a dumb conversation. Id rather argue over more important matters like ford vs chevy lol
 
Life gets in the way. In a good month i go to range 2-4 times. When i was younger and didn't have a family/home, i would go about 8-10 times a month. Even at that point i would clean every time. Not sure why you are going on offense. My original comments were to those who were criticizing those who cleaned after every use as if that was a bad thing. I could care less how many times you clean your guns. Just didn't understand why so many were against cleaning after every use. None the less this is a dumb conversation. Id rather argue over more important matters like ford vs chevy lol
Arguing about cleaning guns is pretty stupid.

Everyone knows that, those that clean their guns after every single range visit can't be trusted. [smile][devil2]
 
This is a weird thread. Do people really care that some people clean their guns more or less than they do? Seems an odd thing to get worked up about.

People can do whatever they want obviously but some of us are just trying to save some people some serious amount of time. Many years ago I was one of those retards that had to clean the gun every time I shot it and now I look back and wish I had all that time back that I wasted..... because eventually you figure out that the gun will not break by letting it go for awhile....
 
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