Recommend a steam cleaner for use with guns and corrosive ammo...

[TED]

What are your recommendations for a steam cleaner for use with guns and corrosive ammo. I'm told that in WWII they used hot water to dissolve the corrosive salts. So me thinks hot water good, steam cleaner better?

TED

[tvfreakarms]

Interesting

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[1168]

Regular water still works. I use a bathtub or kitchen sink for my black powder guns and my 74.

Edit: Check this out- https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?87949-How-I-clean-my-S-amp-W-5-45-AR15

[mlberry]

Well you put your finger on the problem--salt. Corrosive primers leave a salt residue and that will corrode barrels. The natural solvent for that is water. If you can get it old GI bore cleaner is good because it will cut the salt (it's water based). Black powder shooters have the same problem and their solution is hot soapy water. I have not tried this but you might try a black powder cleaning solution to get rid of the salt and then modern solvents.

[tvfreakarms]

I would assume hot steam would do the job

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[JasonB1]

The hot part is mainly for fast drying.

As mlberry pointed out, the affinity of salt and water is what makes it possible for water to clean the salt out, but is simultaneously the source of rust. I am from Kentucky so don't have first hand experience with this, but from what I have read corrosive ammunition can be almost a non issue in dry areas like deserts for that reason.

Also as he pointed out, anything that really works for blackpowder will work to clean chlorate primers with soapy water being the traditional route on both.

What I have mostly switched over to on blackpowder and corrosive primers is the Ballistol and water emulsion they have ratios for

https://ballistol.com/faqs/

It truly does mix, so once the water evaporates there is the Ballistol film left. The other upside is it will dissolve any copper or zinc jacket material which covers most anything I can think of. No idea how, but patches come out blue...just not as fast as cleaners with high ammonia concentrations.

[bigedp51]

The British would pore two pints of boiling water down the bore of their Enfield rifles to remove the corrosive primer salts and carbon. Afterwards they would use a pull through and pull a oily cloth through the bore. The armourers would decide when the copper needed to be removed and then mix up some copper solvent.

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/britishmilitariaforums/imageproxy.php?url=http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i219/GrantRCanada/Enfields/funnelinuse_sm.jpg

[tvfreakarms]

Some say use simple green, Windex

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[JasonB1]

Some say use simple green, Windex

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Simple Green will work for the soap in soapy water. Just don't soak aluminum parts with it.

Water in Windex will clean the salts like water from other sources :)

[Kdubya]

I don't shoot much in the way of corrosive ammo, but have been told Ballistol can be pretty effective. It also makes a pretty good cutting agent with water. Quite a few black powder and mil-surp rifle shooters I know use Ballistol with very good success.

[CLHC]

In regards to Steam Cleaners, try looking at Vapamore.

[T2C]

I've read quite a few posts on multiple websites concerning the neutralization of corrosive salts from shooting surplus ammunition. I am no chemist, but I've read that ammonia may or may not help in neutralizing salts depending on who is posting. I am not sure either way.

I shoot a great deal of corrosive 8mm Mauser and 7.62x54R. I've been successfully using Windex followed up with Hoppe's No. 9 for over 20 years to clean the bores in my old surplus military bolt action rifles and it works. I push a sopping wet patch soaked in Windex through the bore, wait a few minutes, then push dry patches through the bore. I repeat the process with the Windex, then clean like I normally would with Hoppe's No. 9. I spray Windex on the bolt and wipe it down before cleaning like I normally would.

After I push a patch through the bore that looks clean when it exits the muzzle, I lightly oil the inside of the barrel. I push a patch wetted with Mobil 1 synthetic motor oil through the bore to finish up. A few days later I push a dry patch through the bore and usually see dirt drawn out of the metal by detergents in the motor oil. I clean the bore again with Hoppe's No. 9, then wet a patch with Mobil 1 and push it through the bore.

If you have an old rifle bolt or gas cylinder with a lot of gunk on it that just won't come off, you can boil the part. I drop the part(s) in an old pot on my gas barbeque grill and boil it for several minutes. All of the oil will be drawn out of the metal, so you want to make sure you put a light coat of oil on the part(s) after they dry off.