Defensive Carry banner

Badly Leaded Barrel - Best Solution?

8K views 13 replies 11 participants last post by  Superhouse 15 
#1 ·
Got a heavy automatic here w/ a badly leaded barrel from firing plated bullets (.475 Mag), anybody got a good chemical or mechanical way to clean these up? Barrel is stainless and really expensive to replace. Thanks in advance all.
 
#2 ·
Lewis de-leader! Or - get to a marine store and buy some bronze wool. If you effectively pull thru the barrel with bronze as a tight fit it should strip out most of the deposits. I loaded some .303 with lead bullets (home cast) and made them a tad hot - darned things stripped in rifling and left a mass of lead! Only solution was the bronze pull-thru approach. No harm to barrel.

I forget names but there are a few good de-leading compounds and solutions available - these are useful once you have, by bronze, mechanically got most out.

It's tedious but - it does work. BTW - I think you need some hard cast bullets - preferably with gas checks if you drive em hard.
 
#3 ·
Thanks, but I usually ONLY shoot jacketed rounds and this was an attemp to cut cost - how'd we do? No trouble w/ the jacketed stuff but only 50 or so rounds ( loaded on the light side) of the plated bullets just garfed the hell out of the barrel. I usually don't have to worry about cleaning the gun after a short shoot so I didn't notice until I couldn't hit the backer at anything over 50 yds the next time out. Got all weekend to see if I can fix it, hell - got a lifetime at what those barrels cost.....................
 
#4 ·
Check out this page at Brownell's Click Here

AccuBore is a good one for Copper & Lead.

Then what you might want to do is polish/lap your bore with JB Bore Bright.
The smoother and more micro-polished your bore is...the less surface there is for fouling to adhere to in the first place.

Finally...run a patch soaked with WeaponShield (Google search WeaponShield) down your bore...leave that on overnight and the next day run a clean dry patch or two down your bore.

The above will not hurt your barrel lands and grooves at all and will really cut down on future build-up and what little is there will be much easier to remove.
 
#8 ·
Bronze is harder than Lead but, much softer than all Steel barrels most of which are hardened to at least Rockwell 32 so nothing made of Bronze or even annealed Stainless will ever scratch a Steel barrel.
 
#11 ·
I've used a 50/50 solution of white vinegar and hydrogen peroxide to clean a leaded barrel to a spotless condition. Just find some way to plug one end of the barrel and pour the solution in. Let it sit for 5 minutes and pour it out then run a bore brush down the tube a couple of times. DO NOT use this concoction with a blued barrel.
 
#12 ·
Thanks all for helpful tips - never had this problem before. I had heard of problems of this nature w/ plated bullets but never experienced it until now. I did manage to get barrel back to original state after a couple of hours of scrubbing. I wound up having to use a stainless steel brush (did not put a mark in barrel btw) to remove the worst of the galling. I then fired 3 of the plated rounds thru the gun and found the leading took place almost immediately. Actually found a large piece of plating in front of shooting bench that had been stripped from bullet.
Re-cleaned the barrel (much easier this time), fired five jacketed rounds thru gun and found nothing but nominal copper - all I had at the time were 400gr jsp's so I loaded 'em up for about 900fps. Worked just fine, however accuracy of barrel assy is gone. Seems assy has come loose somehow internally and is moving around during firing cycle. Will have to send it off to mfgr for inspection and repair/replacement. Rather disappointing as I was going to use this gun on a hog hunt in about a week. Guess the ol' 45 will have to do w/ the carry piece as a backup.
Thanks again all for helpful tips, here's one in return - Stay away from plated bullets in high pressure applications. It just doesn't seem to hold up and can cause you some time consuming work instead of productive shooting!
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top