TECH TIP: Clean Your Chamber and Lug Recesses
Most competitive shooters are pretty good about bore cleaning (some may even clean their bores too aggressively). However, we’ve found that many shooters neglect the chamber area and the bolt lug recesses. It’s too easy to clean the bore, slip out the guide rod and say “I’m done.” Sinclair Int’l explains why it’s important to clean the action interior: “Shooters use a lot of grease and oil on their bolts to reduce friction and to prevent wear[.] Unfortunately, both of these compounds attract grit, powder and primer residues. Cleaning your receiver is especially critical [with] custom actions where the fit between the action and bolt is held to very tight tolerances. Routine cleaning of the action will prevent unnecessary wear on the bolt body, locking lugs, and the action raceways/guide rails. Frequent action cleaning is also essential to keeping the trigger area free of debris which can cause trigger hang-ups and failures.” Below, we present action cleaning advice from Sinclair’s Reloading Press Newsletter.
Cleaning the Chamber
Combustion by-products, lubricants, and solvent residues can collect in your chamber. Severe build-up of grease and carbon can interfere with chambering. Also some solvents will promote corrosion. You need to keep your chambers clean.
1) Install a clean cotton mop of the correct size on the end of a chamber rod and insert the mop into the chamber. Rotate the mop several times to remove any brush bristles left behind and any excess solvent that was between the rod guide snout and the end of the chamber. Make sure the chamber is dry. Prior to storing a rifle you can oil the chamber but make sure the oil is removed prior to firing the rifle.
2) Alternatively, install an old bore brush on a chamber rod, overlap a couple of patches on the brush bristles, and wrap them around the brush completely. Then insert the patch-covered brush into the chamber while rotating it to remove the excess solvent and debris. Push it firmly into the neck area of the chamber. A similar method is to pierce a large patch on the end of the brush loop and insert it into the action, again rotating the brush as you push the patch up against the breech.
Cleaning the Lug Recess Area
The action lug recess area is one of the dirtiest places on a bolt-action rifle. To properly clean this area, always use a tool designed for the task, such as the $21.50 Sinclair Action Cleaning Tool (part # ACT1) which is part of the Sinclair Action Cleaning Tool Kit (now on sale for $29.99, part #ACT2).
1) Insert a cotton roll or cleaning felt into your lug recess cleaning tool and wet both ends and the face of the cotton roll/felt with solvent.
2) Insert the tool into the action and push it forward until it is positioned fully in the lug recess area and rotate the tool head several times. Then reverse the rotation for another few turns. While rotating the tool move it slightly in and out to cover the entire recess area and to also clean the breech face.
3) Remove the tool from the action and inspect the surface of the felt or cotton roll. If there is quite a bit of residue on both sides of the felt/roll, then repeat with another wet felt/roll.
4) When you feel the recess area is completely clean, insert a dry cotton roll into the tool and rotate the tool head to remove any remaining solvent and debris. If necessary, use a second dry cotton roll.
5) You can follow this step up with another pass of a mop or patches into the chamber to get any debris or solvent that pushed forward out of the lug recess area.
Cleaning Tips from The Reloading Press, used courtesy Sinclair Int’l, All Rights Reserved.
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Tags: Action, Action Cleaning Tool, Bolt, Chamber, Cleaning, Lug, rifle, Sinclair Int'l
Cleaning the chamber is a no brainer…but because of the cost of mops, they tend to get reused, and this can result in and inadequate job being done when they are used to wipe out the chamber, because the mop carries solvent from previous uses. I prefer to use the same chamber rod. Instead of a mop, I use a worn out bronze bore brush, loosely wrapped with a strip of paper toweling, that extends beyond the end of the brush, and about half way through its wrapping is folded to half width to increase the bulk of the loose wrap to larger than the chamber body. After being sure that the wrapped brush is properly inserted into the chamber, I push the rod in as far as it will go, and give it a turn or two, remove it, turn the paper over, and do it one more time. This does a very good job of removing solvent and other undesirable material from the chamber.
I use a bore mop and spray it regularly with aerosol carb cleaner or acetone.
How do you remove the abrasive fiber the paper towels leave behind? Would you clean your glasses with a paper towel Boyd Allen?
In the past I was a strong supporter of acetone. Left the bolt on my Turbo clean and dry and me a happy camper. As time passed I was starting to find rusty firing pin springs that I couldn’t figure out why. Long story short as anybody who has handled acetone knows is how fast it evaporates. So you clean your bolt, rinse it with another shot and put your rifle away not realizing how much condensation was left on the bolt. Bingo. Next Match or next month you have rust on the spring . And yes I know it could be lubricated, but in some circles that is frowned upon as no grease or oil gives u better ignition.
Good day, my bolt action is getting harder to close when I load a round, could this be due to sediment build-up or could there be another reason?