Extreme Barrel Fouling
I recently purchased a Maddog Ultilma Long stock for my Condor SS .25.. On the first time out I could tell that there was a big improvement. Got my best group ever at 50 yards but after that, things went downhill. Flyers everywhere. Looks like a shotgun target.
So, I tore the gun down to inspect. All screws were nice and tight, no clipping signs in the shroud. But when I got to the barrel..woooaahhh. The muzzle end was totally fouled with lead. Looks like someone put toothpaste in there and wiped it out but left it clogging the grooves. I took a nylon brush and my 50/50 Kano Kroil/Shooters Choice bore cleaner and carefully (nervous when this close to the crown) scrubbed the bore. Had to repeat three times; finished with dry patches. Nice and clean now and it passes the Q-tip test.
So my questions are…has anyone else experienced this kind of fouling in the OEM .25 LW barrel? It was fouled from the crown, back as far as my light would go..makes sense as this is where the choke is.
How often should I be cleaning? Obviously not often enough. I’m thinking I’ve put maybe 1000 pellets through since the last clean.
I shoot JSB EK’s almost exclusively. I don’t wash but do lube with Krytec.
Perhaps I should pull a few dry patches through after each shooting session from now on.
Thanks for any opinions…..
KP in NC
Oh yeah, that Maddog stock is beautiful!!!
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Interesting day of testing, interesting discoveries. But cutting to the chase; cleaning the barrel along with washing and lubing pellets made for the best groups yet. One thing’s for sure; even with a Maddog stock, one has to use a light hold on the gun, especially on the bottle. Also lubing unwashed pellets is not good.
This time I lubed with a lot less lube. maybe half as much. Seems to work very well.
Also I think I’ll be pulling 2-3 dry patches through after every shooting session from now on….if I shoot more than say 50 shots. can’t hurt.
This was a five shot group at 50 yards…shooting into the wind. 4 shots in one hole…pulled the 5th…UGH! Barrel cleaned, pellets washed dried and lubed with Krytech.
One-piece TT tophat, no insert, power wheel at 0.5…no witnesses! My personal best.
Thanks for the input Wildfire.
Thought I’d have some targets shot this evening but stepped out from work into 40 mph gusts! Darn. Maybe this weekend.
Please keep us posted on your results!
Wildfire (Mike) :5:
Thanks very much for the reply..very informative. It all makes perfect sense. I think that I might be over lubing…hard to know how much to use. I use about 6 drops/100 or so pellets. I divide a large tin of Exacts into three then 6 drops each time. Might be too much. Just want to say the Paste description isn’t quite accurate. Not a “goo.” I should have said it looks like “dried” toothpaste…its on there pretty hard but it’s probably as you say ..a combo of lube and lead.
I should have mentioned this but I went in and grabbed an un-lubed tin of Exacts when the flyers started. After about 15 or so shots things tightened way up …I thought, wow the gun doesn’t like lubed. But the next day they went south again. Now I’m thinking they scraped out all the excess lube but then went south again…who knows?
I always clean from breech to muzzle as well but I did go in the muzzle this time with the brush held in my fingers to work the area against the grain being careful not to let the brush come all the way out.
I forgot to mention that I lapped the barrel with Mother’s as per Greg Davis’ method on the Yellow. And I have cleaned it a few times (not many) since I got it late last summer.
I like your shrink tube idea. I have used gaffers tape in the past but it gets eaten up quickly. The shotgun swab is cool too. I try rolling rag and twisting in but not the best 🙄 …your way is smarter.
The last time I cleaned it…the groups did tighten. I cleaned it last night and I’ll try to get the scope back on and get outside to test before I lose the light tonight. It’s clear and calm today so I’m gonna be breakin’ speed limits to get home…oops, did I just say that out loud? 😯
Thanks again for the great info….I’m always learning from this forum.
KP in NC
Hey K.P.
It’s hard to say just how often to clean your bore. Really depends on a lot of different factors. If you’re getting the “toothpasty goo” in your rifling, that’s natural if you’re lubing your ammo. The lubrication mixed with the lead dust will turn into a paste. You may be OVER lubing your ammo. I lube very lightly by just keeping a lube soaked cleaning patch in the tin with my pellets and just giving it a light shake from time to time (not hard enough to damage or deform the skirts of course)!
I also run a nylon brush through my barrel when I clean if the lead buildup is excessive. What I have done to protect my crown was to put a sleeve of heat shrink tubing over my cleaning Rod and shrink it down to “plastic coat” the rod and I always clean from breech to muzzle. You want to clean in the same direction as your projectile leaves the barrel. I also clean out my shroud every time I clean the bore. I use a shotgun swab on my cleaning Rod to do this.
Was this the first time you cleaned the bore? If so, you were lucky to get 1000 shots before your POI changed.
After you cleaned it, did your groups tighten up again?
Hope this helps!
Wildfire :5:
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Very awesome group!!!!!
Wildfire :5: