Cleaning your handguns

Every few range trips I'll strip and wipe and reoil my pistols. I generally shoot commercial reloads with jacketed bullets [BDX] and they burn pretty cleanly, with very little appreciable buildup of residue. My blued guns will get more attention, but most of my favorites are stainless anyway. I don't shoot rifle as much, but I'll usually run a boresnake through the barrel and oil as necessary after every shoot.

I'm of the school of thought that maintains that you can cause unnecessary wear and tear with overly frequent and aggressive cleaning. Things were different back in the day when ammo was dirty or corrosive and steel less rust resistant.
 
I'm pretty sure I can put 5 or 10 thousand rounds down any of my Sigs without worrying about failures, same for my GP100. But I like my pistols, rifles and shotguns clean, oiled, and babied, so I clean after every day at the range or hunting. They may not need it, but I like it.
 
oiled, and babied, so I clean after every day at the range or hunting. They may not need it, but I like it.
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Have to agree with you on that. I have done 2000 rounds over 2 days on the G34 with no cleaning and had 0 issues.

Having said that, I normally clean any of the stable after a range trip of over 200 rounds.

The G34 is my only exception. Gets cleaned after 1000 rounds minimum.
 
Usually within a few days of last use. I don't always have time to get on them immediatel. I don't shoot :confused:very often, usually once a month and not every guns.... so my guns can sit in the safe fore almost a year. I'm not worried about round count, but more about rust. If I know I'll shoot a gun a few times in a month, I'll only clean it at the end when it will go back in storage.
 
I put 100 rds thru my CZ 75B on every practice & I've fired 1500 rounds since September. Clean after each session and haven't had a stoppage. Like kids, guns do the darndest things when they get dirty!
 
If you don't clean the bore after use (just fire one shot in a 22 even) and then put it back in the safe and forget about it for a while during those friggin humid summers we get here in east Ont, then you are asking for a pitted bore. I have seen this happen. Therefore, I always clean the bore out after even firing one round. It cleans out real easy when fresh too. The rest of the action is not a real concern. And don't forget to wipe off the outside with oil or you will see rusted finger prints on it the next time you pull it out of the safe. I also have a heated safe, but when you get weeks of 50%+ humid crap during the summer, rust is just around the corner. Have to do the same with tools stored in the shop too.
CD
 
Here's the way I see it: I don't shoot often, and when I do, I put maybe 100-150 rounds or so through one of my guns, at the most. My .22s get much more use, but my .45s are too expensive to fire often.

Then I realize, I'm all gung-ho about investing in quality firearms, but I had garbage cleaning equipment, screw-together metal rods and all.

So I started to look into cleaning equipment that was actually high quality; coated Dewey rods with the red bearing handles, high-quality patches, bronze brushes, lubricants, solvents, greases, cloths, etc. And that way after firing my guns, I would get to play with my nice cleaning equipment too, which makes the experience more enjoyable. When I had the screw-together rods, flimsy brushes and plastic eyelet patch holes, it felt like a chore.

When I was a kid, and somebody had an old car that they took care of, I was always fascinated by the packaging of the spare parts that they kept on hand. I know that sounds strange, but when I saw the boxes of oil filters, FRAM and K&N spare parts in their boxes, etc. it filled me with a sense of pride to have all these neat spare parts on hand.

Now that I am into guns, I feel the same way about having boxes of Hoppes 9 in the glass bottle, old-school looking boxes, etc. that makes me feel that the maintenance of my firearms is taken very seriously.
 
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