Gun cleaning m1 garand - green patch from corrosive ammo??

[xopher]

Today I decided to clean my dad's m1 garand. To my surprise, the first patch came out bluish green instead of the usual black gunk. If I remembered correctly, someone told me this is a good indicator the firearm was in contact with corrosive ammo at one point in time and left to sit. Is this true?

Neither of us recall ever owning or using corrosive surplus which is why I'm very surprised....

Any ideas?

 

[mesaboogie]

Hi it is copper that is being removed. keep it up. Try using sweets 762 cleaning solvent. Your patches will be blue.. again copper fouling, however your bronze brushes will be worn away as well. So use stainless but only for very limited cleaning as they will damage your bore. After clean patches just clean your rifle on regular basis using normal procedure. Hope this helps. Cheers

 

[Corps]

Sounds like you need some copper solvent!

 

[Phat Eagle]

Yup... Copper... Nothing to do with corrosive... Corrosive residue will come out a horrific orange.

 

[zuke]

Copper solvent and elbow grease will remove it

 

[fiddler]

Yup... Copper... Nothing to do with corrosive... Corrosive residue will come out a horrific orange.

Green is copper, not rust, and rust is from neglect, not corrosive ammo. Clean your rifle as normal when you use it. Problem solved.

 

[Ganderite]

The green gunk means it was cleaned after being shot the last time and then left with Hoppes solvent in it.

The Hoppes dissolved some more copper of the years.

The only mistake made was that most solvents are not rust preventatives, so the barrel could have rusted, had it been damp or salty. the fact that the patch did not come out covered in rust is proof that it was not last shot with corrosive ammo.