Help! Cleaning rod got stuck

D

digitalblue

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Long story short, I was trying to clean my horrendously leaded 10/22 and the crud inside the barrel wouldn't budge. I disassembled the gun and removed the barrel so I could try cleaning it from the chamber side. I tried pushing a small patch through and it ended up getting stuck, I managed to yank the rod back but the patch stayed behind. It still wasn't budging so I wacked the cleaning rod a few times with a mallet. The cleaning rod is completely really seized inside the barrel and I'm unable to remove it.

I've already tried the usual methods(twisting the rod with a pair of vise grips, yanking on the rod with a vise, etc) but nothing works...

I figure I should mention that there's a stupid amount of lead in the barrel, I have remington thunderbolts to blame for that...

Any ideas?
 
Since you have the barrel off, put it in a 400-450 degree oven for half an hour, take out and rap smartly on a hardwood block. Lead should strip out from the grooves and you should be able to free the rod.

Dr Jim
 
Is this a carbon fibre type rod or aluminum. Either way it will be different material than the barrel. What I am wondering is what would happen if you put the barrel into a chest freezer or whatever freezer it will fit into. Being a different construction than the barrel, it is possible that the rod will shrink just enough to pull free. There is nothing to lose by trying this.
 
Try Lube

Try pouring some sort of lubricant to help ease the rod slide out. It may take a while & may need to exert a bit of pushing, twisting & pulling which helps with the lubing process. It should eventually come off.

Good Luck.
 
Thanks for the input guys! I just managed to free the rod with brute force. I clamped the rod into a vise and I used a pry bar; destroyed the rod but at least I got it out...

Now, the second part of my dilemma, removing the huge chunk of lead that's completely obstructing the barrel. It was originally a case of bad leading, my ham-fisted efforts have now rendered it into a large chunk of lead. Any ideas on how to remove it?
 
use lots of penetrating oil
try to push a rod without any jag in an attempt to remove the block
then push a brass jag (no patch) to remove more lead
next get a strand from a copper "chore boy" wrapped around the jag and scrub some more.
oil and repeat
 
Inquiring minds would like to know what ammo you were using to lead up a barrel that badly. I don`t clean my 10-22 barrel very often, with no leading problems.
 
If I were you I'd see if a BARE rod fit's thru the bore.
Start with that then a brush, but it would be easier to push the rod thru a couple time's then when it's still sticking out the bore screw on the brush.
It's a lot easier to pull one of those small rod's thru then push it thru.
 
So, I just managed to remove the chunk of lead that was clogging the barrel. My method will make some people cringe but it was really the only way; I used a steel rod and a 5lb mini-sledge to ram the blockage. After extreme hammering, out popped a 1-1/4 slug of lead :eek: I am not exaggerating, this thing probably contains 3 bullets worth of lead. I'll post pictures later tonight.

dead meat - I was using a combination of Remington thunderbolts and Winchester wildcats. I know this stuff is regarded as "bottom of the barrel" ammo but it's cheap and seems to work well.
 
Cavs42 said:
So you were worried about heating your barrel, but felt pounding a cleaning rod through the barrel with a sledge was less likely to cause damage? okay!
Click to expand...

Pounding a cleaning rod through the barrel could damage the rifling and cause loss of accuracy at worst. However, altering the barrel's temper could result in a ruptured barrel.

I don't know about you but I'd rather have an inaccurate barrel than one that's liable to burst on me. Besides, I can always replace the barrel if accuracy becomes an issue, I can't say the same for the latter..
 
digitalblue said:
Pounding a cleaning rod through the barrel could damage the rifling and cause loss of accuracy at worst. However, altering the barrel's temper could result in a ruptured barrel.

I don't know about you but I'd rather have an inaccurate barrel than one that's liable to burst on me. Besides, I can always replace the barrel if accuracy becomes an issue, I can't say the same for the latter..
Click to expand...

Tempering temps for the typical steels used in barrels will be well over 1000F. Below that you cannot hurt the strength or toughness of the material, so heating it would have been fine. Even with a somewhat compromised barrel I doubt a .22LR could burst the barrel, as pressures are very low compared to any of the centerfire cartridges.

I look forward to seeing the slug of lead that came out.


Mark
 
...and people say I clean excessively by cleaning the bore and action after every use.

I think they're the crazy ones...
 
mmattockx said:
Tempering temps for the typical steels used in barrels will be well over 1000F. Below that you cannot hurt the strength or toughness of the material, so heating it would have been fine. Even with a somewhat compromised barrel I doubt a .22LR could burst the barrel, as pressures are very low compared to any of the centerfire cartridges.
Click to expand...

What he said.
 
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