K31 Cleaning!

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PerogieGenie

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Hey guys,

I recently ordered a beautiful K31 from T&T Arms out in BC. It's a small business but Tony was a great help and really awesome in sending me pics of the rifle. Anyways, I was just wondering if any of you guys have any advice on cleaning a K31? I picked up a dewey rod with some patches and I plan on using some Hoppes Elite Gun Cleaner and Hoppes Elite Gun Oil on her as I got some of it just lying around. Think that would be sufficient? This is my first forray into milsurp rifles and I'm worried about wrecking such a great rifle with improper cleaning methods!

Any advice/thoughts would be appreciated
Thanks!
 
Clean it the same way that you would clean any other bolt action rifle. Place the rifle in a rifle rest to hold it steady, remove the bolt and clean from the rear with a properly fitting patches. Start with bore solvent and wipe the bore until clean, then dry patch and follow up with an oiled patch thru the bore and chamber. To clean the chamber use a double patch to get a tight fit. If there is any visible fouling or irregularities in the bore or chamber after cleaning with solvent use a bore and chamber brush to remove these and oil afterwards. The bolt and exterior metal surfaces should also be wiped clean with an oiled patch. Wood can be wiped down with a cloth and raw linseed oil. Do not leave any excess linseed on the stock. Dispose of linseed soaked rags by soaking them in a water and placing them in a sealed jar to a risk of avoid spontaneous combustion. Further disassembly and cleaning may be necessary if the rifle has a heavy accumulation of grease or cosmolene type preservative.
 
Don't over do the cleaning.
The excellent bores these K31 rifles have are due to greasing the bore right after shooting and only cleaning after 120-200 rounds have gone through them.
The grease keeps the crud soft(carbon) and prevents oxygen or sulfur from acting on the barrel steel(rust) or copper fouling(tarnish).
Minimize the application of any rod as much as possible. You can use the bolt cylinder as a Cleaning rod guide to prevent wear on the chamber/throat area, and go slow as you get to the muzzle side to prevent too much bore metal to rod contact

Grease is applied with a soft nylon bore brush passed through enough times to complete cover bore with a light covering of grease.
Grease is removed before shooting with a bore jag and patches. One pass with a snug fitting patch is enough.
You'll be surprised how much crud comes off with it.
 
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Just the man I was hoping would appear haha I've done some searching regarding the grease and the swiss grease (automattenwaffen?) that came with the cleaning kits seems to be hard to find. Are there any alternatives that are readily available that could give the same results?? I'd definitely like to use a similar method of cleaning, AKA "the swiss method" if that will maintain the rifle the best!
 
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Yes, I have done some research and many others have used a Dow 33 type silicone grease. I've got the industrial stuff, but you can use many other branded paintball greases that are Dow33 based as well.

Been working for my k31. And applies nice clean and smooth.

Ps. IfI remember correctly iThe grease with the prefix auto is for auto or semi auto rifles, there was a different one for the k31. There are some home batch recipes on how to make the stuff but it was too much work for me to bother.
 
The older yellow Swiss vegetable based grease is as hard to find as fresh dinosaur eggs.
All the Swiss Rifle Clubs have been using the Automatenfett since at least the early 1970's.
 
Any brands or off the shelf suggestions I could find in stores? I'm kind of at a loss about grease, I've ever only used CLP's with my firearms! Any way I could buy some Automatenfett off you Diopter? :p lol
 
I think as long as they are the same NLGI number it should be ok....but I would defer to the expert himself.

You may also want to pickup the cleaning kit. It has nylon and wire brushes as well as brass connectors thats made for these. The kit also comes with the grease. I recently picked up 2 kits from Tradex.
 
That would make sense I guess? I've read a few threads about people having success with the lithium grease. Hopefully Diopter can chime in! If the cleaning kits are the only way for me to get the original grease I guess I might have too. 15$ is pretty decent I guess. I was just hoping to be able to buy local, off the shelf so I can clean her when I get her tomorrow and head off to the range! haha

Build it and they will come haha Thanks Diopter! Guess its just up to me meow.
 
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Mine doesn't get very dirty, a couple patches through the barrel after about 100 rounds of gp11 is enough. My bolt was a bit stiff when I got it so I disassembled it and used bike grease on it (for bikes) and it worked very well.
 
Practically any grease you can find in a convenient format (e.g. tub or squeeze tube) should work. I am currently using a tube of Lubriplate 105 that I bought from Auto Value. Another option is Permatex Synthetic Grease sold by Canadian Tire.
 
A barrel is a barrel.

Two schools of thought:

1. Clean after each shoot.

2. Clean only when necessary.

I subscribe the the latter approach.

With high quality target rifles you can see when groups start to open. If a particular rifles goes about 300 rounds before opening, I clean it every 250 rounds.

There are advantages to not cleaning every day. Cleaning can cause extra wear. Cleaning can induce oil and gunge into the bedding. besides, I am lazy.

I found that the biggest advantage to not cleaning is that there was no "clean cold barrel" issue of where the first few shots went. The rifle just picked up where it left off.

I use Break Free (CLP) as a barrel lubricant when a rifle is being put away for more than a few days. In a week long competition I will leave the barrel dry over night. But if I am shooting only on week ends, i put it away dirty, but I run a wet CLP patch through it. Rifle is stored muzzle down. Before the next shoot I run a dry patch through. It comes out quite dirty with powder fouling. The first shot goes where I expect.

CLP might work as well as grease. The advantage of grease, and I assume the military took this into consideration, is that it does not run back into the action,the trigger and the bedding if the rifle is stored muzzle up. Nothing will ruin accuracy faster than an oil soaked bedding pad.
 
Cleaning kits with the grease are available from Samco Global Arms in the US.I don't know if they will ship to Canada.Springfield Sporters may hav e the grease as well.
 
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