Shooting FMJ after lead?

[LSP972]

Yeah, bullet casting is one of those side-tracks I never had the slightest interest in pursuing. Helping friends do it was enough to convince me of that.

And of course, bottom feeders are happier with FMJ anyway; and since I stopped competing with a revolver in 1991, my revolver shooting has been much less. I still load .38 Specials, but they are bunny farts for less-painful practice with a Ti-Scan snubby; and I use whatever-is-the-cheapest FMJ or JHP bullet I can find, to minimize the clean-up as much as possible.

I still have memories of a bunch of my fellow State Police Academy classmates and I using an electric drill to speed up the time required to clean our revolvers after a days' training (many hundreds of rounds) using those really dirty .38 reloads provided to us. Fired in our .357-chambered revolvers, they left one hell of a lead ring in the 1/10th of an inch between the case mouth and chamber step in the revolver charge holes, and those were a cast-iron beotch to get out. We would have sold our children for a couple of those stainless .38/.357 chamber brushes Brownell's sells nowadays. Those puppies WORK.

Ken (LSP552) went through the class prior to mine, so I imagine he remembers those dark days as well...

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[jetfire]

I still use an electric drill to clean revo cylinders.

[TR675]

I heard on the internet that was a good way to ruin a revolver.

[jetfire]

I heard on the internet that was a good way to ruin a revolver.

I believe you could ruin a gun doing that if you were sloppy and careless. Or didn't use a nylon brush.

[LSP972]

You remember the aluminum cleaning rods that used to come with S&W revolvers? The ones with a simple loop bent into one end, with the straight end carrying female threads?

Cut the loop off, and you have a dandy extended brush holder. The aluminum is softer than the cylinder steel, so if you do manage to rub against/score/etc. the sides of the charge holes… no problemo. And we used bronze brushes.

The people who goon up their revolvers cleaning them with a drill are using steel rods, or are trying to do the barrel too.

One other thing; keep the yoke in place if you haven't completely disassembled the cylinder. Otherwise, you stand a good chance of getting some bristles into the cylinder's center interior, caught up between the ejector spring and the center pin. Bad juju down the road…

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[TR675]

I believe you could ruin a gun doing that if you were sloppy and careless. Or didn't use a nylon brush.

Serious question. How about a bronze brush? I used to use one in an electric drill in a gp100 based on guns store advice before I got nervous about it.

Beats me if it ever did any harm or not - were my revo's charge holes that rough looking before I started doing that? Who knows, it's a Ruger, but it sure was easier to clean that way.

[Chuck Haggard]

I've seen two guns ruined by shooting jacketed after lead, one a model 66 and the other a Glock 17


I have never seen the need to use a drill on a wheelgun, or any other gun frankly, and I have shot a ton of lead through several of mine over the years.

[rsa-otc]

Lewis Lead remover anyone. I have found that to be a god send. I will say it's still a #$&@ to get rid of the .10 ring in 357 chambers after shooting a ton of plain lead 38s. It's one of the reasons that unless I can't find anything else I will only shoot plated or high tech coated bullets now a days.

I have used the drill trick once years ago when doing the company's inventory annual inspection & cleaning. We used bronze brushes in a cordless drill with the speed dialed way back. I noticed no damage to the chambers.

Today if I come across a particularly hard to remove deposit I will liberally apply a bore cleaning solution, let it sit, use the Lewis Lead remover and then finish up with a patch made up from one of those lead removing cloths on the end of a tight fitting jag. Seems to really get the job done.

[LSP972]

I have never seen the need to use a drill on a wheelgun...

Well, we did. And we managed to not ruin any revolvers.

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[TR675]

Lewis Lead remover anyone.

Had one, used it, the head broke off inside a charge hole. I think the rubber head was too large, it was an SOB to get it through the holes even with the tension screw backed all the way out. N of 1 and all that, lots of people sing their praises and it did what it was supposed to, albeit being a PITA before it broke.