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Old 03-31-2013, 06:55 PM
dfariswheel dfariswheel is offline
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A dish soap like Dawn mixed with hot water will work well, but it will not remove carbon or copper fouling.
In other words, you still need to clean the bore.

After cleaning, a fast way to finish is to drop the gun in a sink full of hot water to rinse, then blow it out if you have access to compressed air, and/or finish drying with a hair dryer to warm the metal.
Note: hair dryer....not heat gun or torch.

After it's completely dry, spray in a good rust preventing lube. Rem-Oil will do, but is a little too thin. I used to use an airbrush to spray in CLP Breakfree. DO NOT breathe the fumes, you will NOT like it.

If you're careful about flammable fumes, ordinary cheap paint thinner makes a good cleaner and requires no rinse, just drying.

Possibly the ultimate cleaner is Cylinder & Slide Shop's "Dunk-Kit". This is a gallon bucket of a cleaner-lubricant.
You soak the gun in the bucket, shake off the excess and that's it. The cleaner leaves a lubricant on the metal.
This works even faster in an ultrasonic cleaner, and there's no rinsing or lubricating to prevent rust needed, but I would still apply a dedicated lubricant on key areas.

Some ultrasonic pointers:
Use a basket or wires to keep parts of the bottom. The cleaner works better is parts aren't lying on the bottom.

Run the unit until the cleaner liquid is warm or use hot water. It works better with warm solution.

KEEP YOUR HANDS OUT OF THE TANK. Bone marrow and ultrasonics don't work well together.
This is not instant, it's cumulative. but don't even start.

Ultrasonics will remove painted sight and safety markings. This may take a few times with water based cleaners, or can happen instantly with many solvents.

As you noted, some of the strong soap cleaners like Simply Green and Greased Lightning will seriously damage aluminum. They do so faster in an ultrasonic tank.

For small parts like trigger units you can put an inch of water in the tank and stand small jars in the bottom filled with lacquer thinner.
The ultrasonic waves pass through the water and into the small containers. You can use glass, plastic, or metal. Again, watch the highly flammable fumes.
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