Bkreutz
US Veteran
There have been a number of occasions where threads have talked about how often and how detailed a cleaning should be done on a M&P pistol. I thought I'd share how I do mine. I'm not promoting a particular brand of cleaning product or recommending a particular interval of cleaning, this is just what works for me in my particular situation. First off, I shoot quite a lot of rounds per week, 600 to 1200 depending on my competition schedule (and the severity of my arthritis 
) so I normally clean my competition gun once a week (usually on Thursdays so I can shoot it a couple of times before a weekend match)
Here's the gun fresh out of the bag after a week of shooting.
and here are the tools I use. I prefer using an Otis flexible cable cleaning brush, I like to pull the brush from the chamber to the muzzle. I also use a nylon cleaning brush (like an M-16 brush) a brass brush, a small flat blade screwdriver and (not pictured but you'll see it later) a dental pick. I also use paper towels and Q-Tips. You can see that my choice of cleaners/lube is Frog Lube. Any brand you choose will work. I've used this for the 70K rounds I have on this pistol and have no reason to change.
Next I field strip the gun (like explained in the manual) and wipe down everything with a paper towel to get the large deposits off (makes it less messy)
I use a solvent to soak down the barrel, then brush the exterior with a brass brush and run a brass brush through the bore. This is the only place I use a liquid solvent.
Next, I run a brass brush with the gel CLP through the bore a couple of times and then set the barrel aside until later. This is the only place I use the gel CLP.
This is what I use for the rest of the cleaning process. It's a paste CLP that I brush on with an acid brush. This goes a long way, I've been using this tub for a year and a half and it's only half gone.
Next I brush every place where there is carbon buildup, inside the slide, inside the lower, and on the outside of the front part of the slide where muzzle blast collects.
I immediately wipe off the carbon and the excess CLP with whatever will work. Q-tips work the best on the trigger bar, slide lock, and lower frame. Paper towel and the nylon brush work well for the slide.
Sometimes just the paste and nylon brush won't remove all the carbon, especially on the slide just behind the breech face. Here I use the brass brush and the flat blade screwdriver to scrape off carbon.
If you look closely, you can see carbon buildup behind the extractor hook, this is after CLP and brass brushing. I use a dental pick to clean this area out, this is a very important step, as the carbon builds up, the extractor catches a smaller and smaller portion of the extraction groove, at best this will result in a failure to extract/eject, or worse, a piece of the extractor will break off.
This is the amount I normally scrape out of the extractor at my weekly cleaning.
This next step is not part of my weekly cleaning routine. In fact I never cleaned the striker and channel until I started getting light striker hits at about the 20K round mark, cleaned this and the light strikes went away. Now I clean the striker and channel once a month or so. Here's a link to a thread that talks about removing the striker, Rastoff's pictures are better than mine.
http://smith-wessonforum.com/smith-wesson-m-p-pistols/338155-shield-40-mishap.html
Now I go back to the barrel, what I use for a patch is one of Otis' round patch with a hole in it, I drop the patch over the cable and pull it through the bore a couple of times.
Lastly I brush a clean layer of paste CLP on all the shiny spots on the pistol, including the forward part of the barrel, wipe off any excess and reassemble. Total time, around 30 minutes if I'm going slow.
I also wipe the outside with a silicone cloth, looks pretty good at 70K
I didn't include cleaning the optic, I do that every time I shoot (sometimes in the middle of a match) with alcohol pads and tissue
Hope you found this useful. Again, not promoting any product or schedule. Personally I think a M&P would run on spit
) so I normally clean my competition gun once a week (usually on Thursdays so I can shoot it a couple of times before a weekend match)
Here's the gun fresh out of the bag after a week of shooting.
and here are the tools I use. I prefer using an Otis flexible cable cleaning brush, I like to pull the brush from the chamber to the muzzle. I also use a nylon cleaning brush (like an M-16 brush) a brass brush, a small flat blade screwdriver and (not pictured but you'll see it later) a dental pick. I also use paper towels and Q-Tips. You can see that my choice of cleaners/lube is Frog Lube. Any brand you choose will work. I've used this for the 70K rounds I have on this pistol and have no reason to change.
Next I field strip the gun (like explained in the manual) and wipe down everything with a paper towel to get the large deposits off (makes it less messy)
I use a solvent to soak down the barrel, then brush the exterior with a brass brush and run a brass brush through the bore. This is the only place I use a liquid solvent.
Next, I run a brass brush with the gel CLP through the bore a couple of times and then set the barrel aside until later. This is the only place I use the gel CLP.
This is what I use for the rest of the cleaning process. It's a paste CLP that I brush on with an acid brush. This goes a long way, I've been using this tub for a year and a half and it's only half gone.
Next I brush every place where there is carbon buildup, inside the slide, inside the lower, and on the outside of the front part of the slide where muzzle blast collects.
I immediately wipe off the carbon and the excess CLP with whatever will work. Q-tips work the best on the trigger bar, slide lock, and lower frame. Paper towel and the nylon brush work well for the slide.
Sometimes just the paste and nylon brush won't remove all the carbon, especially on the slide just behind the breech face. Here I use the brass brush and the flat blade screwdriver to scrape off carbon.
If you look closely, you can see carbon buildup behind the extractor hook, this is after CLP and brass brushing. I use a dental pick to clean this area out, this is a very important step, as the carbon builds up, the extractor catches a smaller and smaller portion of the extraction groove, at best this will result in a failure to extract/eject, or worse, a piece of the extractor will break off.
This is the amount I normally scrape out of the extractor at my weekly cleaning.
This next step is not part of my weekly cleaning routine. In fact I never cleaned the striker and channel until I started getting light striker hits at about the 20K round mark, cleaned this and the light strikes went away. Now I clean the striker and channel once a month or so. Here's a link to a thread that talks about removing the striker, Rastoff's pictures are better than mine.
http://smith-wessonforum.com/smith-wesson-m-p-pistols/338155-shield-40-mishap.html
Now I go back to the barrel, what I use for a patch is one of Otis' round patch with a hole in it, I drop the patch over the cable and pull it through the bore a couple of times.
Lastly I brush a clean layer of paste CLP on all the shiny spots on the pistol, including the forward part of the barrel, wipe off any excess and reassemble. Total time, around 30 minutes if I'm going slow.
I also wipe the outside with a silicone cloth, looks pretty good at 70K
I didn't include cleaning the optic, I do that every time I shoot (sometimes in the middle of a match) with alcohol pads and tissue
Hope you found this useful. Again, not promoting any product or schedule. Personally I think a M&P would run on spit
