Whats the best thing you ever used to clean leading?

[bloo]

Mercury will preform magic in a leaded barrel. I have also been told that it will make the metal brittle. Don't know that for sure but it's someting to think about. I used it on a Ruger Super Blackhawk years ago. Made the bore shine like chrome. Anyone know if using mercury will damage the metal?

 

[ChuckS1]

Originally posted by Model520Fan:

Originally posted by ChuckS1:
+1 on mercury. Works great. LOL, it's funny; back in 1972 we used to play with it in chemistry lab all the time. Made little balls, rolled 'em around, and then brushed it off on the lab floor. No one gave it a second thought then.

I remember the same from the late fifties, early sixties. What gives? I believe that it is poisonous, probably more so than we thought then, but surely less than we are being led to believe now.

Does anybody know?

Can't be that bad. Probably the same scare tactics used by the libs to ban lead in California.

 

[whelenshooter]

I think the powers-that-be go overboard about mercury nowadays, but many also UNDERRATE its toxicity.

When I first started working for the Forest Service in Idaho I went with my boss to visit a very small gold mining operation on the National Forest. One of the older miners was walking around with a cane and would occasionally lose his balance and had to catch himself. He also talked about half nuts. When we got back in our pickup and started driving back to the office my boss said, "You know why that guy loses his balance and acts so nutty don't you?" I admitted I didn't. He went on to tell me that the reason the guy was having so many problems was because he had been using mercury to retrieve small amounts of gold in his pan, then retorting the mercury/gold mix to separate the metals in a potato (small miners have done this for ages). My boss said that breathing the fumes from using potato retorts will give a person mercury poisoning over time. The loss of balance and acting nutty are symptoms of mercury poisoning.

That is where the term "Mad as a Hatter" came from. They used to use mercury in the hat-making industry, and mercury poisoning made the Hatters act crazy.

 

[Mr. Tree]

Agree with mercury 100%. But make sure you take off any gold jewelry like a wedding ring. Mercury will instantly turn gold black and I do not believe this can easily be reversed.

 

[ImprovedModel56Fan]

Originally posted by Mr. Tree:
Agree with mercury 100%. But make sure you take off any gold jewelry like a wedding ring. Mercury will instantly turn gold black and I do not believe this can easily be reversed.

When I was a kid it turned some of my 14K gold ring silver-colored (actually, mercury-colored). I believe that I removed the amalgam with steel wool or something similar.

 

[Smitty500Mag]

I used to carry a little chrome vile of mercury in my pocket when I was kid to shine pennies with. I also used it once to see if it would turn the filling in my teeth a bright silver like it did pennies. Luckily it didn't or I might have kept them polished with it all the time if it did. I was about 12 years old at the time and now I'm a few months from 60 with no ill effects so far unless you call wearing a tin foil hat strange which I don't think there's anything strange about it since all the other little people here at the home with me are wearing them.

Smitty

 

[aphelion]

Originally posted by BunnySlayer:
Unless the leading is of biblical proportions I just shoot a few jacketed rounds through my gun and it takes it right out. That and a gentle scrub with a bronze brush.

Shooting some jacketed bullets is the easiest way, and does no harm. Firing some gas checked cast bullets will usually take it out, too.

 

[Alk8944]

Originally posted by bloo:
Mercury will preform magic in a leaded barrel. I have also been told that it will make the metal brittle. Don't know that for sure but it's someting to think about. I used it on a Ruger Super Blackhawk years ago. Made the bore shine like chrome. Anyone know if using mercury will damage the metal?

Mercury will amalgamate with Cupric (Copper based) alloys, Lead, Silver, Gold, and possibly the other noble metals, but it will cause no problems with Ferric (Iron based) alloys. Amalgamation is what causes Mercury to easily remove the Lead, and is what makes brass cartridges which were fired with Mercuric primers brittle.

 

[Rule3]

Where would one find Mercury these days?
I also remember playing with as a kid. Used to be in thermostats and some thermometers

 

[n4zov]

For anybody considering using mercury as a lead remover, the lead ends up as a very fine powder floating on the top of the mercury. I'm no chemist, but I suspect this powder is very toxic, and great care should be taken not to inhale it. Just blowing it off in an enclosed space might not be a very good idea.

 

[Hillbilly Jim]

Back 50 years ago we used mercury in a hankerchief to magically turn pennies into dimes ala The Boy Scout magazine.
I have a lot of pure mercury but only a fool would use it for any reason. If anyone wants some mercury and can pay the hazardous shipping costs and liability insurance I will ship you some.

 

[Hillbilly Jim]

By the way I would never recommend trying to shoot out leading using jacketed or gas checked bullets, you are asking for high pressures. You just iron lead into the bore and make the bore look shiny.

 

[Gatofeo]

For removing leading from cylinder chambers, I chuck a bronze brush, damp with a bit of Hoppes No. 9, into a cordless drill.
30 seconds at medium speed, with a tight bore brush, removes it. I use .25 caliber brushes in .22, .35 in .32, .40 in .35 (.38, .357) and .50 in .44/45.
I would never use a steel brush in a steel chamber, for fear of removing chamber metal and changing chamber dimensions over time, but bronze brushes will wear before the steel chamber does.
For barrels, I use Iosso bore cleaner. It's a paste that comes in a tube. Alas, I ran out last week and didn't save the tube, so I can't recall if that's the real name.
Best stuff I've found.
If I can't find Iosso -- and it's harder and harder to find anymore -- I use JB Non-Embedding Bore Cleaning Compound. Comes in a small, screw-top tub.
With either Iosso or JB I put some on a clean patch, work it well into the fabric, then put the patch over the flat end of a length of wooden dowel that fits loosely in the bore.
Should be such a tight fit that you have to tap the dowel/patch combination down the bore.
When the patch emerges, it will carry with it long ribbons of lead it's picked up along the way.
A couple of treatments like this and most lead is gone and the bore gleams.
Follow this treatment with a a couple patches damp with Hoppes 9 to remove any paste residue.
This treatment will remove lead and fouling you can't even see.
Years ago, I was given a Marlin 410 lever-action shotgun. Built on the Model 93 action, it dated to 1929.
Lots of work with a bronze brush and Hoppes 9 left the bore bright and shiny.
Then I gave it the tight patch/Iosso treatment.
Wow!
Streaks of brown (rust) and black (lead) on the patch told me it was far from clean. My eyes had lied to me!

A couple more treatments of a tight patch on a cleaning rod, working it back and forth with the Iosso, left the bore sparkling.
Iosso is good stuff. If you find a tube of it, buy two; it's hard to find.

 

[chief38]

LEWIS LEAD REMOVER!!!


CHIEF38

 

[aphelion]

Originally posted by Hillbilly Jim:
By the way I would never recommend trying to shoot out leading using jacketed or gas checked bullets, you are asking for high pressures. You just iron lead into the bore and make the bore look shiny.

That simply isn't the case.

 

[Forty Five Auto]

Wow, can't believe I've made it to page 3 and not seen anyone recommend the Outer's Foul Out system. I've used the Foul Out III for years to clean leading from bores. Works electrochemically, kind of like reverse chrome plating. Not nearly as toxic as the mercury!! Not nearly as labor-intensive as most of these scrubbing techniques (though they are innovative). You just plug the bore, fill it with the provided chemical, drop the electrode in and walk away. Come back in 15/20 and pull the electrode out with most or all of the leading on it. Repeat only if necessary (isn't usually) then clean the remaining carbon out with your normal solvent. Works on copper too, using a different chemical.

 

[BUFF]

"Big .45's Frontier Metal Cleaner" works great. It is a metal wool that looks like coarse steel wool but isn't. Comes in single pads in a sandwich bag-sized bag with a hanger-perforated label. Tear or cut a few strands from the pad and wipe around a worn cleaning brush and scrub away.

It won't wear blue from the metal and I use it with oil to remove light surface rusting, as well.

Skeeter Skelton wrote about it, so it can't be bad!

 

[James57]

I bought a Foul Out I when they first came out and was very happy with it. Then came the Foul Out II and I thought, hmmm. Then Foul Out III came out. By that time I was out of Foul Out lead removal liquid so I bought a new quart of Foul Out liquid. It would not work with my Foul Out I. Light would come on in about 5 minutes saying the barrel was clean but it was not. Tried several time changing the liquid in the bore, cleaning and re-cleaning the rod. Nothing worked. I sent a message to Outers on their web site and that was about 4 years ago and I still haven't heard one word from them. I may call them but I'm not optimistic about any help as a fellow on another forum having the same problem and contacted them by phone and their advice was to buy their new Foul Out III. They did not admit to changing formula or would not offer any remedy for his Foul Out I. I may call them and see what they say about this; I have not bought anything from Outer's since I had my problem and if a solution is not offered, I will never.

 

[S/W - Lifer]

I've yet to clean lead from a bore on my duty handguns. We were told to shoot a few jacketed rounds to clean up the bore and it has worked for me. That is following factory wadcutters. Lead from cast bullets could be different.

 

[bigt5150]

My personal favorite is a 50/50 mix of Hoppes #9 and Kroil. Swab your barrel and cylinder chambers liberally and let it sit for about 10-20 minutes, the longer the better. The lead looks like it oozes out of the barrel.