Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

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Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by salate » 18 Feb 2014, 1:44 pm

Metalwork is not really my thing so forgive the novice question if this is stupid.

My understanding of lapping paste is it basically rubs off a layer of the metal your working on. The same as sanding wood basically, except for metal you're obviously taking back to a clean new surface.

If you're polishing the silverware fair enough. For lapping a barrel though, this must be steadily increasing the internal diameter of the barrel then...

Doing it once as part of breaking in a barrel I can see, but I read some people doing it for cleaning periodically too.

Surely that's bad?

Must shorten the life of your barrel significantly?
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Re: Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by Hennie Dreyer » 19 Feb 2014, 4:43 pm

I will not even consider using lapping compound in my rifle's barrel!
For breaking in purposes use the OEM guidelines on 'shooting it in', and do the cleaning with proper cleaning agents that does not have a corroding effect

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Re: Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by Kelix » 20 Feb 2014, 8:53 am

I dunno about people regularly cleaning with it, that'll wear your barrel out in no time flat.

Along the lines of breaking the barrel in, I think you'll find it's more about taking out burrs or imperfections from the rifling.

People hand lap the barrel with a tight fitting patch and some compound, that sort of thing...
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Re: Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by Chronos » 20 Feb 2014, 9:57 am

I can only guess you're referring to the process done by hand to target Barrels by gunsmiths because I've never heard of anyone doing it them selves.

This process is done by casting a lead slug in the barrel then a lapping compound is applied and the slug worked the full length of the barrel to polish the bore and remove any imperfections. In this case the bore is generally cut under size to allow for lapping

The only other lapping process I can think if that I've seen used in firearms is fire lapping where abrasive coated bullets are fired through a barrel to condition and smooth the throat area on both new and fired rifles. David Tubb sells one such kit (final finish) and I've read a review where this process made the largest accuracy gain per dollar spent in a Remington test rifle

Chronos

Edit: here's a link to the article about testing the final finish system in a rifle. Well worth reading.

http://www.chuckhawks.com/affordable_accuracy.htm
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Re: Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by tucked » 20 Feb 2014, 10:28 am

Surely just shooting the rifle for a while solves the problem itself?
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Re: Cleaning or breaking barrel in with lapping compound

Post by salate » 23 Mar 2014, 5:13 pm

Thanks for the replies guys.

My thoughts were the same as you guys advice on doing it for making a barrel or breaking it in. I wouldn't have thought it a good idea to clean with it but according to other comments it's definitely something people are doing.

I'll be giving it a miss though.

Cheers.
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