Servicing your guns (noob question)

[MG5150]

G’day gents,

It’s pretty standard to get your car serviced every X amount of kms or Y amount of months — just part of keeping it running right.

I also take my guitars in for a professional setup once a year. A good tech checks everything over, makes a few adjustments, and gets it playing exactly how I like it.

That got me thinking — is there something similar for rifles?

Do you take yours to a gunsmith or technician for regular servicing? Is there any sort of rule of thumb for how often it should be done?

Also — I’ve seen a lot of American military movies where guys strip their rifles blindfolded… is that just Hollywood stuff, or is learning to fully strip and reassemble your rifle actually something every hunter should know?

Noob questions, I know — but I’d really appreciate your insights.

Cheers,
MG

[No1Mk3]

I have rifles I've owned since 1972, that were made in the 1930's, that have never been "serviced" and still shoot well. I keep them clean and lubricated. I have had to do maintenance on the bolts of a couple, strip clean and re-grease but that is all. It is a good practice to know how to field strip your firearms for cleaning after a hunt, especially if you have made river crossings or been in heavy rain but not blindfolded. Being able to field strip and re-assemble a firearm blindfolded is a Soldiers combat preparedness excercise for those times when it is very dark and poor weather where using a light would not be advisable.

[GQshayne]

Yep, same here.

Cleaning is the biggie for me. Barrel - unless you are a benchrest shooter it needs less cleaning than many people think. The rest of the rifle will be better off with more cleaning than many think. If you hunt in the west when it is dry, removing dust from the action could be done each day as an example. People scrub barrels when it is not needed, and are just wearing it out faster.

My 2c anyway.

[bladeracer]

G’day gents,

It’s pretty standard to get your car serviced every X amount of kms or Y amount of months — just part of keeping it running right.

I also take my guitars in for a professional setup once a year. A good tech checks everything over, makes a few adjustments, and gets it playing exactly how I like it.

That got me thinking — is there something similar for rifles?

Do you take yours to a gunsmith or technician for regular servicing? Is there any sort of rule of thumb for how often it should be done?

Also — I’ve seen a lot of American military movies where guys strip their rifles blindfolded… is that just Hollywood stuff, or is learning to fully strip and reassemble your rifle actually something every hunter should know?

Noob questions, I know — but I’d really appreciate your insights.

Cheers,
MG

I finally got a chance to clean a pile of rifles and pistols today. Dropped out all the internals of the Uberti 1866 to clean out the blackpowder residue and polish all the brass again. Stripped the bolt in the Henry H001 to clean the extractor and ejector as it's been giving me lots of failures to eject properly. The carbon was so hard and thick I had to scrape it off with screwdrivers - 7845rds since I last cleaned it. It's better but still a bit lazy so I might have to let it soak for a day or two if it's still having issues. The CM22M wasn't bad after 1015rds, lots of carbon but fairly well-contained around the breach. And the Hi Power after 1348rds is filthy but not having any issues. Fairly soon I think I'll have to strip out the trigger components for a proper clean, which I'm not looking forward to. I was going to strip out the 1858's but I'm shooting a match on Saturday so I'll leave those until then. Didn't get into the Rossi 1892 because we had to do a trip to collect hay. Because I log every shot I learn when they start having issues so I clean them before they reach that point. On some firearms it might be as little as a few hundred rounds, on others it can be thousands.

I clean them if they get wet, otherwise when they start feeling gritty or start having issues. The bores I clean when accuracy deteriorates.

[womble]

Depends on the firearm and how much use it gets.

Bladerracer spends roughly 30 hours each day firing guns.

Bolt action rifle. I’m not stripping the bolt unless I absolutely have to.

22 rifle I don’t even clean it. There’s no brass going though it, only lead. Same with my 357 lever action. 92 design. I’m not stripping that thing anytime soon. I only put lead through it. And I don’t put thousands of round through it.

Gas operated firearm yes you will need to strip it down to clean everything, grease and lubricate, pretty much every time you put it back in storage for a while. Ideally anyway.

And also it’s the terrain you’re operating in. If that gun is on the front of a quad bike in western Queensland. Well it probably needs to go through the heavy load cycle on your washing machine. Every crevice is going to be filthy and caked on. You just can’t put it back in the safe like that. Just not on.

Do not put it in the washing machine however because your missus will lose her s**t. You will need compressed air and will be scraping out everything with a magnifying glass with tooth pics and dental floss and whatever else you can pinch around the house.

I will confess however to sneaking things into the dishwasher.

But anyway. The maintenance is in the users manual. And then you just have to consider the mileage you’ve done.

You don’t want to overdo it either. You don’t want to drown the thing in every gun product you have. You do need to clean the barrel thoroughly on a 30 cal centerfire bolt action. Which is another can of worms . But you cannot let that build up. And just a quick dust and wipe over on the regular and you probably won’t ever need to do any more than that.

It’s a personal thing I guess and I’m not overly fussy. I don’t own expensive high maintenance guns. I don’t even own any of these new age fancy straight pulls, lever release whatever. Because I don’t want to clean an maintain them. I have a heap of side by side and they do everything I need them to do. Might need a new spring every 500 years or something.

Deer hunting rifle can probably say the same, other than being meticulous with the barrel.