Thread: Cleaning a free floated rifle

Hi team,

Any advice on what is the best way to clean a rifle with a free floated barrel, particularly after some bush bashing?

Would you just clean the top half of the barrel on the outside and ignore any debris that got inside the barrel channel?

How often would remove the stock to give the barreled action a proper clean?

Do you find the point of impact changes after reinstalling the stock? Any need to re-sight in the rifle?

Cheers!

Dental floss? Sure you get the idea.

I take my rifles out of their stocks all the time and I’ve never had this so called point of impact shift

Once a year ( or before a big trip planed to wet places like Stewart island or fiord land, and after), take rifle out of its stock, make sure everything is dry and apply very light coat of gun oil or grease on the underneath surfaces.
Put back the rifle together , recheck your zero and that is all. If you have been bush bashing, just use a handkerchief or something similar to dislodge the forest bits.
Quite often, on a lot of the old rifles I m taking appart, the underside of the barrel where the forehand is , has a blueing in Better condition than the rifle. ( except we’re wood and metal would have been in tight contact allowing water to stagnate and form rust on the metal).

The best way to clean a rifle,free floated or not is to take it out of the stock and clean and oil it ( yes even stainless ones)
If it is free floated and the bedding is good it should be good to go but I would check zero on any rifle that has been dissasembled.
If said rifle is well known to be a shooter that check could be only one or two shots.

Pressure bedded rifles on the other hand are a whole different kettle of fish........

My 308 has enough room to slide a patch down the channel so it’s easy to clean. It usually gets pulled apart about once or twice a decade. It has a fibreglass stock.
The 243, wooden stock and bedded/floated by me, needs the channel opened up some more when I “get a round tuit”.

Both shoot where they should when reassembled.

Just use a torque wrench and remove the stock. Clean. Torque stock back to where it was. Good to go. My poi has never changed with sako /tikka rifles

I'm the same as Ryan pull the stock off all the time, rainy day in the tent plenty of down time for cleaning. Dosen't take long to empty stock of Manuka, Birch leaves, small twigs and wipe down barrel , action etc.

Piece of paper works ok too, can get it in up by the action and take the crap toward the muzzle

Originally Posted by Gibo

Piece of paper works ok too, can get it in up by the action and take the crap toward the muzzle

Like dental floss?

Originally Posted by Cordite

Like dental floss?

Not sure how you would get that around the barrel at the action end to sweep the crap out of the channel toward the muzzle, rather than forcing it further in, so no, not like dental floss

Blat with compressed air

Blow some compressed air through it (carefully if stock is wooden) then use the ’shoe shine rag’ method, then more compressed air. If the second blast of air doesn’t blow anything out it should be clear. At this point use an oily rag underneath, job done.