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Brass or nylon coated cleaning rod?

Lifelong gunsmith friend has always maintained that brass, aluminum, and coated rods allow for microscopic particles of carbon and such to embed in the soft rod/coating material making the rods themselves abrasive. He swears by bare stainless one piece rods and good bore guides.
 
I've always used one piece stainless steel rods of the appropriate diameter for the bore. Out of thousands of strokes in my 50+ yrs of cleaning I've yet to ruin a barrel. I always wipe down the rod between strokes to keep grit off it.
Coated rods do tend to embed grit and grime. Aluminum rods end up becoming sand paper from aluminum oxides. I stay away from both. I've always wanted to try the carbon fiber rods, unfortunately both my Gunslick and Midway SS are so good they have yet to wear out.
Honestly IMHO you'd have to get real aggressive with a SS one piece rod to damage a bore. Go slow, take your time, it's not a race.
Definitely use bore guides.
 
I have always thought that it's unlikely I will damage a bore by moving a rod at arm speed as compared to a copper or lead bullet moving a 900fps or better-
Just sayin-
And don't get me started at will my brass bristle ruin the rifling in my barrel-how could a softer metal ruin a harder metal-
Some of this gun stuff just takes a little common sense-
 
I have been using Otis cable breach to muzzle for a lot of years and it's easy to take everywhere. When I go to visit and take 2 or three pistols with me, everything fits nicely in a vest or a grab and go. When I was in Az and did a lot of tracking in the desert it served me well. Worked well on my AK,AR, Rugar along with revolvers and all the pistols at the time. Like cars everyone has a choice and pick what what trips you trigger.
 
LDB said:
And why?

I'm looking at Dewey one piece cleaning rods. I think either brass or nylon coated would be the way to go to most protect the barrels while cleaning as opposed to bare stainless steel metal, but which and why? Or is there an even better as yet unnamed draft pick?
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You realize you are shooting metal thru the barrel at massive pressures which the barrel is designed to take.
Get whichever cleans the best on your budget. Brass or nylon.
They are based on longevity of the tool, not the barrel consideration
 
Yes, but shooting metal through the barrel so fast it doesn't have time to do any damage where my cleaning has plenty of time to wreck everything in its slow trek back and forth. :rolleyes: :oops:
 
krunchnik said:
I have always thought that it's unlikely I will damage a bore by moving a rod at arm speed as compared to a copper or lead bullet moving a 900fps or better-
Just sayin-
And don't get me started at will my brass bristle ruin the rifling in my barrel-how could a softer metal ruin a harder metal-
Some of this gun stuff just takes a little common sense-
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Bullets actually cause virtually no wear at all in barrels, given that bullets are copper which is a softer material than what’s used for the barrel. Lead? Softer still.

99.99% of barrel wear is caused by the burning powder's high temperatures.

Improper use of a non coated cleaning rod will probably cause more barrel wear than lead bullets, due to flexing and contact with the bore and/or crown.

Aluminum and brass cleaning rods readily hold abrasive material and rub that stuff back and forth against the bore, causing more removal of barrel metal than the bullet does.

Stainless steel rods are tougher than chrome moly barrel metal but about equal to stainless steel barrels. Chrome moly steel cleaning rods may or may not be harder, softer, more or less tougher than the barrel metal.

We actually get to choose what we do to preserve our favorite barrel's accuracy.
 
LDB said:
Yes, but shooting metal through the barrel so fast it doesn't have time to do any damage where my cleaning has plenty of time to wreck everything in its slow trek back and forth. :rolleyes: :oops:
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if you do it 20000 times… you wont live long enough to wear out a barrel with a rod…
It will wear from heat stress long before a cleaning rod. Think automatic continued fire. You cant do that with a rod unless you are Ron Jeremy
 
LDB said:
Very interesting, and in some cases very technical, discussion so far. But no definitive declaration of the one and only correct choice is _____. :)
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I think the answer is, “it depends.”

The important thing seems to be to keep the rod from bending.

As long as a rod guide is used in the receiver's boltway and it's a decent one, the rod won't get far enough off center to damage the throat. And it won't damage the bore surfaces between the throat and muzzle.

A solid steel rod will be stiffer than a coated one; it'll bend less when the brush/patch is pushed down the bore, especially in 30 caliber or larger.

I believe smaller caliber bores just about always need a coated rod because they'll bend more and their coated sides do bear on the bore.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of top shooters agressively clean their target barrels with both brush and patches, but they use a rod guide. If there was any measurable degradation in accuracy from aggressive cleaning, these folks would notice it and would quickly go to a gentler, kinder cleaning process to preserve the gilt-edge accuracy the barrel maker lapped into the bore.

JMO. YMMV.
 
My cleaning will be .22 rimfire and .22 Hornet long guns and handguns all <.40 caliber, mostly if not totally .32 and .38 revolvers so no from the breech with those.
 
LDB said:
My cleaning will be .22 rimfire and .22 Hornet long guns and handguns all <.40 caliber, mostly if not totally .32 and .38 revolvers so no from the breech with those.
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We I do clean my 38 and 45 LC that way along with the 6 other openings and worked well on both my 41 mags while I had. Guess I did it wrong.
 
Oldmountaiman said:
We I do clean my 38 and 45 LC that way along with the 6 other openings and worked well on both my 41 mags while I had. Guess I did it wrong.
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How do you start the cleaning rod from the breech with the frame in the way? I've been pistols only up to now so looking for any pointers available.
 
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