Cleaning muzzle brake by tumbling with water & stainless media?

[K9TXS]

Has anyone tried cleaning their muzzle brake with tumbling wet media as we do our cases? Sees like it would do a pretty good job. Maybe put a plug in the threads so the media would not mess them up. Any drawbacks?

 

[AckleymanII]

A threaded plug, and you should be good to go.

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Tumbling without the pins will be good or an ultrasonic with simple green will definitely do it

 

[The boogalorian]

Not wanting to start anything here, but I will share my personnel experience. I have used both tumbling and ultra sonic cleaning on muzzle brakes. The tumbling dulled the finish on one of my brakes.



I tried ultra sonic cleaning with dawn, simple green and other gun cleaning solutions. They did work, but took many hours in the sonic cleaner. It would take an entire weekend to clean my suppressor. So now the controversy. After reading a thread on this site I decided to try CLR. It worked great on the muzzle brakes and the suppressor.




Do be cautious in the use of CLR. It works well. Some members have seen some evidence of etching on SS barrels. I have not used CLR on a barrel yet. After removing the muzzle brakes and suppressor from the ultra sonic cleaning I rinsed them with water and brake cleaner then blew them dry with compressed air. The ability for CLR to remove carbon I think is shown pretty clearly in the photos above but use with caution.

 

[Fuj]

Been wanting to try a product call "Piston Kleen" supposed
to be citrus/water based and takes the baked on carbon right off
pistons for engine rebuilders. Initially developed for the U.S. Army.

 

[ACF]

I took an old pill bottle, big enough to fit the brake in, and fill it up with bore tec carbon remover. Let it sit overnight. Next day take it out and run it under hot water, almost all the black crap washes off. A couple
Q-tips remove what's left. Easy as pie.

Chris

 

[dunraven]

Not wanting to start anything here, but I will share my personnel experience. I have used both tumbling and ultra sonic cleaning on muzzle brakes. The tumbling dulled the finish on one of my brakes.

View attachment 1207635

I tried ultra sonic cleaning with dawn, simple green and other gun cleaning solutions. They did work, but took many hours in the sonic cleaner. It would take an entire weekend to clean my suppressor. So now the controversy. After reading a thread on this site I decided to try CLR. It worked great on the muzzle brakes and the suppressor.

View attachment 1207637
View attachment 1207638View attachment 1207643me?

Do be cautious in the use of CLR. It works well. Some members have seen some evidence of etching on SS barrels. I have not used CLR on a barrel yet. After removing the muzzle brakes and suppressor from the ultra sonic cleaning I rinsed them with water and brake cleaner then blew them dry with compressed air. The ability for CLR to remove carbon I think is shown pretty clearly in the photos above but use with caution.

what do you mean by 'with caution'? Time?

 

[Pvt.Donut]

Depends on the brake. Do not tumble the Area 419 brake since pins can get into the collar and cause it to no longer tighten onto the universal adapter.

 

[The boogalorian]

I am showing some good results with my brakes and suppressor. Others have seen etching on ss barrel drops. People should understand that any time you use a chemical reaction to clean something on your rifle there is a chance for undesirable side effects, I.e. etching. Experiment with something that is disposable. I used a dirty brake that I had sitting in a tool box before I cleaned the ones in use on my barrels. Don’t just fill a container up and leave something in overnight. I placed the test piece in the CLR for about 5-10 minutes. Washed it in water, brushes it off and inspected it before putting it back in the CLR for another 5-10 minutes. I repeated this until it was clean. Once I was confident that I didn’t see ill effects I moved onto another piece.
Remember this is the internet. If you follow someone’s “advice” and it goes wrong that no one is going to reimburse you for your loss. Proceed with caution, be prepared for something to go wrong, don’t make a bet you can’t afford to lose or don’t attempt it at all.

 

[antelopedundee]

My smith always sends back the leftover part of the muzzle end of the barrel so that's good to have if I ever want to "test" something.

 

[wbm]

LOL! Seriously?

Only with Tide in a Maytag.

 

[ricco1949]

I've only cleaned brakes and suppressor parts in a Harbor Freight sonic cleaner using Dawn, Lemi-Shine and cream of tartar. They come out sparkling clean.....like new. However the most shots I've fired is 300-400 while prairie dogging before cleaning......a full days worth of shooting.

I would be concerned about peening the corner of the the brake shoulder as it fell into the pins during wet tumbling......similar to brass case mouth peening.

At the very least it could round the brake shoulder corner enough to make the junction of the brake and barrel shoulders visible where the gunsmith has taken pains to make an invisible line at the junction.