Things I learned with my new Lyman Borecam today.

[gambleone]

I pretty much came to the same conclusions when I got bore cam. I still dont use a brush as much as I should and I still like Kroil.

Kroil might not work as good by itself, but mixing it with Hoppes #9 or some other
bore cleaner may change it to a different chemical of (who knows what). Like Ed's
Red works better than any of the 4 ingredients used to make it by their self.

 

[Joe Salt]

Yes when the smoke starts coming out the end of the barrel it should be clean enough! Seen it done. I think it was Sweet's and Barns cr-6

Joe Salt

 

[dickn52]

How long is the rod that has the camera on the end ?

20"

 

[284winner]

20"

Thanks

 

[JimPag]

I've learned owning a Hawkeye for a number of years that you can't judge a barrel by the way it looks sometimes. I remember Dave Apple telling me about one of Dean Breeden's barrels that had pieces of steel missing from some of the lands and that barrel still shot lights out for a number of years. As far as using a brush, I never do and I never have had any issues with my cleaning regiment. I just use Wipe-Out Patch out, finish it off with Marvel MO and done. IMO, I believe more barrels are ruined by over cleaning than anything else.

 

[LHSmith]

In regards to #6.....don't get me wrong, I never had much use for a "cost effective" cheap, cheesy gun...but there really was a time when Savage OEM barrels were just about the best factory barrel out there. You could scope a rifle from back in the late 80's early 90's and see what looked like the best custom today. They might not all have been that way back then, but every one I looked at was.
You will eventually come to the conclusion that JB Bore cleaner is the one that works the fastest. Is there any way you can post a picture of a bore taken with your borescope?????

FWIW- I remember a pic from a shooting rag showing a Savage employee "straightening" a barrel by bending it on a jig....trial and error of course...bend it too far? Then just tweak the bend in reverse. They checked by simply looking through the bore. I suppose the better barrels never needed correcting.....but those that were bent to make straight must have walked shots off many a target backer board as the barrels heated.

 

[boltman13]

Just got my Lyman Bore Cam as well. Things I have learned so far:
1 Compared to my gunsmith's Hawkeye Borescope the quality of the image I would estimate is about 85-90%.
2 My Ruger Model 77 in 30-06 with at least 2000+ rounds down the pipe still has quite a bit of throat left but the bore has a lot of pits and gouges about half way up the barrel. It still shoots my hunting load into 1.5", however.
3 My new Ruger American Predator is badly fouled with both carbon and copper after only 13 shots. It will be a good indicator of my cleaning method's results after cleaning.
4 I think this Bore Cam will be a great tool to judge cleaning effectiveness, barrel wear, and new barrel quality, and I'm glad I bought it.

 

[snert]

I've learned owning a Hawkeye for a number of years that you can't judge a barrel by the way it looks sometimes. I remember Dave Apple telling me about one of Dean Breeden's barrels that had pieces of steel missing from some of the lands and that barrel still shot lights out for a number of years. As far as using a brush, I never do and I never have had any issues with my cleaning regiment. I just use Wipe-Out Patch out, finish it off with Marvel MO and done. IMO, I believe more barrels are ruined by over cleaning than anything else.

i have a douglass 220 Swift barrel from the 50s that loooks awful and also a 22K hornet that actually has missing rifling and both still shoot acceptable groups for PD and groundhogs, with kills to 700 witht the 220.

 

[Rust]

I got a Hawkeye years back when it was the only expensive game in town. Learned a lot of things.

1. Never put up a CrMo barrel dry for any extended amount of time. My grandfather and father impressed that on me and after sticking a bore scope down other peoples rifle I was very happy I put mine up wet. A pitted barrel is a copper magnet. There are some theories that you don't want to entirely remove copper fouling from a heavily pitter barrel but since mine aren't pitted it's a moot point.

2. Sometimes you see some weird fouling, exact cause unknown. I found some very hard greyish glazing towards the muzzle in one instance that solvents didn't touch. JBs and a bronze brush took care of it, I wrapped a patch around the brush, cleaned up fine.

3. Sometimes a barrel looks like crap but shoots anyhow. The final arbiter is the target. Had an original Savage 10FP, the barrel looked like crap out of the box, and it fouled like crazy but it shot. Conversely I've had more than one brand new perfect looking barrel that wouldn't hit a bull in the rump with no visible reason.

4. I've had the occasional screaming good deal on used rifles. In the late 60's I picked up a Sako Vixen in .222 that the owner was quite upset with. I figured on a new barrel. Got it home, shone a light up the barrel and it was the most fouled thing I'd ever seen, looked like a smoothbore. Took all my spare time for two days to clean it out. Turned out to be really accurate for about another twenty years as I didn't burn a lot of ammo in it.

 

[Joe R]

20 inches ...........

You've got to be kidding.

I bought a generic digital borescope from Amazon and paid around $200 two years ago. It came with a one-meter and a ten-meter fiber optic cables. The 1 meter is all I use and works really well on my 32 inch barrels.

Joe

 

[memilanuk]

The cable from the head is much longer... probably 1.5 meters. The actual rigid metal tubing housing the fiber-optic fibers and the mirror... yes, 20".

Did the digi borescope you got from Amazon have a 90 degree mirror head on it? I'd looked at a number of inexpensive versions a few years back, and that was always the deal killer for me - the lens only looked 'forward', not to the side, as they were built for a different application than ours.

 

[Joe R]

The cable from the head is much longer... probably 1.5 meters. The actual rigid metal tubing housing the fiber-optic fibers and the mirror... yes, 20".

Did the digi borescope you got from Amazon have a 90 degree mirror head on it? I'd looked at a number of inexpensive versions a few years back, and that was always the deal killer for me - the lens only looked 'forward', not to the side, as they were built for a different application than ours.

Hi Monte,
Yes, mine has a ninety-degree mirror, but I've only used it once. Using it is like putting on blinders and a visor then looking down at your feet while walking around. I didn't know where I was, where I was going or where I had been.

In terms of resolution, the current crop of digital borescopes can't match the resolution or magnification of a Hawkeye, but for my purposes, I don't need that kind of resolution. All I want to do is check the conditions of a new barrel and check to see if the bore is clean. Looking straight ahead works great for that.

Kindest regards,

Joe