Barrel polishing

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PaulB

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Nov 17, 2015
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How easy and safe is it to polish your rifle barrel???

I am just about to get a new Kral PCP and reading Troy Hammer's comments about the mods he did for his EBR gun he said main ones were polishing and recrowning the barrel. I do not think I am brave enough to try recrowning but might well consider polishing.

Thanks in advance for any advice given 
 
I polish all my bores with a bore mop and Flitz. I've never come across a bore that didn't shoot better afterwards(including LW).

As an experiment, I chucked a bore mop up in my cordless and went to town on a factory Crosman until the barrel got warm... It shot much better after that.

I don't think you could polish away any noticable material with Flitz, even if you tried. If you managed to break the edges of the rifling, you'd still be fine. Look at the poly and FX barrels, there are no hard edges on the lands and grooves and they shoot great.



P.S. I DO NOT advise using a drill motor to polish your bore, just sharing an experiment.
 
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I haven't polished a barrel before, but, I did re-crown one of my .22LRs years ago..
I used the exact same method that Steve [Air Velocity Sport] uses in this video, and it works great!
The materials and method has been used for a lonnng time - even by experienced gunsmiths!
[Even though some people like to claim otherwise] *I just used a different abrasive compound..
Anyways, here's his video just in case you have 2nd thoughts and decide to give it a whirl..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=387OEhtYzkA

🙂👍 

Sam -
 
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Polishing the bore is pretty safe and effective if you use a ball-bearing rod (to follow the rifling) and work from the breech end. Work that end with more strokes and progressively fewer out toward the muzzle. Never let the patch (or cast lap) exit the muzzle.

It is part of the accurizing regimen I use on every barrel. Sometimes the improvements are significant, sometimes modest, but never has a barrel performed worse after having done it.

If anyone is interested, I drafted an accurizing how-to a while back that covers the crown, barrel port deburring, leade, and polishing:

https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=130555.0
 
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I use a drill to polish. Nothing beats it. I’ve restored barrels that no amount of back and forth barrel scrubbing could fix. Just be smart about it. 

I use JB Bore Paste as my polishing compound and a mop followed by a brass brush as my applicator and scrubber, sometimes wrapped in Choreboy. 

After a good polish, I rarely have to clean a barrel that thorough again.
 
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I expect a bore snake would be safe but my concern would be how effective it is. We want the implement to closely conform to the cross section of the bore, so as to polish the entire surface. For example, I don’t know how well a bore snake will get up into the corners of the rifling. That’s a place where lead tends to accumulate and impair accuracy.

I could be wrong about that...it’s not something I’ve tried. I like the Brownell’s VFG felt pellets for this job. Others will insist a poured lead lap is the only proper way to do it so take my advice with a grain of salt. 
 
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Thanks for all the info. 

Flitz I believe is a brand name what is the product name?? Neither this or JB Bore paste appear to be available in Turkey where I live now so will need to source from overseas. Flitz have dealers listed in UK so will try there. There are other metal polishes available here but not worth the risk that they might be too abrasive.

Before anyone suggests EBay, that does not work from here as PayPal will not handle any transactions from Turkey. They had a disagreement with the government who insisted they should have a banking licence to operate here. As you can imagine this is a severe PITA. I wanted to get the Patch Worm but they ONLY accept payments via PayPal so had to give up on that idea.
 
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Hmm the images are there but they’re hosted on the forum so I bet you have to be logged in to see them.

I just edited the article to use imgur. Will you tell me if they appear for you now? I want anyone and everyone to be able to access the full article.

Regarding using a bore mop, that’s what JSAR recommended above so I would take that as credible advice. It’s gonna get gunked up really quickly though. It may have no adverse effect on how well it works if you keep applying fresh compound, I don’t know. Personally I like the felt pellets because I can throw it away after 10 - 20 passes and load a fresh one. 
 
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Used pretty much all the methods already listed. Fire-lapping too.

If ur a reloader, a .308 cal bullet with compound, chucked in a drill does a decent polish at the crown, even a sharpened pencil.

As long as you don’t get carried away, it’s almost always an improvement to polish the bore

1550717319_7242073405c6e11872b1770.22055864_54A2B5E8-F1CE-4058-8D6C-D9E7425A3D7C.jpeg

 
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