So what was up with our forefathers? Tougher than us?
 

This is off topic maybe, but I shot my Citori skeet gun a few weeks back with brush loads and my God the lead fouling nearly killed me getting it out. Payne Gallway brushing, Shooters Choice solvent, Barnes solvent, then a Chore Boy around a brass brush on a drill. Then repeat above several times. I am not a "soak it and leave it until tomorrow" type of guy, way too hyper. Did our forefathers just leave lead in there forever?? I am perplexed how people 100 years ago got lead out without our current tools since I know they didn't use plastic wads. I think I'm done with brush wads, not worth it but I had to experiment. I assume it was powder more than lead that lead to so much pitting see in older guns (no pun intended). Thoughts? I find cleaning guns therapeutic but this was just BULLSH*T FYI it was Herco in a 20g Rio hull/Rio primer and BP brush wad.

I think those fellas in the golden age used a brass swage.
I use Big 45 Frontier pad wrapped around a brass bore brush on a rod and chucked up on a cordless drill.





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Hence my point Dean. They used muscle or just didn’t care. They didn’t have cordless drills. I have never worked so hard to clean a bore in my life. It was 100 rounds of magnum #9 shot at about 1290fps.

Maybe need a higher antimony lead with those wads…?





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No idea, Eagle magnum shot.

Anyone out there not bother to clean their bores, only run a fuzzy rod through the bore?

When was that Lewis Lead Remover marketed? It had expandable padded fingers faced with screen mesh and was available in the various gauges.

A friend of mine is an avid trap shooter. He NEVER cleans the bore of his shotgun. He shoots thousands of rounds a year, year after year. At one time Perrazi offered free gun cleaning at the Grand American shoot. He figured it's free, why not. The Italians were so disgusted that they passed the gun around in disbelief for an hour. It cleaned up well, no harm done.

I am not the best bore cleaning guy around, but this was unlike anything I've ever seen. As I have half a flat of these left to shoot up I will, and I'll try to post a photo if I'm able to take one. The only thing I've seen comparable was a friend who insisted on using lead bullets in his Glock 27, about 500 shots worth. Couldn't even see the rifling.

I reload waxed fiber wads and have never noticed unreasonable fouling. Is there any chance that it was smeared up plastic? If the old timers were as diligent as yourself maybe there would be less pitted barrels out there.