Am I the only one who hates cleaning ARs?

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A few page 1 responses were really on, but I want to re-emphasize it:

Cleaning is fine. I occasionally clean the hell out of my guns, especially if it's time to replace parts.

Over-cleaning causes almost all the wear, and breakage of a quality weapon.

If it makes you happy, clean an AR as much as you want:
  • Spray it down with your favorite solvent (I like Ballistol but whatever), wipe with rags, brushes, q-tips.
  • Use a quality (plastic coated one piece) rod or a pull, run the bore with patches (not a brush), from the chamber side
  • Clean the chamber, and locking lug recesses, with a dedicated cleaning brush for this purpose, and a non-spinning rod.
  • Take down and clean the mags periodically.
  • And everyone, cleaning or not, should lube it liberally, and often.
For carbines especially (rifle length systems are more forgiving):
  • When cleaning, inspect the recoil spring. Have replacements on hand. When the old one is more than 1" shorter at rest (laying on your workbench) than the new one, toss it and replace,
Never, ever, ever:
  • Try to clean the INSIDE of the gas tube. It won't work, and a lot of people get the pipe cleaners stuck or leave debris that makes it worse later. If you get aggressive enough, it damages the tube and eventually burns through.
  • Scrape carbon off the bolt tail. It will damage the metal of the bolt.
  • Use Simple Green, or other good-idea® cleaners. Receivers are aluminum, and many of these cleaners can degrade, corrode, dissolve important parts of the gun. Simple Green specifically will remove anodizing which is Important.

Here's PS mag on the approved M16/M4 cleaning kit. Note, there are no "carbon scrapers." That's a hint.
https://www.nsncenter.com/Library/PSMAG/PS_740?PageNumber=20
 
Is it that hard to clean a gun?

I never thought it was, it is easier that washing a car. Besides it gives me something to do when I watch TV....
 
I kind of got sour on cleaning guns when, while in the Army, I cleaned a lot of already cleaned clean weapons... to make sure they were cleanerererer...

My guns, not just my AR, are not clean, but they are not neglected, either, and are perfectly serviceable. In reality, I'd rather clean an AR than almost any other gun... it's absurdly simple.
 
For many years (when I only had a few firearms) I would always clean my firearm(s) after a session, even if that session extended several days of, for instance, a visit to this (maternal grandparents') farm.

Now, the only firearms that I will always clean soon after use are those in which I have fired ammunition with chlorate primers (immediate water-based pre-cleaning to remove potassium choride) and/or firearms that I have used outside during inclement weather.

To me, cleaning firearms is a chore. :)
 
I regularly shoot our local rifle match each month, plus practice and the pre-match safety orientation. I do see ARs that are too dry to run but have never seen a AR that was too dirty to run.

My personal predilection is to lube ARs after shooting to soften up the fouling, then before shooting wipe the bore dry. I’ll do a detail strip and clean a couple times a year it when I get bored.

When I lived in the desert I’d strip and clean more often as I really don’t like grit in firearms.

BSW
 
? You mean ... we're supposed to clean our ARs? :D
LOL...I got a good chuckle out of that! I can sympathize.

I guess my lack of AR cleaning is some how due to my AR's being built with bargain components. That is, all except the barrels, which are ARPerfofmance. So I'll clean the bores with a good rod & Hoppe's followed by a sloppy patch of silicon. The rest of the gun gets silicon sprayed & wiped off with a paper towel then back to the safe. Guess when something doesn't work right or something goes awry they'll get a full strip cleaning.

Please don't hate me! :uhoh:
 
For the price of a DI rifle I wouldn't complain. Piston rifle would be a solution but that's an expensive solution for an AR. One of the reasons I bought a Mini-14, no gas in the chamber and they break down pretty fast to clean.:D

Not as accurate as an AR but close enough for gov't work.
 
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I had to clean obsessively in the USMC. Not because it was needed, but because poor leadership figured it was busy work to keep junior Marines out of trouble.

I still clean my firearms, just not obsessively. There is no need.

Quality AR’s will run almost indefinitely with generous lubrication and no cleaning, not that you should but you can. Of course a Knight’s Armament is no run of the mill AR...

http://ballisticradio.com/endurance-tests/kac-sr-15-mod-2/
 
ARs and AKs and Uzis are the three easiest to clean platforms. Take down an AR7 completely, detail clean it, and put it back together... tell me how that goes for you.
 
I just read the filthy 14 article, great read. I used to clean my guns mildly obsessively. I run primarily glocks and AR-15s and the last few years I've not really been cleaning them. I don't have any reliability issues and have basically subscribed to the spray and wipe method as others have suggested. No more q tips and obsessive scrubbing. It used to take me an hour to clean a gun, waste of time.......
 
Try cleaning a gas gun that's been shot suppressed, ugh. Cleaning semi-auto anything is my least favorite shooting chore, until someone invents a dirt-pump, you know, like a heat-pump, it'll stay on my least favorite list. Bolt and lever action cleaning is not so much of a chore to me.
 
I just cleaned both of my 300 BO ARs after a bunch of suppressed shooting. Dirty but it does not take that long. Wear nitrile gloves and get it done. I would rather clean an AR than a revolver and I love revolvers.
 
I really don’t see what is so time consuming about cleaning an AR-15?

Unless your goal is to achieve idiotic USMC armory turn in levels of “cleanliness” also known as cleaning to the point of premature finish wear, and other problems; then it shouldn’t take more than about 30 minutes to do a very very thorough job that is still not necessary.

Get the right tools for the job and it’s pretty easy. For example Franklin Armory and a few others make some nylon brushes that are sized to clean the barrel, chamber, inside of the bolt carrier, and the inside of the upper receiver. They work well and are fast. Scrub the grime out, then wipe off with a paper towel. The bolt itself is easy to clean, don’t worry about carbon on the bolt tail it affects nothing, if you really can’t stand it an Odis BONE tool will quickly remove it so that you may immediately replace the carbon the next time you shoot.

I suppose if one is super anal the little felt cleaning jobs for the barrel extension make that job take about 30 seconds. Obviously the barrel is easy to clean, I don’t bother until accuracy falls off with anything other than an oily patch and then a dry patch. Just make sure I clean the chamber with the least harsh method possible. Frankly foaming bore cleaner is so easy and handy I usually give a liberal dose in the chamber and barrel then come back to it after cleaning the bolt and bolt carrier. Keep in mind all of this I just described is totally unnecessary.

A can of air or shop air quickly cleans the outside of the rifle.

Then live all the clean parts and put back together.

For the super lazy and super anal, an ultrasonic cleaner works phenomenally well on bolts, extractors, firing pins, cam pins, and bolt carriers. Again it is totally unnecessary, but if it makes you feel good whatever.
 
ARs and AKs and Uzis are the three easiest to clean platforms. Take down an AR7 completely, detail clean it, and put it back together... tell me how that goes for you.

I love how easy the AK in particular makes it. Pop the dust cover, pull the bolt carrier out, rotate the bolt free. You've just disassembled the gun as far you'll ever need to in about 20 seconds. Now I don't love how AKs shoot, but you can't ask for easier maintenance.

The only problem with the ARs IMO is that you have to remove a cotter pin to really get to the bolt, which kind of annoys me.
 
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It is a hell of a lot more easy then a great deal of other self loading rifles. I have never really been a fan boi of the AR....well that is not really true, I shot the hell out of it in the 80, but with all the hype it now sits in the back of the safe. They are a belly button now. Older automatics are a real pain, ever take apart a model 8/81, now that is a pain. I would say a garand, carbine, or any other automatic of that vintage is....well not harder, but takes more time.

I need to dust off that AR, if nothing else to hose it down with oil and stow it away for another 10 years....perhaps the fad will fade away.
 
I love how easy the AKs in particular makes it. Pop the dust cover, pull the bolt carrier out, rotate the bolt free. You've just disassembled the gun as far you'll ever need to in about 20 seconds. Now I don't love how AKs shoot, but you can't ask for easier maintenance.

The only problem with the ARs IMO is that you have to remove a cotter pin to really get to the bolt, which kind of annoys me.

Getting that AK dust cover back on can be a pain.
 
A can of spray carburetor cleaner, a few tools and 15 minutes. I'm no longer in the Army so I can use products that really work and don't waste an entire afternoon.
kwg
 
Living really close to the club, if internal cleaning were needed after any gun use, could require hours per week cleaning. I tend to do internal cleaning on 'regular use guns' about once per month, otherwise only rubbing somewhat moist patches on the outsides.

Coal Dragger: A young Marine who worked three years ago as hotel security (during our layovers) in downtown Tallahassee served as Infantry in Iraq. He told me that on the first patrol after cleaning, they would see at least one standard rifle jam.
Was it too much CLP, which might have been exposed to the thin dust, or probably just very worn out components?
 
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