Stainless pistol cleaning questions

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Waterboy3313

Waterboy3313

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The last pistol I bought was a Ruger GP 100 in stainless. I have had all blued guns until this one. I actually decided on the stainless thinking it would be easier to keep looking good. My blued carry pistol is only about 3 years old and looks pretty well worn from sliding into and out of a kydex holster. The kydex holster was made locally and was probably less than perfect. It had some burrs that scratched the bluing pretty bad when new. So thinking about that I bought the last pistol in stainless thinking it would be more resistant to scratching and less maintenance to keep looking clean.

The cylinder and areas around the cylinder of the stainless revolver seems to be turning a dark color. I have taken this pistol to the range maybe 5 times since buying it new. The first 2-3 times the black color wiped off rather effortlessly during cleaning. The 4th time it would not wipe off its like a stain. I have used several cleaning solvents to try to clean this stain off. But no matter what I use it does not come off.

I have not used anything abrassive and I was hoping to avoid anything abrassive or any kind of polish. If anyone has any recommendations on how to remove this blackish stain I would greatly appreciate it.

I'm not trying to make it look better than new I just don't want this gun to look dirty or neglected.
 
Is it high polished or satin finish? My Stainless revolvers always get the black stains when fired but most of it wipes off with a normal cleaning. I don't worry about the discoloration. I figure if I need it to look pretty later I can polish it then. The satin finish seems to hold on to the stains harder.
 
I guess I would call it satin finish. I don't like flashy chrome like looking stuff. I was just wanting something durable.
Here is a picture of it sorry if the picture doesn't show it very good. I will take a better picture tomorrow in natural sunlight. The cylinder itself is actually the worst part. IMG_20200130_174333877.jpg
 
I figure if I need it to look pretty later I can polish it then. The satin finish seems to hold on to the stains harder.
Click to expand...

That's kind of my thought as well I just don't want any kind of damage that I can't somewhat easily reverse.
 
I see the "burnt powder" stains on the cylinder from here. I have three stainless guns, one of them a revolver. The revolver shows powder stains the quickest. So far I'm able to get rid of the stains on the face of the cylinder with a nylon brush and Hoppes. I haven't worried too much about making the outer diameter of the cylinder better, yet.

I wonder if bleach would have any effect? Kinda like what you have to do to clean out white ceramic coffee mugs on occasion.
 
I just found it odd that the this pistol looked like new until about the 4th time I shot it. Everything wiped off clean. Now it after cleaning it doesn't look clean. I was almost Wondering if I cleaned it and then waxed it if that would help keep it clean. I do shoot a lot and this is my top two favorite pistols.

Also this is my only pistol that has never had factory ammo in it. Everything I have shot through it has been reloaded by me.
 
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Don't worry about it, or stop using filthy ammo. Some revolver ammo, particularly lead bullets with lubrication are really dirty. Even jacketed bullets without lube can have dirty primers, and if they're magnums they can have a lot of powder that leaves more residue. You won't see any 9x19mm ammo that uses 22 grains of powder like a .357 can. But you can find cleaner ammo or load your own.
 
Waterboy3313 said:
I just found it odd that the this pistol looked like new until about the 4th time I shot it.
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No sir, not odd at all. There really is no way around it and my advice to you would be that once you accept burn rings are just part of the game with stainless revolvers you will enjoy that revolver even more. I do understand where your coming from, I am just saying it is an uphill battle especially if you shoot a lot.
 
@Waterboy3313 now that you mention that they were reloads, my S&W model 64 gets just filthy from my reloads using Bullseye.
I haven't tried any other powders yet to see if it makes any difference.
I recently shot a box of Federal factory stuff through my SS 1911 and it was dirty like that too but it pretty much wiped off. Much easier than the Bullseye reloads.
 
Besides the burn-rings on the front face of the cylinder, the sides of revolver cylinders can get dirty and stained. This happens when burning gas is ejected out of the barrel-to-cylinder gap. While the gas will certainly mark the front of the cylinder as it is squeezed through the gap between the cylinder face and the barrel face, some of the escaping gas will also hit the top-strap (eventually causing some amount of erosion or "flame cutting" there) and then bouncing off the top strap and onto the top side of the cylinder. As the cylinder rotates, all the sides will get some splash.

The bead-blast finished revolvers don't wipe off as easily as satin satinless and stain more readily. On the S&W below, which I found on a web magazine article, you can also see how the hole in the frame's top strap for the rear sight base screw is focusing this gas in a circular area. This happens because the screw that holds the base of the rear sight to the top strap is not quite long enough to be flush with the bottom of the top strap. So there's a little divot under the top strap that focuses burning gas on one area of the cylinder. By making the screw fit flush, this focus can be avoided and the gas will splatter the whole cylinder side more evenly. The other thing that can be done to minimize this is to minimize the barrel-to-cylinder gap. I find about 0.004" to be acceptable, but factories often set it at 0.008" or more either because they're sloppy or they want to avoid problems with the cylinder binding or being obstructed when the gun is filthy, which it will be more so because they left the gap big.

IMG_20180216_165717241-390x219.jpg
 
Sometimes one of my stainless revolvers will get the "staining" like it appears your Ruger has. What works well for me is a bronze wool pad with whatever bore cleaner I'm using at the time. Lately I've been using Hoppes Black. Found a couple of quarts at a gun show cheap and it works well. The bronze wool is abrasive enough to cut the stain and doesn't affect the stainless finish. If it gets real bad you can go to a gray scotchbrite pad, but then you will have to lightly rub the entire gun to match.
 
ontarget said:
@Waterboy3313 now that you mention that they were reloads, my S&W model 64 gets just filthy from my reloads using Bullseye.
I haven't tried any other powders yet to see if it makes any difference.
I recently shot a box of Federal factory stuff through my SS 1911 and it was dirty like that too but it pretty much wiped off. Much easier than the Bullseye reloads.
Click to expand...

I'm gonna bet you are reloading with regular lead bullets? The dirty from shooting target loads is normally not from the powder, but from the lube in lead bullets. The lube also causes more smoke than if shooting jacketed or coated bullets. I only shoot coated lead now days except for one target gun which still gets Lead HBWC and Bullseye. It gets filthy after several hundred rounds, but the coated lead bullets shoot as clean as jacketed inside and out. Bore gets no leading and outside does not get near as dirty. Accuracy does not suffer and the price is not that much different. Also cleaner to load and you don't get lube build up in the dies. Well worth the little difference in my opinion.
 
Ok so this has me thinking a little bit. I do shoot a lot of lead but I do load some Hornady XTP bullets. My lead cast swc seem to be pretty accurate and I do gravitate towards them over the jacketed bullets. My other 357 is a snub nose that I mostly shoot 38s out of. Since getting this gun I have used it mostly for load development.

I use titegroup powder and I've been happy with it so far. I go plinking a lot and it covers the application nicely. For the different bullets and I have been using and even shooting some 38s through this gun most of my loads are in the upper end for using titegroup. I do have a very accurate low recoil 38 load I use with 3.5 gr titegroup and lead swc. Which is right about the middle of the road for a powder charge. I have shot quite a few of these the last 2 times. Between being a 38 special and being mid range on the powder charge I'm wondering if that's maybe why things are getting so dirty.
 
These cleaning rags may be just what your looking for. Cheap to try.
 

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On my stainless guns I coat the smoky parts with Break Free CLP and leave it over night then try cleaning it. I will even submerge the cylinder in CLP overnight if it’s really bad.
 
Try something like MPro7 cleaner and then see if it will brush off with a stiff nylon brush. It really won't hurt to leave it there, but I can understand why you want it gone.
 
I just use the lead away cloths. It takes minimal scrubbing and cleans right up.

Most of the time I don't even worry about it though, and my revolvers shoot almost exclusively lead and coated lead.
 
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