How often do you clean your carry weapon

[Shadow9mm]

Have been following the thread on gun oil for semi auto handguns. This made me do some thinking about carry or duty weapons.

To me there are lots of good oils out there, however I feel the focus it too much on the "best" oil and not nearly enough on proper firearms maintenance.

When I started shooting I shot regularly, once a week or every other week and I cleaned after every session.

As the years have gone by life has gotten busier and I only get to the range once every month or so, but again I clean my carry weapons as soon as I get home.

I am issued a duty weapon, and I do a field strip, wipe any dust out, and make sure it is properly lubricated about once a month. I am issued a G17, but mostly train with my personal G19 as it shoots the same point of impact and handles the same.

I was a glock armorer and assisted my agency with yearly weapons inspections for a while. I have also spent a fair bit of time at my agencies range doing training. What I have observed is, most weapons fail due to lack of maintenance. I have seen weapons soaked with oil, like they just sprayed it in with a can, which while messy did not cause any issues. I have seen bone dry weapons full of dust and lint that did not want to field strip. I have seen weapons that were fired a year prior and never cleaned. But it seems most malfunction, aside from operator error, were due to improper maintenance.

So, how do you do maintenance on your carry weapon?

 

[dgludwig]

Wipe down and lubricate after every use. Don't field strip until needed.

 

[FrankenMauser]

I clean when necessary - which is rare for the carry guns.

I blow the dust and lint out every couple months, or six.

 

[Crankylove]

You’re supposed to clean them?

 

[MarkCO]

Carry guns don't get shot much, so they get neglected more. There are probably a startling number of folks carrying pistols that won't make it through 3 rounds.

I have, for many years, carried duplicate pistols specifically to test this out. I recently shot my KelTec PF9, out of the car, draw and fire, after 3000 hours of carry with no cleaning. It ran. Only a few dabs of Lucas Oil Gun Grease in the slide grooves. It has a NiB slide, which has natural lubricity. My 4" 1911, treated the same way, failed to run after about 150 hours. My Kahrs don't even make it as long as the KelTec PF9.

I have been shooting my carry guns, at least a magazine worth, once a quarter at a minimum for the last 20+ years. I was not as diligent for the first 15 years. At a class I taught, a student had a pistol he had carried for 8 years, and had not fired a single round in that time. I challenged him about the neglect. We set up for him to fire at a 5 yard target. He missed high left on the first round and it literally took him 3 minutes to get the 2nd round off.

If I am going to clean, I do it at the range, then fire a few rounds afterwards, load back up and holster.

 

[TunnelRat]

I shoot my carry guns at least every few months (often monthly) and clean then afterwards in terms of wiping off the carbon fouling and reapplying lubrication. Bores get cleaned every 500 rounds. At least once a year I clean everything in the safe. I put on a Podcast while I work and do it over the course of a number of weekends.

Years ago I had a pistol on which I used Frog Lube. I went to shoot it in the winter and the firing pin was gummed up. I had applied a thin coat of Frog Lube to the underside of the slide that rides over the cartridges. Over time this lubrication crept down the firing pin block and stopped the pistol cold. This woke me up a bit to the need for regular maintenance and for proper maintenance as well.

Some years ago I purchased a short barreled Mossberg 590 that had come out of a police cruiser (department was switching out firearms). First time at the range and I had multiple light primer strikes. If the officer had needed that shotgun it may well not have worked. That’s why when I hear the adage about police trade-ins “carried a lot, shot a little” and how that’s a good thing, I tend to disagree. Mechanical objects that sit for long periods of time without use and without good maintenance aren’t always a good investment. Without use as issue often isn’t discovered.

For many there’s a balance here between actually “wearing out” a firearm and not shooting it out of fear of wearing it out. For this reason I’ve generally owned two of the pistol I carry, one that I shoot weekly and use in higher round count courses, the other I shoot at least quarterly (I took the idea from a post by the late Todd Green). These days I have come to believe that if you’re performing maintenance at the recommended intervals by the manufacturer and it’s a quality firearm that is a known entity (years of history from which to draw), you’re likely fine using that one pistol. Of course if you’re shooting tens of thousands of rounds through that one pistol in a year you’ll need new barrels and perhaps other major parts with time. If you have the budget to do that, however, my assumption is you can afford either the new parts or a new pistol with time. My experience is many people tend to worry about durability of firearms when they will often never come close to the useful life of that firearm (this being an enthusiast forum, for lack of a better word, is often an exception).


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[Red Devil]

Trust a pistol that you know works.

Clean my Glock G36 .45 ACP every coupla hundred rounds and lube w/ grease.

But I inspect it every time I carry it.




Red

 

[Bob Willman]

I had not fired my daily carry gun for over 2 years until last month. It functioned fine. About once a month I dis-assemble it, clean it and lubricate all areas shown in the manual and then re-assemble it. It is usually dusty with lint from clothing because I carry in an iwb Crossbreed tuckable holster with shirt tucked in.

Every few months I dis-assemble the magazines and clean them of dust also.

NRA Benefactor

 

[Unclenick]

Every few months I dis-assemble the magazines and clean them of dust also.

That's one a lot of people miss. It is critically important that the magazine behaves in a serious situation, yet many people never clean them, much less occasionally putting new springs in the ones they keep compressed by a stack of ammo.

 

[Shadow9mm]

That's one a lot of people miss. It is critically important that the magazine behaves in a serious situation, yet many people never clean them, much less occasionally putting new springs in the ones they keep compressed by a stack of ammo.

True I do have a magazines brush, but I dont clean them out as much as I should, I brush them out a couple times a year.

I have had to have the magazine springs replaced on my duty weapon before. Oddly enough, at the time we were issued g22s. However they had us only put on 14rnds per magazine instead of the 15 it was supposed to hold, to help reduce tension and make slide closed reloads easier. After about 5yrs I was having failures to feed entirely and rounds nosing up and jamming. Got some springs from the armourey and it was back to 100%.

 

[Mike38]

I shoot a magazine (eight rounds) through my carry pistol monthly to make sure it's in operating order. It then gets cleaned and inspected. None of my range pistols have been cleaned so far this year. From one extreme to the other!

 

[tlm225]

I clean my guns after each range trip. My carry guns get shot each month as a minimum.

 

[TailGator]

I clean all my pistols after each range trip, as many here do. Any carry pistols that don't get shot (unusual, but not unheard of) are cleaned once a month with a field strip, wipe off and replenish lube as needed.

 

[FairWarning]

I do a basic cleaning after each range strip, but field stripping is not something I do simply because I looked at a gun in the safe a few weeks after the last strip. There is no scientific reason to do so, but if it makes you happy, go for it.

At a minimum, I'll go at least a couple of hundred rounds between field stripping, which could be several range trips. The first time is typically sooner for a factory new gun, but for one that is well broken in, I am not worried about it based on a lifetime of experience and learning with many different models. If a gun is so dodgy that it can't manage a couple of hundred rounds without jamming, I would SELL it right away. It wouldn't even be a candidate for carry.

 

[Rob228]

I clean after every range trip (typically around 200 rounds). I'll look it over every time I carry it but if there is nothing too heinous I just take it out of the holster. I do a mag check-press check every time I holster it, which is how I caught that I had a TON of crud built up inside the extractor channel (Shadow Systems MR920). This was after about 4k rounds and I hadn't ever pulled all the small parts (it is a Glock clone but for this model you have to pull the RDS off to pull the extractor).

That reminds me, about once a week I clean the RDS lens with a Zeiss lens wipe.

 

[rodfac]

Wipe down and lubricate after every use. Don't field strip until needed.

Yep...and Unclenick's reminder about magazine interiors/spring replacement is one that I often overlook....Thx Nick....

When I'm shooting the .22's, I carry a cleaning rod with me to the range...every 50 rounds, I run the brush down the bore and am rewarded with almost malfunction free .22 autos. My Smith M-18 with its especially tight cylinder chambers (charge holes in S&W speak) is far easier to eject if it's been brushed out every 20-30 rounds.

Best regards, Rod

 

[BornFighting88]

Either every range trip or once a month. Whichever happens first. Ammo crunch made it so I had less live fire practice, hence just the once a month of taking the slide assembly off, blowing out the lint, drops of oil, and put back together and function tested. Wife got me a Strikeman laser system for Christmas a while back, and have worn out a few batteries in the laser cartridge practicing as much as I do. I think before I get to practicing for an hour or so, I will drip a drop of oil down the hammer/sear line to keep it lubricated during use. Then put back in the holster after its loaded up, ready to go for a walk.

 

[Reloadron]

So, how do you do maintenance on your carry weapon?

While a carry gun makes every range trip they don't necessarily get fired every range trip. When a carry gun is fired it is typically 50 rounds. I field strip and clean every time any carry gun is used at the range. This includes cleaning the magazines.

Ron

 

[tex45acp]

Weekly due to lint build up from pocket carry in a pocket holster.

 

[Butzbach]

Weakly?