CLEAN TO THE EXTREME

Many shooters will tell you that they never clean the barrels of their airguns – and that goes for a lot of rimfire shooters too. As a lead projectile is fired down the bore, be it a pellet, slug or bullet, it will deposit a thin layer of lead over the lands and grooves of the rifling. This will help level out and smooth the contact surfaces, filling any microscopic fissures and minimising friction. But while all this is a good thing, that layer of lead will continue to build with each shot that’s taken, and when it gets too thick, accuracy will eventually suffer.

When you notice your rifle isn’t shooting quite as well as expected, cleaning the bore and re-leading the barrel is all that’s usually needed to restore the gun’s inherent accuracy. This is a fairly gentle, non-invasive process, but what happens if it fails to work?

Maybe a gentle clean isn’t delivering the desired results. Perhaps the leading on a sub-12 foot pound rifle has simply been allowed to build up too much over too long a period. Maybe you have an FAC rifle, which will deposit more lead much more quickly due