Gun cleaning practices vary from person to person, and there are differing ideas as to how often people should clean their firearms. Some gun owners choose to clean their weapons at the beginning of a hunting season and then again at the end of the season. Other times people opt to clean their gun after every use, maybe after activities like range shooting. One fact is clear, however. Eventually, your gun must be cleaned.
There are benefits to having a clean firearm, and reasons why you should clean your gun regularly.
BEING FAMILIAR WITH YOUR GUN
Maybe you aren’t the most mechanically savvy, but you should at least be familiar with how to disassemble and reassemble your gun, and the functionality of each part of the gun. The easiest way to get familiar with your firearm is by cleaning it. The more you know about how your gun works, the better you will be able to repair it when something goes wrong.
PREVENTING MALFUNCTIONS
Firearms are built to last a long time, and many safety features are put in place to prevent accidents. But if you use your firearm consistently, the chances of something happening will always be present. In most cases, any malfunctions that take place with a gun aren’t due to manufacturer error, but due to negligence and user error. In order to minimize these problems, and ensure gun safety, cleaning your gun on a regular basis is the smart thing to do. In fact, some gun malfunctions are caused by a dirty gun.
Incomplete Discharge – This is when a round is fired but gets stuck inside the gun barrel. This can be caused by damage to the inside of the barrel or by residue buildup from previous rounds. If you tried to fire another round in this scenario, it can cause the gun to explode.
Failure to Eject – When a cartridge is fired, it must then be extracted by the gun’s mechanism and ejected. The problem here is if the gun is dirty, rusted, or corroded, it could fail to extract the used cartridge. A live round would then be forced into the base of the jammed cartridge, potentially causing the gun to explode.