Don't Use Aluminum Cleaning Rods

 Kleenbore brass cleaning rods with muzzle guides.

If you go to the gun cleaning aisle at your local shooting or sporting goods store, the first thing you'll see is a wide array of aluminum cleaning rods from Hoppes, or Outers, or some private brand. If you buy a new gun for the first time, the salesman will probably steer you down that aisle and tell you you should buy a kit in the appropriate caliber to keep your gun functioning properly. But that's the last thing you should do, if you want your gun to stay accurate.

Here's the problem: Aluminum rods are extremely abrasive, and repeated use will result in wearing war at the muzzle crown, and even a tiny bit of wear will totally destroy your gun's accuracy. Hang on, you say. Aluminum is a very soft metal- much softer than the steel they make barrels from! How can it possibly wear away the steel? True, pure aluminum is very soft, and even the hardest alloys are softer than steel. But aluminum has another property: It's extremely reactive. As soon as you cut or machine a piece of aluminum and expose it to the air, it immediately reacts with the oxygen in the air and forms a thin layer of aluminum oxide that protects the metal from further oxidation. And aluminum oxide is a very hard material- it's used to make grinding wheels and sandpaper.

A better choice for cleaning your gun is a teflon coated rod, brass cleaning rod, or stainless steel cleaning rod, preferable with a plastic or brass muzzle guide that keeps the rod from coming into contact with the muzzle. Even easier to use, and cheaper, is a bore snake, which combines a brass or stainless steel brush with a soft absorbent section, and is simply pulled through the bore after spraying with cleaning. That's what I use for most of my non-match guns.