How to Clean Your Handgun

This is….not the right way to clean your handgun.

Back when I was younger and even more naïve than I am now, I owned a restaurant and attended a seminar presented by the world’s leading expert on cleaning things. He pointed out one thing that I remember to this day: bad mopping technique.

What does this have to do with cleaning guns? Plenty. Bad mopping involves swirling a mop in a bucket, wiping it around the floor, then dipping it right back into the bucket. All that grime you just picked up from the floor went right back in the clean water so it can be redistributed elsewhere on the next swirl. Doing it right, and actually getting a floor clean, requires wringing the dirty water out into an empty bucket, so the clean mop water stays relatively clean. With this common-sense method, you’re actually removing the dirt from the floor, not just moving it around.

The same principle applies to guns. If you use a nasty, grimy, gun rag to clean your gun, you’re just moving the dirt around. With that said, I’d like to share my gun cleaning method. It’s not the only correct way to clean a gun, but this method works for me.

I’m using a Glock as an example here, but the methods here are pretty universal and will apply to most any pistol.

What You Need

You don’t have to spend a lot of money on cleaning supplies for pistols. Here’s the basic list of things you need:

• A cleaning rag
• Cleaning patches
• A toothbrush or gun cleaning brush
• A cleaning rod or cable
• Combination cleaner/lubricant/preservative such as CLP, or each separately

We’ll talk more about the specifics of the supplies when we get to those steps below. You can get a basic cleaning kit like this Outers brass rod cleaning kit at most sporting or big box stores for about ten bucks.

Read the rest at Range365!