klundin2000

I was cleaning my ML's after a round of shooting and I happened to shine my fenix flashlight down my barrel and noticed that there were little white or gray spots in my barrel. As near as I can tell, most of the spots are near the end of the barrel.

I brushed it, then swabbed it with Hoppe's, Shooter's Choice, and Butch's Boreshine to see if these spots would come out. Nope

Is this normal or did I ruin my barrels???

spaniel

What powder, and what kind of barrel? Blued, stainless?

That sounds like typical 777 fouling can look, chalky white. If you are shooting 777, you are using the wrong solvents. I would think what you are using would eventually remove the fouling so that you didn't see it after cleaning, but for 777 you need water or water-based solvents. BH209 you use the normal Hoppe's or smokeless solvents.

klundin2000

I have only shot Blackhorn 209 and 777 in my Knight LRH. When I used Blackhorn 209 I cleaned with Hoppe's only, when I was shooting 777 I used either T17 or EZ Clean by Knight. T17 is designed to be used to clean 777 fouling. I would clean after every outing until the patches were realatively clean and then I would run a lightly dampened patch of Breakfree oil through the barrel. Sometimes I would then take a dry patch and run that through if I thought the patch had too much Breakfree on it.

My Knight Disc Extreme has only seen Blackhorn powder. Sometimes I wouldn't clean that for weeks at a time. Then I would use Hoppe's solvent.

I noticed the pitting after shining a light down the barrel to see if my teflon taped breech plug sealed.

I got to tell you, this looks like pitting to me.

cherokee75

I used to see similar things but realized it was just pieces of fabric from my cleaning patches getting cought on what I assumed were little burs. They always seemed to move when swabbed or completely disappear. But if they aren't moving or disappearing for you, I am not sure what it coud be.

klundin2000

That's exactly what I thought to. Until I took out my Fenix flashlight and inspected a little closer. Shining my light from the end of the barrel and looking into the breech it looks like a mirror. I'm a little distressed right now. kl

Mark whiz

It might well be some small pits or burrs in the metal that your patches aren't hitting good enough. You might want to try some bore paste (like JBs, Iosso, Flitz,etc) and work a few patches of that thru the bore and see if those spots clear out after you've cleaned out the paste residue.

spaniel

Before you said white spots now it sounds like you're saying you can tell it's actually pitting. Are you sure it's pitting and not machining marks that could have been there when the gun was new? You'd be amazed at how many MLs don't have pristine barrels right out of the box. I once dropped a bore light down a whole rack in the store, every single Traditions, a lot of the CVAs, and even a couple of the Knight guns had visible machining marks in the bores. This was years ago so no T/C to try.

Question is, do the guns still shoot well? If so, don't worry. And if you never got rusty patches, again I would not worry.

flounder33

I wouldn't push the panic button too fast. If you had some serious pitting you should be able to feel it with the patch. Also from the kind of groups you have been getting there can't be too much wrong with that barrel. A little bore paste might work wonders for you too.
Good Luck, Art

klundin2000

Spaniel, I wish I had looked down the barrel before I bought it. Maybe the pitting or machine marks were already there.

Your right Art, both my Knight ML's shoot better then my two Remington 700 .35 Whelen's. I just don't like the look of the pitting, machining marks or what ever it is. I'll run some JB bore paste down the barrel a few times and see it that helps.

spaniel

If it's shooting lights out what matters more, the groups on the paper or how the inside of the barrel looks? Bore paste is just another way of saying removing metal....

It's your gun, but if I were you I wouldn't touch it. Not many people are going to stick an eye down the end of your barrel if they are too busy admiring your groups!