doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com newbie cleaning question!

is it safe to use regular ole Hoppes to clean the bores of early 1900s double guns? thanks fellas

Well:
I've been using "regular ole Hoppes" for about 50 years to clean all kinds of guns and haven't had a problem yet. I'm sure you'll get all kinds of recomendations from the membership but I maintain about 250 rental guns for our club and we have everything from every other cleaning product to professional ultrasonic tanks and Hoppes is still our mainstay.

Jim

Hoppes #9 is to guns as feathers are to birds! You can try all the other stuff and listen to its supporters but nothing will ever replace the old standby. Why, the smell of Hoppes triggers great memories, just as the smell of a freshly fired paper case does. And best of all, it works great....

Shooters cologne!

thanks fellas! i just dont want to mess my first double up

Hoppe's has never harmed guns, or it wouldn't have been the standard cleaner for as long as it has. Some "save the planet" hippie decided there was a toxic ingredient and they changed the recipe, to accommodate that nonsense. It is a fine cleaner. That said, I like Shooter's Choice Shotgun and Choke Tube Cleaner, as my favorite.

Modern Hoppe's #9 is mostly kerosene and petroleum distillates.
For the question asked, it is perfectly suited to the task. It is relatively benign when exposed to it topically.

The pre-1973'ish #9 had Nitrobenene in it, which was fabulous for dissolving corrosive primer residues. It smelled very different, but was also a very dangerous chemical mixture.
I recommend using an ammonia based product for removing the corrosive salts left behind by old ammunition.

Another product still in use, but not the same as previously formulated is the brown bottle "Lysol". It no longer contains the Phenolic compounds also linked to serious health concerns.
You might recall it's "mediciney" smell from your youth. Not there now.
The other product gone from our lives is Carbon-tet (CCl4) the most fabuluous organic solvent there ever was. Commonly used as a stain remover and drycleaning agent, it's a powerful carcinogen.

But please, don't ever dupe yourself into thinking an old bottle of Hoppe's #9 is safe to get on your skin. It's not. The graveyards around Midland, MI can testify to that for you. Benzene production was a local industry for almost a century.

The original question having been answered I'll do
as I always do when this cleaning topic comes up,
I recommend Ed's Red Bore Cleaner DETAILS

It works very well and is economical to concoct.

Here you can see how it removed leading left by some old paper shells:


JMTC

JC

We've also been deprived of DDT, world wide. Millions of people have died from mosquito borne diseases, since we've been saved from the DDT menace.