Shooting Q-tips

[NoHeavyHitter]

My friends who own airguns shoot these little felt pellets to clean the bore of their pellet guns. I always used my cleaning kit, but some of my older pellet guns have barrels that appear to be made of brass, so I have to be super-cautious cleaning them. One day after cleaning my Benjamin pistol, I was looking at a Q-tip on the table and wondered, why not just shoot Q-tips as cleaners? I have spring piston rifles that I would not trust using a felt pellet as I think that would be too close to "dry-firing", but a Q-tip has much more mass - not to mention, two cleaning surfaces and are a lot cheaper than those felt cleaning pellets. I tied it and they seem to work just dandy.

So, I just wondered if anyone else does this or if I'm overlooking doing some kind of harm to my airguns? I've been doing it for several years, but then I don't do it very often and have had no problems so far. I still wonder a bit every time I do it though..

[DentonandSasquatchShow]

We use to do that as kids just for fun. Never even thought about it actually cleaning the bore.

[mtenenhaus]

this is the technique we used to use with a drop of Ballistol:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoBddYO_Nuc

[NoHeavyHitter]

this is the technique we used to use with a drop of Ballistol:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoBddYO_Nuc

I actually do something similar to that for dry swabbing my bore (to remove preservative oil) prior to shooting. However I use a length of high-strength braided fishing line. To avoid needing a vacuum cleaner, I crimped a small sinker on one end of the string. When the patch is just the right size, it makes a funny sort of low squeaking sound as its pulled through the bore.

It works very well because I leave a fair amount of oil in the bore of my guns because I don't always know when I may shoot the gun again. As I have a fair collection, sometimes it can be years before I get back to shooting certain guns.

[subscriber]

You can use felt pellets in a "springer", if you load a regular pellet behind it. You need to have a good trap close, because the pellet may not follow a normal trajectory.

If you want to have the felt pellet wipe the bore more aggressively, load it between two regular pellets. Wadcutters preferred.

[VictorFranko]

Lol, I got written up for a safety violation while working at Lockheed in a machine shop for shooting Q-tips from an airgun.
I had a three foot SS extension on an compressed air airgun and discovered by accident how well a six inch, single end wooden cotton swab would shoot from the airgun.
Game on! I set up different targets and was quite accurate. A supervisor saw me doing it and all hell broke loose and I got written up.
Good times!

[Usmc0844spare]

For future reference, interesting things can happen when you shoot those 12 inch long fireplace matches out of your air rifle.

I don't mean fire, just that they can sail off in interesting ways.

Once when I was a young'in I thought, "how far will this go" and did it. Angled barrel up towards my back neighbor's house and pulled the trigger, thinking it would peter out well short of the house.

Nope, it kept going and at the last second did an abrupt climb and buried itself perfectly in the seam between two boards of the 2nd floor roof eaves [This is conjecture as I can't imagine it actually penetrated and stuck into some plywood]. I'd like to think it is still there today.

Don't think it did any cleaning of my barrel though.

[CVShooter]

I'm going to have to try this...

[Paul_R]

It's not particularly effective as a bore cleaner but it's fun. Especially if your neighbor's cat happens to be sh*ting in your garden at the time...