Well it depends. I shoot once a week, anywhere from 20 to 100 rounds a session, 22 hornet up to 375HH and a lot of .22 lr. Always with an accurate 22 along for the day. A mix of Nosler, a few Barnes and some Hammers. Depends on the rifle/application. Nice to be retired.
Most of my rifles have a couple of well developed loads so I spend very little time actually on the bench. What I do know is accuracy started degrading when shooting offhand a few years ago, at 70 I don’t hold as tight as I used to. From the bench it will vary between rifles but anywhere from 50 to 100 rounds before I think I need to clean, depends on the rifle. Except the Hornet. I think she might go 1000 rounds, wonderful little gun.
Regardless I clean regularly. If I’m doing load developement I’ll start with a 2 fouling rounds then fire a five shot group at 100. Then a five shot group at 300. If it’s 1 moa at 300 there is something to work with. If not it’s on to plan B. Out of habit I always start load developement out of a cold clean barrel with two fouling shots. Don’t think I’ve ever gone more than20 rounds before cleaning at the load developement stage.
I love wipe out, it works quick getting the copper out. Carbon is another story and it depends on the rifle. I got a bore scope for my birthday last year, if you have OCD don’t buy one. Using any carbon cleaner you want I’ll guarantee you’ll be getting clean patches before you’re getting all the carbon out.
I’ve been using Isso bore paste with Kroil and a carbon solvent as a carrier to great effect. It takes some time, some thing like 10 strokes add a little isso and bore teck,10 strokes add a little isso and bore tech. Run a couple of patches and done. Been experimenting a lot and I’ve got it down to two passes with the brush with Isso past and solvent for every round fired. The high speed 30 and fast 338 take a little more.
I don’t see much difference in getting the copper out between mono’s, bonded or cup and core bullets out of my hand lapped barrels. Fill the rifle with Wipe out, get my gear policed up, knock out a quick chore for the wife, clean up my range notes and then attack the carbon. Often I’ll have a rifle set up on the cleaning bench while reloading. Scrub for a bit/ resize a box of shells. Scrub for a bit, trim to length, scrub for a bit chamfer the case mouth. When it comes to priming, powder and ball I don’t like distractions.
Time to go feed the horses
