Cleaning receiver

[hihaven]

Will soaking the receiver in acetone for a good cleaning harm the original case coloring ? Thanks Jeff

[Fox20obsessed]

Jeff,
I use mineral spirits, never had any issues as far as the case colors.
-Matt

[hihaven]

Matt, Thanks for your help.

[Fox20obsessed]

You are very welcome Jeff. Not to say acetone wouldn’t work as well, but I can’t say as far as whether or not it would harm the case colors. Both of my mentors used plain old mineral spirits so I just stuck with that. Been toying around with the idea of buying one of those new fangled super sonic jewelry cleaners so I could just drop the parts in and walk away, but I try to do this stuff on the cheap and the spirits do the trick...
-Matt

[vaturkey]

Falling into the FWIW, category. Dan Rossiter uses a ultra sonic cleaner. Strips everything throw it in the cleaner with I believe Simple Green 50/50 mixture with water. Pulled them out and then dries them off good and then puts the gun back together with the appropriate amount of oil where required.

[Brian Dudley]

I do not think that Acetone will harm metal finishes. But I cannot say that I have soaked parts in it for any extended period of time. I know that Mineral Spirits, Denatured alcohol and Lacquer thinner have no effect on metal finishes.
To fully clean actions I fully disassemble them and ultrasonic clean the major parts that have metal finishes on them in a solution of distilled water and the cleaning granolas that Harbor freight sells for ultrasonic cleaners. All of the small parts soak overnight in a can of automotive carb/parts cleaner and are then rinsed in water.

I never put assembled components and springs into he ultrasonic. I have heard of too many examples of flat springs wanting to break in ultrasonics.

[Stan Hillis]

Falling into the FWIW, category. Dan Rossiter uses a ultra sonic cleaner. Strips everything throw it in the cleaner with I believe Simple Green 50/50 mixture with water. Pulled them out and then dries them off good and then puts the gun back together with the appropriate amount of oil where required.

Does he not rinse the parts with clean water after the 50/50 cleansing? Some of these high strength cleaners take considerable rinsing with clean water to remove all traces of them. They do their job well but they are tough to get rinsed off sometimes.

SRH

[hihaven]

Thanks for the replies, I think acetone is in lacquer thinner. I will play it safe and buy some mineral spirits to soak receiver in since the main springs are in it.

[vaturkey]

Falling into the FWIW, category. Dan Rossiter uses a ultra sonic cleaner. Strips everything throw it in the cleaner with I believe Simple Green 50/50 mixture with water. Pulled them out and then dries them off good and then puts the gun back together with the appropriate amount of oil where required.

Does he not rinse the parts with clean water after the 50/50 cleansing? Some of these high strength cleaners take considerable rinsing with clean water to remove all traces of them. They do their job well but they are tough to get rinsed off sometimes.

SRH

Not sure. Imagine he does using distilled water, but never asked. He has done a fair amount of stripping and cleaning for me over the years.

[Mike of the Mountain]

I use an ultrasonic cleaner too. I use the Lyman. 50/50 mix of water and Simple Green. There really is little to no residue left on the parts after cleaning. If you want to I'd suggest using a gun cleaner that you normally se to wipe down your gun after shooting. That should suffice to remove any bit of residue and add the protective coating to the clean steel.

Best part of using the ultrasonic cleaner is how little time it takes for the unit to clean any parts you need done. I even drop in the entire bolt carrier group of a MSR and it comes out squeaky clean. My next step is to buy one of the larger units that can hold a shotgun barrel or rifled action.