When you buy a firearm, it generally comes with disassembly instructions.\u00a0 If you\u2019re gonna shoot it, ya gotta clean it\u2026and when it gets dirty enough, ya gotta take it apart to get it cleaned right.<\/p>\n
Actually, taking it apart is the easy part.\u00a0 As so many of our experienced readers know, the challenge comes when you try to put the damn things back together.<\/p>\n
Hint\u2026leftover parts are NOT a good sign, and were NOT usually extraneous to the design\u2026<\/p>\n
As a kid, I was proud of my ability to disassemble, clean, and most importantly, reassemble the family firearms.\u00a0 And I remember my frustration at age twelve when I ran into the first gun I couldn\u2019t properly do that with, the Ruger .22 caliber semiautomatic pistol.\u00a0 (I was later relieved to learn that grownups went nuts getting it apart and back together, too. There are actually tools to help you do this. Google \u201cBrownell\u2019s.\u201d)<\/p>\n
Today I am old and lazy, and probably go too far between cleaning guns \u2013 well, at least the play guns as opposed to the work guns. Some of my match guns don\u2019t get cleaned until I realize that lower life forms are beginning to evolve in the mechanisms. I knew I was getting sloppy when a friend asked me, \u201cMas, what do you use to clean guns?\u201d\u00a0 I heard myself answer, \u201cArmorers.\u201d<\/p>\n
In rural America, where guns are handed down through the generations and bought or swapped between friends, owners\u2019 manuals tend not to last as long as the hardware. Today, most gun manufacturers will happily furnish you with the manuals. Trouble is, in \u201cbackwoods homes,\u201d there dwell lots of guns whose manufacturers are no longer in existence..<\/p>\n