New Owner question

[Crossroads Joe]

OK, be polite, new owner of a 22/45 Lite. Have never owned any firearms nor did my dad teach me about cleaning them. So I've watched the videos and read the online docs on the disassemble and reassemble of the 22/45 Lite, but one thing that none of them seems to go over is what do I clean and what do I use? Yes, I am very much aware that is is a beginners question, but I don't have a group of shooters that I hang around so I'm taking these first steps of learning/using a firearm rather on my own. Appreciate the help.

Joe

 

[contender]

Welcome to the Forum Joe!
We do try & be polite here, as long as the folks who visit are polite as well. If you look around, you will see excellent posts by others about how this place is.
And in the spirit of that, I'll offer a bit of help.
First, the Ruger MKIII and even it's predecessors can be tricky to re-assemble for folks not familiar with them. Disassembly isn't as hard, it's getting things back in the proper place in the correct sequence that causes most headaches. So, if you take your gun apart, upon re-assembly, go slow, don't force the parts, (unless it's the receiver to frame fit that needs a bit of extra umph to seat it properly,) & stop & ask questions before messing something up. We will help when we can.
Next, since you didn't put a location in your info, I don't know where you are. BUT,,,,, if you do divulge your location, you may find we have a member nearby who can offer hands on help. I'm in Western NC, and my door & range is open to you.
Now, what to clean.
Some here never disassemble their MK series autos. They will remove the grip panels, (if they have them,) spray a brake cleaner all around the insides letting it flush out the gunk inside things. Wipe it off, apply a LIGHT lube & be fine. Others do the field strip as mentioned in the manual, and clean things from there.
If you do the field strip, I'd use the brake cleaner spray for the lower grip frame assembly insides. It's easy & very effective. Add a light oil to the mating & moving surfaces & the lower is good to go. An old toothbrush, (or similar brush,) can also allow you to brush out any crud you may need to remove. Next the bolt. A good cleaner will remove the surface gunk, and again, a toothbrush can & will clean the boltface. Spray the extractor area & move it a lot to remove the gunk in that channel.
The receiver, clean it inside. Especially the face area where the bolt closes to it. I use a toothpick or similar object to "dig" out the gunk in the corner all around the circumference. One area that needs close attention, is the extractor slot in the receiver. Again, a toothpick is an excellent tool to dig out that space, as well as a good spraying.
Lastly, I use a boresnake down the bore, or a wet patch on a rod jag, followed by a proper sized brush, followed by a few dry patches.
That's all I do to clean mine.
I hope this helps!

 

[hittman]

Hoppe's Number 9.
Hoppe's oil.
CLP spray.
Pro-Shot Products Silicone Cloth.

No need to disassemble these guns; ever.
Wipe down the outside.
Swab out the barrel.

Welcome to the Forum.

 

[Kevin]

Welcome to the forum! I'm one of those who only disassemble my Mark II when it gets dirty enough to cause problems firing, failure to fire or failure to eject, stove pipe issues. Those sorts of things. This seems to be around every 4 or 5 thousand rounds.

Between those cleanings, after every time I go shooting, I wipe the outside down for fingerprints. About every two or three range trips I use Hoppes #9 and a tooth brush or those little cotton square gun wipes. Clean the chamber area well and get all the visible crud off. You know also little wooden BBQ skewers work well for the tight spots.

If you do take your 22/45 Lite apart, read the instructions and it will go just fine.

Let us know what you think of the Lite. I want to get one for my daughter. She will be old enough to come shooting in a year or so. What model did you get? One of the colored ones?

There's a company called TandomKross, they sell a lot of aftermarket 22/45 parts. They have pretty good reviews online.

 

[GunnyGene]

About that reassembly sequence. Back in bootcamp, the routine taught is as you disassemble place each part in a line in front of you placing the first part out the farthest from you, then each subsequent part coming back toward you. As you clean each one, place it back in the line where it came from. Upon reassembly the part closest to you goes in first, etc. We practiced this enough to be able to strip and reassemble an M-1 in under 2 minutes, blindfolded.

 

[Crossroads Joe]

Welcome to the forum!

Let us know what you think of the Lite. I want to get one for my daughter. She will be old enough to come shooting in a year or so. What model did you get? One of the colored ones?

So far I really like it. In a couple of weeks I'll take to my brother's and let my youngest daughter who is 11 shoot it. She has already shot the .22 rifle and a crossbow, so I'm sure she'll be able to shoot this pistol. The recoil is minimum which I figure she can handle. I got the OD Green. The shop that I got had the red one, but I just liked the green one better. It's a fun pistol and I hope that I can instill that into my daughter and wife. My daughter has already taken to heart my stressing of safety first. She got my dad's BB Gun and she walks with it pointed down, only points it the target and orders everyone behind her when she prepares to shoot. So yea I'm proud of her. The 22/45 Lite got high recommendations from every store that I visited. As for all the extras you can add to it.......yea, everyone was pointing out those items. LOL. I'm taking my time with it and enjoying the learning process.

 

[contender]

I have one of the Lite 22/45's in my stable. We use it for our ladies clinics a lot, and it's well received. I put a red dot on top of it & the ladies love to shoot the dot.

 

[blume357]

I just spray the insides of mine and wipe off any excess on the outside..... these things don't need that internal cleaning as much as some folks like to think.

 

[Chuckfish]

Boresnake and some Ballistol is all you'll ever need.imho

 

[gramps]

Yep, you can wear them out cleaning :shock: :mrgreen: IMO. Where are you located? We have Ruger Forum members all over the place. Meet ups are fun. Welcome to the forum
gramps

 

[CraigC]

Agree with hittman and Kevin, no need to take them apart for cleaning unless absolutely necessary.

 

[rugerguy]

welcome to the Forum, all good information above, and these days we tend to agree, and simply just use kerosene, soak 'em good, brush 'em off, blow it all out with an airhose, spray it down with whatever oil you have handy,again,blow out the excess, wipe 'er down, and the boresnake or a swab on a rod, will clear the bore......nothing to it...over the years in our shops, we've seen and worked on more guns that were damaged from overcleaning, as well as "absuse"....good luck and practice, practice, practice :wink:

 

[Rumrunner]

Plenty of info here, so I will just say welcome and enjoy your first gun. I'm sure there will be more, and if Ruger's, you can find out most anything about them here.

 

[Mobuck]

I'm not a fan of Ruger pistol dis-assembly except under the worst case scenarios. I can and have but see little need for dis-assembly for simple cleaning. I use a "pull through" bore cleaning rope-some don't like these but they are bore safe and easy.
For the rest of the pistol, remove the grip panels(if present) and hose out the gunk, grease, whatever with a synthetic and alloy safe aerosol product. Apply some sort of lube to the moving parts inside the frame(don't hose it till it drips) and the moving parts of the bolt with attention to the recoil spring/guide.
That's all the pistol needs unless you've dunked it, dropped it in the sand /dust, or shot it with cheap ammo that's clotted the bore with fouling.
I carry a 22/45 on the trap line and it's subjected to the worst sort of environmental conditions. I haven't felt the need to clean it since I dropped it in the creek 3 years back and it got a "pop the top and flush the guts" clean-up.