Two weeks ago, my wife wanted to go up to the range and refresh herself with her cowboy guns, prior to shooting the Kings River Regulators Fort Miller Shootout. I went with her to test a new 1873 extractor, and to do some revolver live fire.
I set out five 12" square targets at 7 yards, and we blazed our way through a couple hundred rounds.
Partway through, I began to miss badly, but with only one of the pistols.
After several rounds, missing 3 or 4 out of five shots, I stopped shooting fast and tested the gun. Steadying it against a post, and then a table, I continued to miss.
My wife asked if cleaning the gun would help. I retrieved a bronze spiral brush from the cart and scrubbed the bore. Then put on a jag and pushed 4 or 5 dry patches through the bore. Lots of lead schards apeared on the patches. When I fired the cleaned gun, it resumed its former precision.
I guess I never worried very much about leading in a revolver bore, especially shooting such close targets. We all respect the effects of leading on rifle precision. But I confess I often cleaned the revolver receiver and cylinder, but usually neglected to clean the bore.
I learned a painless lesson in our practice. But then, last weekend at the Shootout, I had the same problem occur again with the same gun, costing 4 misses on close targets in the second to last stage. The missing immediately corrected when I scrubbed out the bore.
From now on, I will carry the tools and solvent and scrub the pistol bores each time I clean the shotgun during matches. I wonder how many of my misses over the years, were contributed to by barrel leading.
Friends are saying to shoot a couple jacketed rounds through the bore to shoot out the lead. But you can't exactly do that between stages in a match. In my case, during the Shootout match, consequential leading re-deposited over only 9 stages (45 rounds). I never would have expected that.