PRO-Shot Products cleaning kits
Pro-Shot Products brings the cleaning kit to a whole new level, canceling some old hard held beliefs on what is needed to clean a firearm.
PRO-Shot cleaning kit
Pro-Shot Products, a brand that's entirely Made in USA, born in 1982, when Chinese cleaning kits didn't even exist yet. But above all, in an era when — as older gun enthusiasts know — if you wanted a well-made cleaning kit, with all the necessary accessories, there were only a handful of brands to choose from, and they were all American.
Today the market is flooded with cleaning kits of every kind and price point, almost all Made in China and all packaged in ways that look remarkably alike. Which is fairly obvious, when there's a company that "paves the way," setting the rules even when it comes to packaging, rules that everyone else then follows, because they're well thought out. And in fact Pro-Shot's packaging has always stood out for exactly this: a genuinely rational storage unit, a well-organized kit with everything in its place. It costs more than the others, because it isn't like the others — so it depends on what you're looking for, the choice is yours.
Pro-Shot offers kits for every gun denomination, from airguns to shotguns.
Inside you will find a box of patches, one or more jags (depending upon kit) of the appropriate caliber, a clear fiber optic bore inspection tool not to be mistaken for an empty chamber indicator even if, in a pinch, it can work that way too, a bottle of lubricant/cleaning liquid with a needle dispenser, a sample of Pro-Shot Pro-Gold gun grease, a mop or nylon brush (again depending upon kit) and, obviously, a ball bearing rod handle and cleaning rod.
The cleaning rod is truly a thing of beauty, if one can use such words for a simple metal implement. First, the rod is made of heat-treated stainless steel.
What? Shouldn’t a cleaning rod be made of some sort of soft material like brass, or plastic coated stee, to prevent harming the rifling?
The two rifle kits for .308 and .223 look identical...
... but cleaning rod, patch jags and brushes are of different sizes.
Well, this is one of those counter-intuitive things: soft materials like those will cause hard particles to become embedded in the rod’s surface, effectively turning the rod in an abrasive implement with time.
This is why all good cleaning rods, such as those you find in the Pro-Shot kits, are made of heat-treated, hard, highly polished steel. This way the steel will glide on the rifling, should it contact it (we’ll see in a moment how to prevent even this eventuality) without causing wear.
The other dogma about cleaning rods has always been that they had to be one-piece cleaning rods, least the corners where the segments join cause damage to the throat, muzzle crown or such.
Well, that was very sensible advice… in the old ‘900. Fast forward to the XXI century and Pro-Shot segmented cleaning rods, machined to such accurate tolerances that you can barely perceive them with your touch.
The hanging slot is retractable, so that you can both store the kits stacking them horizontally, or by hanging them on a tool rack
Now, before discounting such measuring system as “touch”, know that the human touch can discriminate a single imperfection or raised point as 3 micrometers high (for comparison, a human hair can go between 50 to 100 micrometers).
Yep, that’s good indeed and, for all purposes, functionally the same as a one-piece rod.
Pro-Shot anyway also sells excellent one-piece rods, if you want one.
To this, add that the kit contains a brass muzzle guide for cleaning the barrels of those guns that can’t be cleaned from the breech, to prevent any untoward contact between cleaning rod and bore.
The main difference between the .308 cleaning kit and the .223 cleaning kit is the diameter of the rod and the cleaning jag and bore mop.
Obviously, both can be used for any .30 caliber and .22 caliber rifle respectively.
Why use two different rods? After all, the .22 rod can also fit the .308. Because this way, the rod for the larger caliber can be more rigid. Nothing is left to chance.
In each Pro-Shot kit there is all you need, all high quality.
The only detail to account for is that the .30 caliber cleaning rod is about 32.5” long so you may have some issues with rifles with particularly long barrels, such as some long range, magnum caliber target rifles, considering the length of the action and eventual muzzle devices.
But it will be ok for any barrel within a length of 22”-24” inches.
The pistol cleaning kit contains a single piece cleaning rod, the rod’s grip, a nylon brush and .38, .40/10mm and .45 patch jag, allowing you to clean practically any kind of handgun, from the ancient, to the classic, to the modern.
All cleaning kits also contain a silicone cloth to protect your firearm against moisture, a traditional slot patch holder, a nylon brush with large and small head, and the aforementioned muzzle protector.
Pro-Shot leaning kits fit all kinds of guns
Pro-Shot also sells patches, brushes and all the chemicals and lubricants separately, so you can easily replenish your cleaning kit of consumables or get another option among the many that Pro-Shot offers, in the same format as the cleaning and lubricant bottle provided with the kit .
The Pro-Gold grease is sold in 1 oz jars, and is a very good grease for applications where the lubricant should stay where it is meant to be, like bolt action lugs, frame rails, shotgun hinge pins etc.
In short, the Pro-Shot cleaning kits contain everything you need to take care of your guns. The boxes are sturdy, easily stackable and the same loop that allows the dealer to hang them on the display rack can slide back to transform the case into a square box or can slide out to hang the box to a tool rack panel. The label and clear plastic cover allow you to see at a glance which cleaning kit you are looking at.
At an MSRP in the 45-55$ ballpark, Pro-Shot cleaning kits aren’t cheap, but you definitely get your money’s worth to the last cent with a high-quality cleaning system that will serve you well for a very long time.
