Hoppe’s 9 Deluxe Gun Cleaning Kit
Recent innovations in the firearms industry have benefited not only the actual firearms themselves, but also the gear that goes with them. The innovation includes creating new tools, rethinking old ones, and generally making much of it more portable and easy to use.
Minimal cleaning kits and maintenance gear for AR-15s or modern sporting rifles are an easy cross-sell opportunity. Even if your customers already understand the need for regular maintenance and cleaning of firearms and even if they have some of the required gear in their possession or at least readily available to them, now more than ever, you can press for adding minimal cleaning kits and gear — equipment meant to easily travel with them for on-the-spot care and maintenance.
Today’s shooters can take advantage of full cleaning kits that fit easily in a range bag; single-pass cleaning tools that fit in a pocket; new chemical compounds that combine a cleaner, lubricant and protectant in one formula; and more. Let’s take a look at some of the gear and how to think about it from a retail perspective.
Full Kits
With cleaning and maintenance gear for firearms, encourage your customers that they don’t have to think in terms of what’s on their gun bench versus on their person (or at least in proximity to them). Further, they won’t have to fuss with gathering up the necessities from the gun bench for a trip to the range and back. Instead, they can have all the needed gear on their person in a capable, dedicated kit.
Kits such as the OTIS Defender Series, Real Avid Gun Boss Pro, and even the Hoppe’s 9 Deluxe Gun Cleaning Kit offer portable solutions for a full range of firearm cleaning and care. Each of the kits contain the requisite rods and brushes; the OTIS and Hoppe’s kits include a small bottle of CLP or bore cleaner, respectively. The Real Avid kit comes in a hard case that opens up, putting all the tools in front of you in an organized fashion, helping to keep things in place. The OTIS is a dual caliber cleaning system and includes one-pass Ripcords for both .223/5/5.56mm and 9mm.
The OTIS kit comes in a soft-sided case measuring 10”x4”x2”. Real Avid’s plastic case/organizer measures 8.25”x4.5” x1.25”. For a more traditional or nostalgic feel, the Hoppe’s case is a traditional wooden box measuring 14.5”x 5.87”x2.37”.
- .223 cal/5.56mm and 9mm Ripcords® for quick, one-pass cleaning
- 100% cotton 2" and 3" patches (10 each) and small & large slotted tips
- .223 cal/5.56mm and 9mm bronze bore brushes with size marked on brush stem
- 8" and 30" aircraft grade Memory-Flex® cables for proper Breech-to-Muzzle® cleaning
- Blue Nylon All Purpose Brush removes fresh carbon or powder residue but won’t scratch your firearm finish
- .223 cal/5.56mm chamber brush for more precise chamber cleaning
- 8-32 thread solid rod set
- Also includes 0.5 fl.oz. of Shooter’s Choice FP-10 Lubricant Elite® CLP and instruction manual
- All items packed neatly in a 10"x4"x2" soft pack case
- No nonsense warranty
- Made in the USA
Real Avid Gun Boss® Pro AR15 Cleaning Kit
- Durable case
- Pegboard hole
- 6 Wool Star chamber cleaning pads
- 4 threaded brass rods combine to form a 29” rod
- Multi-function handle
- Tap hammer
- Kickstand tool case
- Rotating brass threaded receiver
- Bolt carrier brush
- 50 cleaning patches
- 90 angled brass scraper
- Hooked steel cleaning pick
- 3-in-1 bore illuminator, pin punch, safety flat
- 5.56/.223 phosphor bronze bore brush
- Star chamber brush
- Nylon slotted tip
HOPPE’s 9 Deluxe Gun Cleaning Kit (pictured above)
- Heavy-duty wood storage box
- Solid hard wood
- Brass rod
- Bronze brushes
- Full size 2-oz. chemicals
- Hoppe’s No. 9™ Gun Bore Cleaner
- Lubricating oil, patches
- Three-piece brass rod
- Four slotted ends
- Five phosphor bronze brushes to fit .22 and .30 caliber rifles, .38 caliber pistols, and 20- and 12-gauge shotguns
- Rifle/shotgun and pistol adapter
- Silicone cleaning cloth
- Hoppe’s “Guide to Gun Care” booklet
One-Pass Solutions
Even if a customer already owns a full cleaning kit, show them one-pass cleaning solutions such as an OTIS Ripcord or Hoppe’s Boresnake. These inexpensive, easy-to-store tools make quick work of cleaning. While they aren’t meant for a truly deep clean, they do a great job of keeping the rifle’s bore mostly free of buildup and fouling. The Otis Ripcord sports a braided Nomex surface good for up to 700 degrees Fahrenheit, so your customer can run it through a hot firearm. The Ripcord also features a threaded end to which a customer can attach Otis cleaning components, depending on what’s needed. The Hoppe’s Boresnake claims a cleaning area 160 times larger than a standard patch; a user applies a cleaner/oil or CLP to the head and tail of the Boresnake and pulls it through the bore.
- Cleans: .22/.223 cal/5.56mm/5.7mm rifles and pistols
- Length: 36"
- 10 inches of aggressive cleaning surface
- Caliber-specific molded rubberized core for 360-degree cleaning
- Heat resistant up to 700 degrees F
- Nomex® fibers act as both a brush to loosen and a patch to capture fouling particles
- Easy-feed design makes for quicker cleaning from Breech-to-Muzzle®
- Equipped with 8-32 threaded ends to fit all Otis cleaning components
- Nomex® is a registered trademark of DuPont™.
- Scrubs fouling and clears barrel of loose debris with one pass
- “The world’s quickest, three-step bore shine”
- Brass weight on the pull cord is stamped with the caliber
- Extremely packable
- Patented one-piece design
All-in-One Formulas
If the firearms industry is one thing, it’s a collection of passionate people who are not only willing to defend freedom and family, but also to freely debate weapon brand choices, ammunition calibers, and, yes, even the solvents used to clean and maintain firearms. Back in the day, properly cleaning a firearm required at least two solvents: a cleaner followed by a lubricant.
Today, customers have additional choices from polymer cleaners to specialized protectants to rust inhibitors and more. Additionally, some cleaning solvent manufacturers created all-in-one formulas — putting a cleaner, lubricant and protectant in one solution. Some of these can be sprayed, some can be applied with a dropper, some are bottles in which a brush or sponge can be dipped.
Whatever your customer’s preferences in this area, the all-in-one formulas available today may at least be a decent short-term field cleaning solution when combined with a product such as a Ripcord or Boresnake. In any case, consider the opportunity to push both a portable field cleaning solution as well as a secondary, deeper-clean solution for the gun bench.
- Gun oil & cleaner: 2-in-1 cleaning and lubrication, removes carbon build-up, lead deposits, oil and grime, while penetrating to protect from rust and corrosion … minimizes friction from metal-to-metal contact.
- Gun rust protection: Useful for long-term storage protection
- Multi-purpose: Able to be used on tools, auto, metal, locks, knives, bicycles, and additional home items subject to corrosion damage.
- The odorless spray has a temp range of -53 degrees to +430 degrees Fahrenheit
- Made in the USA
Wipes
Maximizing portability can be a function of merely reducing the overall size of something, as the cleaning kits demonstrate. But it doesn’t need to stop there. Just consider the abundance of wipes — small, disposable, individually-dispensed and/or wrapped cloths. Made for one-time uses, wipes usually contain a solution, often for cleaning purposes. The wipes trend, of course, moved into the firearms industry, with wipes producers offering wipes for cleaning, lubricating, and protecting firearms as well as for cleaning up a user’s hands.
Hoppe’s 9 Lead B Gone 40 Wipes
- Hoppes Lead-B-Gone™ Skin Cleaning Wipes lift and trap lead, nickel, cadmium, arsenic, silver, mercury, zinc, chromium, copper, antimony and other metals without smearing.
