My own preference is for the Carbon fiber rods. I have seen objections on the basis that they are hard and abrasive. That could well be true, but I have not seen anything beyond opinions to support that.
I think that any rod can become abrasive if it's allowed to accumulate fouling, and then allowed to rub against the bore. This would seem to occur most likely at the throat, and then most likely at the muzzle, primarily when used without a rod guide. Any flex that occurs while the rod is inside the bore has the potential to cause the rod to abrade against the bore interior. I wipe my rods with an absorbent cloth after every pass through the bore, so fouling accumulation is kept to a minimum, and also use a rod guide at all times when using a cleaning rod. Patches should be removed once they exit the muzzle; pulling them back through can be a serious cause of crown damage and excessive wear inside the muzzle.
The end bushings of cleaning rod guides should be carefully matched to the actual cleaning rod diameter. Most of us use the thinner rods. That can be OK, but when we clean a smaller diameter bore with a smaller diameter rod, we need to take care to assure that the guide bushing's inner diameter allows only minimal lateral clearance for the rod. Running a 30 caliber guide tip bushing with a 22 caliber rod in a 22 caliber bore is no better than using no guide at all. I prefer to use the largest diameter rod that fits properly within the given bore, to minimize any rod flex, which is where I suspect those mysterious kinks develop,
Bores which cannot be accessed from the breech end need to have a reliable form of muzzle bore guide employed. A bore snake can be useful, but at some point, a rod becomes necessary.
If you don't use a bore guide every time you clean, why do you even own one in the first place?
In 'Nam, we used a fired 12ga hull with the primer punched out and the flash hole reamed to rod diameter as a muzzle rod guide that slipped tightly over the M-14 flash suppressor. Perhaps less than perfect, but also perhaps a bit better than nothing at all?
My preference for carbon rod shafts is because the carbon fiber rods will not assume a bend. Every metallic rod I have ever owned has eventually assumed a bend..I have always taken great pains to protect my rods from bending, but eventually, they all acquire that kink, however mild. When they do, they can rub along the inside of the bore. That's not something I'll accept from a cleaning rod. I use the carbon fiber rods because they appear better at resisting any acquisition of such bends.
Just for kicks. try rolling your metal rods along a flat surface, and see whether they have or haven't acquired that kink.
Some apprehension gets expressed about how cleaning may be the largest single contributor to bore wear. If it is, I think that bent rods rate high on the list of culprits. But I also think that except in extreme cases, the real killer of bores is heat. Bore transit times are minuscule, with the entire bore transit time a barrel experiences before wear out probably totals maybe just a few minutes overall. The extreme heat and pressure a bore/throat undergoes with each firing can be hard to visualize. Throats are probably more vulnerable to cleaning wear, especially when bore guides are used incorrectly or not at all. That does not combine well with throat damage due to heat.
Greg
