Lube, Lint & Leather: 3 L’s For Good Gun Maintenance

How To Care For Your Concealed Carry Handgun

Team iconcealed.com runs down a few handgun maintenance must-haves.

What we like to call the 3 L’s…

Lint

Anything that invades the cracks and crevices of your handgun falls into this category. Hair, dust, gunk. For sake of simplicity, we’ll just call it LINT.

Look around your house. See all that dust collected on the coffee table? Think about how much settles in your gun. Not good.

Got pets? Of course you do.

Assume their hair will wind up in and on your firearm. Cause it will.

They don’t call ’em furballs for nothin’!

The level of lint depends on your method of carry. An OWD holster will ward off more lint than if you stick your gun in your pocket where lint likes to live.

Changing the type of covering garment can dramatically effect the amount of lint. Rayon button down? No lint. Cotton sweatshirt? Fuzz factory.

Rule of thumb: dry, clean guns attract less lint than dirty or well-lubed handguns.

Whether you carry every day or once a month, check your gun at the end of the day. Blow or wipe off external lint but don’t worry about cleaning it at this point.

It’s not dirty, just linty. There’s a difference. Field-strip once a week, wipe it down, reassemble, load, and you’re back in business.

Lube

Well lubed handguns perform better. Period. Yeah, yeah. They run fine dry, but most will cycle more smoothly when lubed.

That said, keeping your carry lubricated can lead to problems. For instance, lint is less likely to stick to dry metal whereas lubing causes lint to adhere to nooks and crannies.

Also, lube tends not to stay where you put it. Guaranteed it will evaporate or rub off and after just a few short days of carry, a well-lubed gun can become anything but.

Solution? Switch from light oils to heavier pastes. This cuts down on migration issues. More gel than fluid lubrication is key.

Of course, the type of handgun makes a big difference. After lint removal, slathering thick lube on the wrong weapon (like a Glock), could gum up the works.

Overall, we recommend Gun Smoke Labs gun oil (https://gunsmokelabs.com/order.php) for best overall lube / price / effectiveness.

Leather

Basically a holster (leather or otherwise) does not affect performance, reliability or accuracy. The “look” or appearance is about all you can affect with a holster.

Whether it’s leather or some kind of orthermoplastic acrylic-polyvinyl chloride composite — doesn’t matter. Every type of carry will leave marks on your handgun. That said, different types of holsters cause different types of wear.

Kydex doesn’t flex all that much, so the spots where it causes wear & tear are limited to where the gun rests or is locked in place (i.e. front slide edge or trigger guard edges).

Leather holsters, on the other hand, grip guns like a glove. Which is good. Less wear & tear. But, over time, leather tends to get linty, dusty, and carbon foul-y, all of which can have an abrasive effect on your gun finish.