Mike Ross was a renowned smallbore theorist and gunsmith who conducted several tests related to barrel indexing and published his findings on its effects in Precision Shooting magazine. I had the privilege of participating in many of his tests and have inherited the barrel-indexing fixture that Mike Ross used. It is a barrel clamp design that has a mount for a scope and is transportable. Size is approximately 2ft x 6in x 10in. My love for shooting rests with high power rifles and I do not have the time or interest to get heavily involved in smallbore. I would like to sell this barrel-indexing fixture and find it a good home with someone who will continue to put it to use. My initial thoughts are that a serious smallbore gunsmith or shooter would find value in this kind of tool. Are there any gunsmiths that are seriously involved with competitive smallbore shooting and would have a use for a barrel-indexing fixture for testing or providing the barrel indexing service for a customer? Thanks in advance. -Trevor
Trevor, I remember Mike's posts concerning indexing 22RF bbls for best accuracy on German Salazar's "Florida Smallbore Shooting" site on Delphi. His written descriptions were lucid & made sense to me, so when I needed a rimfire smith to install a new Broughton sporter bbl on a Win 52D for me, there was a clear & easy choice of who to get to do the job. Mike did a good job fitting & chambering that bbl, and along with a Karl Kenyon trigger job & a Doan Trevor sporter stock cut from a very nice English walnut blank, I had a striking 52 sporter - even if it was a single shot instead of a repeater. I also seem to recall there were some who felt Mike's process was flawed or even bogus, though I never did understand the basis for their opinions. Sadly, I believe Mike stopped posting on German's site due to the controversy - all I can say to his detractors is that the rifle Mike put together for me is a very fine shooter. I hope his indexing fixture goes to a good home with someone who believes that Mike was onto something exceptional.
I really enjoyed his research, even more his back and forth with the WLM from Borden, who’s chief argument, usually, was he did’nt invent the process.
Thanks for the sharing background. I can attest that barrel indexing is not a hoax. I was fortunate to participate in some of the barrel tests and the results were repeatable barrel after barrel, day after day. Mike even had a different return-to-battery rest that I tested my Palma rifle in on one occasion. It was also a barrel clamp design and allowed for the barreled action to be rotated to shoot groups and determine the difference in group size based on barrel orientation. The benefits of barrel indexing are painfully obvious to anyone who conducts the experiment. Unfortunately, most people don’t have the equipment/ resources to conduct these experiments. That’s why I started this thread. This barrel indexing fixture is unique because it is a convenient and repeatable way to conduct the testing on rimfire barrels. -T
Some interesting reading on the topic.... http://forums.delphiforums.com/smallbore/messages/?msg=304.1 Best Regards, ken
Thanks for that link Ken. It sure brought back a lot of fond memories of all the years I've spent on the Smallbore forum with a lot of fabulous people, but it also left me feeling more than a little melancholy. I miss Mike deeply. Trevor, Mike was very proud of you and spoke often of it. I obviously have no need of Mike's rest for other than sentimental reasons, but whoever buys it should appreciate the link provided as it gives an excellent starting point for anyone interested in barrel indexing. Appreciate isn't strong enough, I'd say a search on the forum for all things relevant to indexing should be mandatory or you run the risk of botching up "Indexing" like Calfee did. Off topic, but do you know what happened to Mike's Swindlehurst action. I ask because I was constantly "ribbing" him to do something with it instead of using it as a paperweight for all the years he had it. LOL Landy
Holy cow! After reading two pages of the discussion on Delphi, I believe I'll just keep indexing barrels before chambering with the high point of the muzzle at 12:00...right, wrong, or indifferent, it's worked fairly well for me in the past, and I don't have any better way to do it.
So , how do u know that the bbl is more accurate when the high point is indexed at the 12 o'clock vs the 6 o' clock position? Other than firing the rifle. I can see that indexing the bbl at one of those positions will greatly aid keeping ur sights centered or when installing a replacement bbl. For LR shooting it can also determine how high or low ur front sight setting must be. Indexing all of ur cf bbls certainly adds to the consistency of POI as well as consistency of bbl vibration. There are many good reasons to index but I dont know how u could predict a CF bbls most accurate indexed position without actually testing it on paper. That said, am I missing the obvious here? Bob
Bob B.. you answered your own question.. But yes, indexing is prevalent to adjustment of the scope as well, trying to keep the erector centered in the tube is important, when i a person has a scope that has only 30 to 42 moa total movement, it becomes critical! i believe that this fixture is mainly for rimfire barrels.. where you have to tune the rifle to the ammo.. it isn't like you get to tune the ammo to the barrel in centerfire. This indexing of the barrel is from what i understand is why Bill Myers did a "cone breech" barrel, so that he could index the barrel to squeeze out that last bit of accuracy node in the barrel.. i might be wrong, but that is how my mind sees it..
Uh, not really. Bill was doing cone breaches well before a lot of the indexing experiments got traction. There are a lot of opinions about this but the long and short of it for many, if not most, it was basically, they were quicker to get the barrel out the door than cutting extractor slots. I got one of the first ones from him and I asked more than a few questions about the proposition. Was never a big fan.
First off, most of this was intended and used on 22 BR rifles. Remember, once you got the barrel in the vertical plane, the majority of group dispersion became vertical, tuner adjustments are typically done to minamize the vertical component so, in effect, you were working with, not against what the barrel was giving you.
