Can a barrel blank be recontoured

[Minesweeper3433]

I managed to snag a cut rifled barrel blank in a straight contour for a project I have been itching to play with. Only problem is that it won't fit in the current stock as a straight blank. Is it safe to remove material from the outside of a cut rifle barrel blank and contour it down even though it has already been rifled? Is there a limit to what can be taken down or is it an all together no? If I could get it down to a varmint contour that would make it much easier to squeeze into the stock I have for this project with out having to go crazy with the rebuilding of the stock. If it helps it is a cut rifle blank 18 inchs long 30 cal 8 twist 5 groove. The barrel is going to be cut down to 15" and be pinned and welded for playing with subsonics in 308win and the occasional 600 yard any any match.

 

[fredhorace77]

IMO if ur looking for benchrest accuracy i would say dont do it. if its just for plinking and hunting loads it probably will not affect it too greatly. if memory serves me correctly most quality manufactures recommend contouring then a final lapping.

 

[z2013]

How does this differ from having your gunsmith buy the blank and he turns the profile to your needs?

 

[dtucker]

Go for it. It sounds like you are not going to be taking much off anyhow. I do not see how you are going to do any harm to the barrel whether it is a cut rifled barrel or button barrel.

 

[Minesweeper3433]

I called and asked Krieger. They have a standard of some sort that they use to decide how much they can remove from the blank if any. Some can have more removed then others I guess based off what is already there. Anyway I think I am going to try and make it work without recontouring and see were that gets me the I can take off a little bit later on if I need.

 

[Ackman]

With a cut rifled barrel it's not supposed to matter. And supposedly a buttoned barrel will change when turned smaller. But years ago in Rifleman magazine some guys made a .22lr barrel substantially smaller, even took big fast cuts to get there, and it made no difference at all in accuracy. So who knows? But I've turned down a barrel, that steel is hard and it goes slowly, takes forever. Pay someone and hourly lathe time won't be cheap. I wouldn't do it if there's more than just a little to take off.

 

[Phil]

Krieger turned a .224 barrel that was 1.25" to thier #17 contour for me.....

Shoots lights out...

Phil.


They also told me that there is a limit to what they will re-contour to..

 

[swampshooter]

Many years ago we turned a target barrel 308 down to heavy sporter profile. It never did shoot good afterwards. 1 1/2"- 2". It had shot respectably good as a target barrel. IIRC in the high .3's and low .4's. Which was pretty good 40 years ago, although not good enough to win a BR match. The work was done by a friend who was an accuracy gunsmith who advised us that it probably wouldn't shoot good after being turned down, but we just wanted a deer rifle.