fluted or plain varmint barrels help please?

[grahamfarmer]

well have decided to change in my light 308 win deer rifle for a more dual purpose one taken by offerings from tikka in the t3 varmint and also remington with the 700 varmint models . both have a fluted barrel option available what are the pos and cons with these over the standard varmint profile

looking for a deer rifle and some target punching at 600 yds barrel lenght likly to be 24 or 26 inches comments please .

 

[Rust]

In a factory rifle there is virtually no functional difference in performance between the two. A more imprtant consideration is stainless or CrMo steel since not taking care of a CrMo barrel and chamber will lead to rust. Otherwise it's six of one half a dozen of the other between stainless and CrMo. Yeah, there are those pundits that will claim some performance advantage for stainless but not that I've ever noticed in a field rifle.

Now as far as purchase of a Remington goes, look at the serial number, numbers prefixed by the letter "G" are new production made at the S&W plant on new CNC machinery and they look real nice. Matter of fact my new 700P in .308 has turned out to be a real shooter, first match at 1,000 it did just fine even if I didn't,lacked elevation dope going into the match as it hadn't been fired at 1,000 previously.

Only picks are a little more freebore and an larger chamber size than I'd prefer, of course they aren't going to put something like the AMU match chamber in a factory rifle.

Other nice thing is I fired 90 rounds,short range) the other day without cleaning and accuracy didn't fall off. A goodly amount of RL-15 behind a 155 Scenar. While it does leave a lot of black soot it's soft and cleans easily. The barrel doesn't copper up much either. Won't mention the load because I use up all the freebore seating the bullets so that only about half the neck is used on bearing surface which leaves a bunch more room in the case so I can get away with more powder. Shot that load in a minimal freebore chamber and there could be trouble.

I'd buy it again.

 

[grahamfarmer]

well thanks for the info rust have taken the plunge and ordered a remington 700p which is all ready screw cut by the importers into the uk it was the last one they had in stock and arent expecting any more in the near future.
so just got to get the paper work sorted and see when it arrives so will getsome new brass and load a few light loads to fire form cases and break in the barrel at the same time . cant see that i will be disappointed unless i get a right muppet of a gun will keep a eye out for the g serial number and hope.

 

[tx_shooter]

Given equal lengths, a fluted barrel will weigh less, but the main advantage in fluting is that the barrel will cool faster.

Yes, it will cool faster - but it is at a rate that is minimally faster. Unless they are doing some deep flutes to really increase the amount of surface area exposed to the air then the fluting is more about looks and some weight loss. If it is the "light fluting" found on the thinner barrels then it is of no effect. The heavier barrels with the deeper fluting will get the best results.

 

[Rust]

The fluting you see on any factory rifle does not contribute significantly to barrel cooling. Try a twenty round string of hot loads on an Alabama summer day at a match, the barrel will be hot no matter what and it will take awhile to cool down.

Old fashioned Kal Gard Gun Coat done properly does cool a barrel faster. The rough finish increases surface area, over doubles it and the stuff transmits heat pretty well. But the finish has to be applied properly and kept clean to work optimally, can't coat it with oil or anything else, had to be clean bare Gun Kote. Originally developed for large bore naval ordnance. But the barrel will still be plenty hot after a 20 round string.

And I've seen one or two barrels that didn't look so much fluted as longitudinally finned. Probably over triple the surface area of a plain barrel, and they did cool of quite rapidly. But they were ugly to look at, and cutting all of those flutes was time consuming. Without your own mill, and given what most smiths charge per flute, well....

Like most things, the KISS principle works quite well.

 

[bootlaceb]

This is an extract from Shilen Barrels, on their Website FAQ;

What about "fluting" a barrel?
Fluting is a service we neither offer nor recommend. If you have a Shilen barrel fluted, the warranty is void. Fluting a barrel can induce unrecoverable stresses that will encourage warping when heated and can also swell the bore dimensions, causing loose spots in the bore. A solid,un-fluted) barrel is more rigid than a fluted barrel of equal diameter. A fluted barrel is more rigid than a solid barrel of equal weight. All rifle barrels flex when fired. Accuracy requires that they simply flex the same and return the same each time they are fired, hence the requirement for a pillar bedded action and free floating barrel. The unrecoverable stresses that fluting can induce will cause the barrel to flex differently or not return from the flexing without cooling down a major amount. This is usually longer than a shooter has to wait for the next shot. The claim of the flutes helping to wick heat away faster is true, but the benefit of the flutes is not recognizable in this regard until the barrel is already too hot.

 

[fdshuster]

Amen to the Shilen opinion on barrel fluting: I'll believe a major barrel manufacturer, and continue to follow their expert advice, before the claims being made, in some cases, by those whose only interest is to "make work"/ solve a non-existant problem. I've personnaly seen barrels that were once match-quality, destroyed by "fluting". If the barrel maker chooses to flute, that's a whole different issue, since there is no third party to shift the blame for a botched "job".

 

[Obtunded]

Fluting is a bad idea generally. Hammer forged and button rifled barrels have latent stresses that "stress relieving" does not eliminate completely; this makes them very bad candidates for fluting, but even cut rifled barrels must have perfectly homogeneous steel. In both cases, the heating that occurs with firing will affect the steel and subject the steel to asymmetrical stress.

Non-fluted and cut rifled barrels re susceptible too, but fluting is in itself a form of stress relieving that will potentially affect Buttoned and hammer forged barrels much more so.

 

[boogershooter]

So has anyone had a fluted barrel that shot exceptionally well?

 

[boogershooter]

Not One?

 

[jb77]

I have a fluted Hart in 22-250 that Pete Pieper at Precision Barrel Work installed on a blueprinted Rem. 700 and it will shoot into the .2's when the operator isn't malfunctioning.

It's for weight savings and looks though, not extra cooling. Here in Texas in the Summer if you leave anything made of metal in the sun for very long you can't hold it without gloves anyway.

 

[expiper]

Most Benchrest guys have tried em...the only reason to flute,IMHO) is to save weight ...and be able to use a longer bbl. and still make weight....it is not done to improve the accuracy or heat properties by most Benchrest gunsmiths...It looks "cool" but really doesnt cool the bbl much ....Roger

 

[people]

The bushmaster's that I shot would shoot .25 of an inch at 100yds. I guess that is good enough to shoot Paire dogs.

 

[grahamfarmer]

well i have opted for the plain varmint barrel as furnished but at least the comments have been interesting having a pes moderater proofed and a harris bi pod now all i need is to find a scope within a 400 pound budget