Wacky barrel sleeving idea?

[joshb]

My mind tends to wander and theorize sometimes. I have a skinny Sporter barrel that's pretty accurate before it heats up. I was conjuring a "fix". Through out Gunsmithing history, has any one ever cast a "sleeve" over a skinny barrel? May I have wandered too far into left field?

 

[wvlongshot]

Carbon fiber

 

[Sniper338]

Thats what a proof research barrel is. Barrel wrapped in carbon fiber

 

[joshb]

Yeah, but that's high tech. I was thinking about a soft metal with a "low" melting point a guy could pour in his shop, maybe aluminum. Probably a stupid idea.

 

[savagedasher]

You could pour a silicone sleeve over it would dampen vibration . I wouldn't but you can .
Larry

 

[Ggmac]

Yeah, but that's high tech. I was thinking about a soft metal with a "low" melting point a guy could pour in his shop, maybe aluminum. Probably a stupid idea.

Gosh , I've done that with many dif mediums . Resin , epoxy , lead , bondo , silicone , etc .
BIG PROBLEM , the barrel actually swells as the bullet passes thru , think chicken /egg . All but the silicone came loose . Silicone really helped the accuracy but did not transmit heat . Next was lead , that worked for about 20 shots before I realized it was starting to vibrate loose . I even used water / anti freeze , expansion was a problem once heated even a little .
The best fix for thin barrels when concerned about heat is external threading , painted black with a large finned section near the chamber ( think R/C engine cooling fins .
Coffee tine , Gary
PS the external threading wasn't my idea , it was Roy Dunlap who first used it , it's much , much better than CURRENT fluted barrels .

 

[grandslam 4]

Just send it to CRYO Plus and have it stress relieved , she does a great job ,

 

[paperpuncher]

There was some experimenting with stretchers years back. Basically a tube that locates on a shoulder on the breech end and a cap on the muzzle end. The muzzle gets threaded to match the cap. The cap gets tightened to tension the barrel. I did try this on a GM 22 rimfire barrel on a ar upper it shoots quite well. I will concede however that I never tried the barrel without the tube, the barrel is about .600 od for all but about 1.5" on the breech end the tube is aluminum about 1" od

 

[Papa Charlie]

I would be concerned with different expansion ratios between different materials. This would also affect heat radiation and could cause the barrel to overheat and would have a huge affect on barrel life.
Carbon fiber works because of its strength, flexibility and its ability to transfer heat. I work for Boeing on the 787 program, which is a all Carbon fiber airplane. We normally flex a new wing design in our lab until it breaks. When they tried this with the 787 wing, the tips ended up touching the ceiling of the lab and still had not given way. The decision was to discontinue the tests at that point, as the material had absorbed a huge amount of energy and there was fear of it letting it go.
But from a individuals point of view, I think that by the time you finished, you would have been better off getting a new barrel.
Interesting thought though.

 

[GLZ]

https://www.dracosbarrels.com/

All you need to do is figure out the proprietary media

 

[savagedasher]

LineX it Larry

 

[jdh47]

Yes there is this company that sleeves barrels for bolt actions. It is sort of pricy.

http://www.teludynetech.com/

Joe

 

[butchlambert]

Just send it to CRYO Plus and have it stress relieved , she does a great job ,

Now tell me scientifically what that would accomplish?

 

[billlarson]

sleeving barrels is nothing new....... still done today with rail guns......
bill

 

[butchlambert]

sleeving barrels is nothing new....... still done today with rail guns......
bill

Yup, some with oil, water, or many other media to reduce vibration and as a cooling method. I used golf shafting tape on my rails for vibration control. Heat was never a problem.

 

[Mozella]

You can "fix" the problem for $350 to $500, depending on how fancy you want to go. Simply buy an aftermarket barrel, screw it on, and have fun. Cheaper than many of the wacky suggestions in this thread and MUCH more likely to solve your problem.

 

[joshb]

I live with a curious mind. I figured that it had already been tried, given the tendencies of this crowd to think outside the box. Seems Gary nailed what I was thinking with the " lead" idea. Simple for a novice like me. I started to think about using aluminum in consideration of the weight issue of lead. Nice analogy with the chicken and the egg. Is that from personal observation, Gary? I just have to know. Picturing you staring at a chickens butt for hours on end doesn't seem to fit. Anyway, it chewed up a few hours of my "idle time". A new barrel is probably safer and easier. Thanks for the input. Josh

 

[Mozella]

......... snip..............A new barrel is probably safer and easier. Thanks for the input. Josh

Well, a new barrel is not only probably safer and easier, it is quite likely to solve your problem. You can't say that for any of the other ideas floated in this thread. Plus a new barrel is going to be less expensive and is is guaranteed to be easier.

 

[Ggmac]

What I learned in my experiments , lasting on and off 2-3 yrs is that a new barrel is easier but not the only answer to accuracy . If I could of used the water , glycol mix to expand less it was good but heavy . When I induced stress by sleeving and either compressing or expanding the tube it would create tight spots one way any loose spots the other .
I can say ; without thinking out of the box , we as a shooting group will not expand our understanding and ultimate goal of smaller and smaller groups . Do it , but do it safely !

 

[Mozella]

What I learned in my experiments , lasting on and off 2-3 yrs is that a new barrel is easier but not the only answer to accuracy . If I could of used the water , glycol mix to expand less it was good but heavy . When I induced stress by sleeving and either compressing or expanding the tube it would create tight spots one way any loose spots the other .
I can say ; without thinking out of the box , we as a shooting group will not expand our understanding and ultimate goal of smaller and smaller groups . Do it , but do it safely !

I hear what you're saying. I'm an experimenter myself. However, the OP didn't say he wanted to experiment with various ways of building accurate barrels. He said he had a skinny barrel which lost precision as it got hot and asked about ways to "fix" his problem with accuracy degradation, not how to embark on an interesting science project. The "fix" is, quite obviously, to buy a new barrel. I suspect he knows that because his possible plan was accompanied with a question asking about being too far into left field.

The search for a new way to build barrels could go in any direction, but any project more complex than wrapping a barrel in Duct Tape is likely to be more expensive than buying a new barrel and is surely going to take a lot more time, effort, and probably involve a heap of frustration. Nothing wrong with that at all. I've gone down more than my share of very expensive rabbit holes in my long life time. But I try to do that when looking for a scientific adventure, and I try to avoid it if I'm just looking to solve an easily solvable situation.