What makes a barrel great?

[Terry]

What is it that makes a barrel shoot so much better than others?

I have two "Super Match" barrels, one in 6.5x47 Lapua, and one in 22BR.
My stock Savage 6BR barrel out shoots them both.

Thanks!

Terry

 

[jonbearman]

Send them back if they clearly have accuracy problems. The answer to your ? is the time and patience taken by the person actually doing the machining operations to manufacture said barrel. All companys make hummers and less than accurate barrels. Most will admit that it may be a problem but most will deny it do to their overinflated ego's.

 

[mikecr]

It would be a more valid topic to consider if you had 3 identical guns, in the same cartridge, using same bullets & components, with one barrel causing worse performance.
With this you have 3 different shooting systems, and notion that it is only one thing(out of all differences) deviating.

It matters because it's an example reason why nobody can predict great barrel performance.
Today, anyone could only predict bad barrel performance(if it were poorly drilled/lapped, etc).
Great barrels have always been a crapshoot.

 

[Hengehold]

There is an article on 6mmbr.com that has a video showing differences between a Lilja Barrel and factory barrel. To answer your question, I am under the impression that the following make an impact to barrel performance.

Lapping - was barrel lapped at factory after rifling was made. This will smooth out any roughness in the bore( see video in article).

Stress relieve steel - are barrels baked in an oven after rifling is formed to relieve stress from steel. This is standard practice for high quality match barrel makers like Brouton, Lilja, Hart ect.

Cut vs button rifling - records set and championships are won with both. My understanding is that button rifling induces more stress on the steel but when heat treated properly, stress is relieved.

Bore curve - a barrels bore is never manufactured perfectly straight. The amount of curve and orientation of the curve are believed by some to make an impact on accuracy. I have witnessed dozens of barrels being tested for bore curve orientation, most of which were for smallbore, and 100% of the time when the curve was oriented in a vertical plane the groups were always better than when oriented in a lateral plane by a margin of around 20% improvement. Some top gunsmiths orient the curve when they fit a barrel. These tests can be difficult to perform if you do not have the necessary equipment and I think that for this reason, many people are not convinced that this makes a difference.

Machining/fitting - a barrel cannot be shot without being chambered and fit to an action. Therefore, a gunsmith induces an unmeasurable amount of accuracy loss when performing these functions. Cutting a chamber that is off-center, having an improper fit between barrel/action or cutting a crown with dull tools are some examples of error in this area that may impact the performance of a barrel.

We are opening a can of worms here, I am interested to see what some of the other opinions are.

Trevor

 

[dreever]

It's a crap shoot. You buy a name brand barrel (Kreiger, Bartlein, etc.) you'll always get a good barrel.....sometimes you'll get a great barrel, and once in a blue moon you might even get one of the mystical hummers which is a FANTASTIC barrel.


Danny