Your round count

[fatelvis]

How many rounds of 6BR did you have down your barrel before it started shooting looser groups, enough to warrant a re-barrel for competition? also, was it chrome Moly or stainless? Thanks

 

[std7mag]

A lot is going to depend on your shooting discipline.
Group size opening up for BR is going to be vastly different than for F-Class, and hunting.

Then again there are different levels of competitiveness. Are you just shooting local matches, or trying to get to national level?

 

[Rat Rifle]

I have a match barrel with 1,400 rounds on it. I don’t think it has lost any accuracy. But the throat has moved out .030”

 

[JEFFPPC]

Group barrels are on a class by themselves in my opinion. No group shoots in my area so I will comment on barrels for score shooting in my case these days mostly groundhog matches from 100 to 500 yards and usually 1 inch ten rings at 500 yards. 6ppc barrels 2500 rounds. 6 brx barrels 1800 to 2200 rounds. 30 br barrels, well never shot either of mine out yet.....but lots of rounds.

 

[rwj]

I have over 4000 rounds through a Bartlein 5R, 8 twist, stainless barrel, shooting 105 grain bullets at a muzzle velocity of 2800 feet per second. My group size average is 1.25 inches at 300 yards, smaller on my good days! I don’t shoot matches and don’t know if that group size would be considered competitive. I estimate that my group size started to increase around 3000 rounds, at 4000 rounds I’m starting to experience the dreaded “flyers” (shots whose POI I didn’t call).

 

[fatelvis]

Then again there are different levels of competitiveness. Are you just shooting local matches, or trying to get to national level?

Just shooting local matches

 

[Dave@MAM]

Took one off of a fellow shooters comp gun with, very close to 3500 rounds on it and the last 300 yd match it shot lacked 2 points shooting clean. Never had anything over 2890fps shot through it. Removing it account of becoming hard to clean.

 

[JFrank]

This br has 2000 rounds on the barrel, I was looking to squeeze a bit more out of it a couple months ago with a bushing change. Its more of a back up gun now.

 

[divingin]

Not a competition barrel (I shoot for personal satisfaction); just replaced my short range barrel (Krieger 13.5 twist, 1.25 straight, 6BR no turn chamber) after somewhere near 4000 rounds. I can't really say it opened up, but it did seem like the really small groups (read <.1") were getting fewer and further between. Still shoots 0.15 - .4" as a general rule. Cleaning was also getting to be a PITA; getting the copper out of the firecracking took a lot of work. So I had the smith spin on the spare barrel, and am relegating the old one to be a ground squirrel barrel (if I ever accompany my friends on one of their hunts), or use it for stupid-high pressure testing (if I get around to that.)

 

[jelenko]

1 inch ten rings at 500 yards

Yikes. 1/5 MOA 10 ring! My X rings are 1 MOA; 10 rings 2 MOA.

That's tighter than F Class open, yes? [They have 1/2 MOA X rings, I thought]

 

[JFrank]

NBRSA 600 yard X ring is 1.2 inches

 

[JEFFPPC]

Just shooting local matches

That is not competitive at local matches . Looking for .5 or better at 300 yards.

 

[Okumacaptain]

That is not competitive at local matches . Looking for .5 or better at 300 yards.

Our local matches are F class Bench . Don’t ask me why , I didn’t make the rules . Anyways , pretty difficult putting 20 rds at 300 in X ring which is 1.5”. You won’t see anyone getting all 20 rds in .5” group .

 

[ARW]

I had, what I considered a very good 6BR barrel several years ago that was my groundhog and just for fun target gun. I did not keep an accurate round count on it but if I was guessing I would say it had well over a thousand rounds put thru it. I shot strictly 65gr V-Max with N135 at I believe 3500fps.
After having it for approx. 6-8 years, I wanted something different in a different caliber and not being able to afford two setups I let my son have the barrel. He had it re-chambered in a 6PPC. We were talking about that barrel not too long ago and he told me, if I remember correctly, that it never shot above a .3 group at 100yds. I thought that was pretty impressive for a barrel that was cut down and re-chambered with over a thousand prior rounds thru it.
I have heard of others also getting really good accuracy out of 6BR barrels with a pretty high round count on them also, so your question is a difficult one to answer other that say it will probably be a bunch of rounds before it shoots poorly.
As a side note, I did later regret letting that 6BR barrel go but I was happy it worked out as well as it did for my son.