What makes a barrel "shot out"

[Pastprime]

is it just erosion in the throat area or does the rifling also get worn so much accuracy falls off. I'm asking because I just traded for a 12 BVSS in .223 with an unknown round count. I'd like to have the barrel cut off and rechambered in .222. That would be cheaper than buying a new barrel. Any way to tell if the rifling is still OK for that??

[hafejd30]

Borescope would tell you what the rifling looks like. Your gunsmith may have one. The throat usually goes first. You can do what your talking about and restore the accuracy. Same or different chambering in same caliber. Some people mess up the rifling with cleaning improperly. If the rifle was taken care of it should be good. .223 is pretty easy on barrels compared to other cartridges

[darkker]

Agreed.
What most people call "shot out" is actually hard carbon fouling in the throat, and they don't know it.
Any good gunsmith has a bore scope, or there is a model from a company I can't recall at the moment.... Anyway only costs about $200 and has great reviews online.

[Texas10]

You can buy a bore scope camera for less than $20 on Amazon with USB connection to your laptop and you can look directly into the throat or muzzle. I use a Snap-On model BK5500 http://www.ebay.com/sch/sis.html?_nkw=Snap+on+BK5500+Visual+Inspection+Dev ice and use it every time I clean or am using a Hornaday OAL gage to check bullet fit. Want to make sure I don't have a carbon buildup in the throat or else I'm just wasting my time making measurements the are going to change immediately.

I guess the first thing to do is to seat something like a 75 gr SMK to the lands and see how much of the bullet is left in the neck. When my BVSS had about 6000 rounds fired, the bullet was completely out of the neck when touching the lands. Still shot good, sub moa, but just not great like it did when new, so I decided to re-barrel it in same caliber but faster twist.

[RC20]

Shot out means that a properly cleaned barrel no longer holds the accuracy you could shoot previously.

that can mean a small change of 1/10 or its more. For a bench rest type that could be 1500 rounds, for others, 5-7,000. Depends on cartridge and loads (hot or mild) as to how soon that happens.


Bore scope camera listed is $1500, yee hah.

If you do get one make sure its 5mm or 5.5mm, otherwise its chamber only not the barrel.

Or you can use a good Carbon Cleaner (Carbon Cleaner 2000 or the like) and make sure there is none there.

I will get the scope but prefer something that is stand alone so I don't have to hook up to laptop and don't have a smart phone.

[jonbearman]

I think if it is a factory barrel instead of wasting money on a rechamber I would buy one of the many great replacement barrels out there such as mcgowen,shilen,x-caliber,etc. Or a good custom like a brux or pac-nor and kreiger etc. Then you will have a nice fresh barrel and no surprises.

[Pastprime]

Thanks for all of the information. Probably get a new barrel later . I got ahead of myself and hadn't checked the barrel twist when I posted. Just got the rifle two days ago. It's a 1-8 so a .222 would not work well. I'll shoot it a little and see how it does. It's not a factory barrel and it has no name on it. Might be a good shooter, but I'd still like to try a .222.

[Zero333]

If you rechamber it, make sure you also cut off at least 1/2" from the muzzle and re-crown it.

I've toasted a few too many sticks and I noticed that the last 1" or so of the muzzle the rifling is not very deep.

But I have to agree with other posters. Even if the throat looks bad, it doesn't mean it's toast. I have a 243win barrel that has over 4,000 through it (stopped counting at 4k a few years ago) and it shoots very nicely. Not much worst than new. And I wasn't careful with it. Got it stinking hot on a regular basis.

All I have to do is clean it thoroughly once in a while and it shoots like new. It's a Sav. Mod 11 xp hunter 243w I've had for many years and now only use it for deer hunting. It's accuracy still amazes me every fall when I re-sight it before hunting. It averages well under 1moa 5-shots,.. factory ammo or handloads. It does however take a long time to get all the carbon out when cleaning. So thank goodness I only have to do it 1 a year.

[Robinhood]

What makes a barrel "shot out"

Shooting it too much.

[wbm]

Usually, 6-10 seconds of "bullet time" will do the trick.

[Pastprime]

Usually, 6-10 seconds of "bullet time" will do the trick.

I wish you hadn't reminded me of that. It's a pretty depressing statistic when you think about spending several hundred dollars on a new barrel....:o.

[wbm]

I wish you hadn't reminded me of that.

Yeah. Saw that bit of trivia on accurateshooter.

[Robinhood]

You must look at that statistic as part of the aggregate. There is hundreds of hours spent reloading in order to use that barrel up. It really is a marathon and not a sprint as the time in seconds it takes to wear a barrel out might suggest.