barrel making

irishwoodsman

irishwoodsman

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Hi guys, was wondering what is the best steel to make barrels out of, is it cold roll or hot rolled or something else:biggrin: ty much mac
 
The chrome-molly steel 4140 is a common choice and 4150, although that tends to get a bit pricey. As far as it being hot rolled or cold rolled, cold rolled contains more built up stresses so it may not be the best choice for a barrel. I'll be interested to hear what Highpower has to say.

I am gearing up to build my first single shot and have been looking into barrel materials myself. What are you building?

Tom
 
I have some mauser actions that the barrels are shot, i have 1 spanish mauser which i want to make a 308 barrel and i got a yugo 8 mil i want to replace barrel back with a 8 mil, these are sporting rifles, i know alot of you guys like to keep them original but i hunt with these and i sporterize them the way i like lol i was buying my barrels from midway usa but the last one i got was wondering to much for a new barrel and that was with factory ammo the action had been nicely bedded but still wondered 3 and 4 inchs at 200 yrds and that was in a shooters vice so i got a military barrel from brownells and put back on it and i got it to 1inch groups at 280yrds:biggrin:
 
Wow! If my calculations are right that works out to .34 MOA. Better hold on to that barrel.:cool:

Tom
 
Plan on it, thats my deer rifle lol it cost me a bit more but it was a grade A barrel, but i was very happy with it, we hunt alot of fence lines and bean rows here in missouri and it has proven its worth and its great for coyotes we finally have rabbits again:biggrin:
 
I don't want to hijack this thread but I do have another question along the lines of "barrel making". I was looking through the latest shooting supplies flyer from Sportsman's Guide last night and saw some different barrel blanks. (Nice looking AK barrel btw.) That got me to thinking about how one goes about boring the barrel accurately. Heck, I have trouble drilling out 6" on my lathe without being 0.10" off by the time I reach the other end. (Yeah, let's not go there, I have some ideas why that is happening but it's not related to the topic. :eek:)

So, how do you bore something out for 28" (or whatever) accurately?

Thanks,

-Ron
 
you drill your barrel first, rough bore as they call it, then you turn your barrel down that way your bore is center of your work piece:biggrin:
 
they have extensions you use for a barrel bit that gets you close to your caliber then from what i understand you use a reamer then a chamber reamer, i am still reading up on this, plus i have a friend that is a old time gun smith that is going to watch me when i'm ready, he says the only way to learn is do it, but he will be there so i dont screw up, i have used finish reamers on short chambers barrels but never built one from blank:biggrin: mac
 
To drill a deep, straight hole, requires a special drill appropriately called a gun drill. A gun drill is a hollow, carbide tipped, single flute drill with a v-groove running the length of the shank. To use it, the barrel blank is rotated and the stationary drill fed into it. To keep the chips cleaned out, high pressure coolant is pumped through the drill and exits through the V-groove taking the chips with it. The bore is drilled a few thousandths undersize and then reamed. To cut the rifling, a carbide button is pulled through which forms the rifling and puts a super finish on the bore. Then, as Mac pointed out, the barrel is chambered so the cartridge sits at the proper depth.

Tom
 
On rifling barrels, there are generally 3 types, cut, button and hammer forged. Hammer forged are used mostly in factory guns since they can be made quite cheaply, They are not considered "top quality".Cut and button are the best qualty wise and both win matches, it comes down to personal preference. Here is a link that has a great article on the process:http://www.border-barrels.com/articles/bmart.htm
 
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