Shawn Carlock
Sponsor
GG,
Nice job. The first 4 look to be about .100-.120" ish. Nicely done.
Capt
Nice job. The first 4 look to be about .100-.120" ish. Nicely done.
Capt
My smallest 3 shot group
- Thread starter Shawn Carlock
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Guy M
Well-Known Member
Shawn - congrats - I completely understand about how great it is to have such an utterly reliable rifle, that churns out great accuracy time after time over the years.
Years ago Jim Cloward built my .308 duty rifle, truing the action, chambering and installing the 1:12 twist Krieger, it was later re-stocked with a McMillan by Rick Freudenberg.
Freudenberg's Custom Rifles - Rifles of EXTREME Accuracy
Over the years, time after time, this thing has been so remarkably consistent it's just terrific! I can count on it to remain sighted-in perfectly - that in itself is great. The superb accuracy is icing on the cake. It's my duty rifle. I've also used it for hunting. I've also shot "high master" scores with it in NRA prone competition and have done both good and bad in tactical comps with it. When I've done badly, it's been my fault for sure!
A consistently accurate rifle, reliable as a stone, is a wonderful thing to have. If any of my other rifles are giving me fits, I know I can grab the good ol' "Green Machine" and a box of 168 grain match ammo and proceed to put my shooting world right.
Regards, Guy
Years ago Jim Cloward built my .308 duty rifle, truing the action, chambering and installing the 1:12 twist Krieger, it was later re-stocked with a McMillan by Rick Freudenberg.
Freudenberg's Custom Rifles - Rifles of EXTREME Accuracy
Over the years, time after time, this thing has been so remarkably consistent it's just terrific! I can count on it to remain sighted-in perfectly - that in itself is great. The superb accuracy is icing on the cake. It's my duty rifle. I've also used it for hunting. I've also shot "high master" scores with it in NRA prone competition and have done both good and bad in tactical comps with it. When I've done badly, it's been my fault for sure!
A consistently accurate rifle, reliable as a stone, is a wonderful thing to have. If any of my other rifles are giving me fits, I know I can grab the good ol' "Green Machine" and a box of 168 grain match ammo and proceed to put my shooting world right.
Regards, Guy
MontanaRifleman
Well-Known Member
Shawn, congrats on an awesome group. What's really amazing to me is that it was fired with over 200 rounds without cleaning. If someone would have told me about it, I would have been skeptikal but seeing is believing.
It's very interesting to see how tempermental different rifles and barrels are, some shooting well with clean barrels and some dirty and some it doesn't matter.
Maybe I missed it, but what barrel do you have?
Congrats again, It feels real good to know just where your bullet is going.
Mark
It's very interesting to see how tempermental different rifles and barrels are, some shooting well with clean barrels and some dirty and some it doesn't matter.
Maybe I missed it, but what barrel do you have?
Congrats again, It feels real good to know just where your bullet is going.
Mark
Shawn Carlock
Sponsor
The barrel is a Hart Sendero taper fluted, 24" long. My daughter has taken a shine to shooting it (she is 8) with a shorter stock on it. I hope to have some footage of her shooting it in my upcoming video. My son wants to shoot his first deer with it. All very cool things.
This is a 5 shot group I shot on a good day.
Checking point of inpact with two rounds this.
And then I handed my rifle to a fella who is a much better shot than I am... would you believe this 3-shot group?? I thought he was taking the ****
Anyway I asked him to fire another 4 th shot at a new target and it was exactly on the same position... it could be or??
Rifle is my stainless howa sporter 22-250 tuned by roedale precision in Germany. PSE light weight composite stock and a-tec moderator.
A bit of varget and 52gr Nosler BTHP custom match.
Forget the 308 holes from the next target.
edi
Checking point of inpact with two rounds this.
And then I handed my rifle to a fella who is a much better shot than I am... would you believe this 3-shot group?? I thought he was taking the ****
Anyway I asked him to fire another 4 th shot at a new target and it was exactly on the same position... it could be or??Rifle is my stainless howa sporter 22-250 tuned by roedale precision in Germany. PSE light weight composite stock and a-tec moderator.
A bit of varget and 52gr Nosler BTHP custom match.
Forget the 308 holes from the next target.
edi
Marine sniper
Well-Known Member
The .308 is a terrible military sniper round, great for cops where the ranges are always less than 300 and usually less than 100, but for the military anyone who understands ballistics knows how bad it is.
The last two things I wanted to accomplish before I left the Marine Corps was to get rid of the Unertl scope and the 308 for our long range work. The 308 is great in AR-10 type rifles for urban stuff, but I am personally a fan of big 7 mm's for long range military sniping, followed very closely by the big .338's.
I don't know what kind of barrel life we could get out of it, but there is nothing that comes even close to the 7 AM with the 200 gr. ULD (as far as trajectory and wind drift) it even beats the .338 AM and flat embarrasses every thing else I compared it to, including my 300 WBY with 210 Berger's, my 30-378 with 240 SMK, and my 408 Chey Tac.
1/2 the wind drift at 1500 yards as my 300 with 210 Bergers. Just over 16 MOA at 1000, unreal.
yobuck
Well-Known Member
hell no wonder, all these good shooters are leftys
Because they're in their right mind?lightbulb
davewilson
Well-Known Member
a bug hole with 200 rounds down the tube. come to think of it, mine seems to shoot as good or better with 20-30 rounds, but i'm always cleaning it. think i'll put the cleaning rod away for a while.
JLR
Well-Known Member
I subscribed to the Carlock school of cleaning this summer and the only thing I've noticed is how much longer a bag of patches lasts Everything shoots as good as when I clean all the time if not better...in fact, I'd say my rifles shoot more consistent after about 30 rounds or so.
Everything shoots as good as when I clean all the time if not better...in fact, I'd say my rifles shoot more consistent after about 30 rounds or so.MontanaRifleman
Well-Known Member
This is a very interesting thread, as I have always been a believer in keeping a clean bore.
Shawn, If you would humor me with an answer to one more question, what is your thoughts on breaking in a barrel and did you break this one in?
Thanks, Mark
Shawn, If you would humor me with an answer to one more question, what is your thoughts on breaking in a barrel and did you break this one in?
Thanks, Mark
Not that it matters, but I've got two cutom built rifles (one of them built by Shawn) and neither one of them did I do any "barrel break-in" procedures. After combing through tons of internet forums and reading what some of the top gunsmiths and shooters had to say about it, I came to the conclusion that its a waste of time and may infact lessen the life of your barrel.
My 338 Edge that Shawn built shot a .241" (100 yards) five shot hole with the first five shots. I think I've cleaned that barrel 2 times in 600 shots and it still shoots the same to this day.
Over time, I've found no issues in my accuracy. In fact I get the best accuracy when my round count is between 100 and 300 rounds. After 300 rounds is when I start to see the accuracy taper off and that is when I clean the barrel.
I questioned George Gardner of GA Precision about barrel break-in and his exact words were "just go shoot it". He says that he puts barrel break-in instructions into the cases of every rifle he builds, just because he was getting tired of people calling him about it.
Here's a quote from Gale McMillan of McMillan Stocks, that you might find interesting:
As a barrel maker I have looked in thousands of new and used barrels with a bore scope and I will tell you that if every one followed the prescribed [one shot, one clean] break-in method, a very large number would do more harm than good. The reason you hear of the gain in accuracy is because if you chamber a barrel with a reamer that has a dull throater instead of cutting clean sharp rifling it smears a burr up on the down wind side of the rifling. It takes from one to two hundred rounds to burn this burr out and the rifle to settle down and shoot its best. Any one who chambers rifle barrels has tolerances on how dull to let the reamer get and factories let them go longer than any competent smith would.
Another tidbit to consider--take a 300 Win Mag that has a life expectancy of 1000 rounds. Use 10% of it up with your break-in procedure. For every 10 barrels the barrel-maker makes he has to make one more just to take care of the break-in. No wonder barrel-makers like to see this. Now when you flame me on this please [explain] what you think is happening to the inside of your barrel during the break in that is helping you.
Consider this: every round shot in breaking-in a barrel is one round off the life of said rifle barrel. No one has ever told me the physical reason of what happens during break-in firing. In other words what, to the number of pounds of powder shot at any given pressure, is the life of the barrel. No one has ever explained what is being accomplished by shooting and cleaning in any prescribed method. Start your barrel off with 5 rounds and clean it thoroughly and do it again. Nev Maden, a friend down under that my brother taught to make barrels was the one who came up with the [one shot one clean] break-in method. He may think he has come upon something, or he has come up with another way to sell barrels. I feel that the first shot out of a barrel is its best and every one after that deteriorates [the bore] until the barrel is gone. If some one can explain what physically takes place during break-in to modify the barrel then I may change my mind. As the physical properties of a barrel don't change because of the break-in procedures it means it's all hog wash. I am open to any suggestions that can be documented otherwise if it is just someone's opinion--forget it.
It all got started when a barrel maker that I know started putting break-in instructions in the box with each barrel he shipped a few years ago. I asked him how he figured it would help and his reply was if they shoot 100 rounds breaking in this barrel that's total life is 3000 rounds and I make 1000 barrels a year just figure how many more barrels I will get to make. He had a point; it definately will shorten the barrel life. I have been a barrel maker a fair amount of time and my barrels have set and reset benchrest world records so many times I quit keeping track (at one time they held 7 at one time) along with High Power, Silhouette, Smallbore national and world records and my instructions were to clean as often as possible preferably every 10 rounds. I inspect every barrel taken off and every new barrel before it is shipped with a bore scope and I will tell you all that I see far more barrels ruined by cleaning rods than I see worn out from normal wear and tear. I am even reading about people recommending breaking-in pistols. As if it will help their shooting ability or the guns'.
More from Gale McMillan: Barrel Break-In
My 338 Edge that Shawn built shot a .241" (100 yards) five shot hole with the first five shots. I think I've cleaned that barrel 2 times in 600 shots and it still shoots the same to this day.
Over time, I've found no issues in my accuracy. In fact I get the best accuracy when my round count is between 100 and 300 rounds. After 300 rounds is when I start to see the accuracy taper off and that is when I clean the barrel.
I questioned George Gardner of GA Precision about barrel break-in and his exact words were "just go shoot it". He says that he puts barrel break-in instructions into the cases of every rifle he builds, just because he was getting tired of people calling him about it.
Here's a quote from Gale McMillan of McMillan Stocks, that you might find interesting:
As a barrel maker I have looked in thousands of new and used barrels with a bore scope and I will tell you that if every one followed the prescribed [one shot, one clean] break-in method, a very large number would do more harm than good. The reason you hear of the gain in accuracy is because if you chamber a barrel with a reamer that has a dull throater instead of cutting clean sharp rifling it smears a burr up on the down wind side of the rifling. It takes from one to two hundred rounds to burn this burr out and the rifle to settle down and shoot its best. Any one who chambers rifle barrels has tolerances on how dull to let the reamer get and factories let them go longer than any competent smith would.
Another tidbit to consider--take a 300 Win Mag that has a life expectancy of 1000 rounds. Use 10% of it up with your break-in procedure. For every 10 barrels the barrel-maker makes he has to make one more just to take care of the break-in. No wonder barrel-makers like to see this. Now when you flame me on this please [explain] what you think is happening to the inside of your barrel during the break in that is helping you.
Consider this: every round shot in breaking-in a barrel is one round off the life of said rifle barrel. No one has ever told me the physical reason of what happens during break-in firing. In other words what, to the number of pounds of powder shot at any given pressure, is the life of the barrel. No one has ever explained what is being accomplished by shooting and cleaning in any prescribed method. Start your barrel off with 5 rounds and clean it thoroughly and do it again. Nev Maden, a friend down under that my brother taught to make barrels was the one who came up with the [one shot one clean] break-in method. He may think he has come upon something, or he has come up with another way to sell barrels. I feel that the first shot out of a barrel is its best and every one after that deteriorates [the bore] until the barrel is gone. If some one can explain what physically takes place during break-in to modify the barrel then I may change my mind. As the physical properties of a barrel don't change because of the break-in procedures it means it's all hog wash. I am open to any suggestions that can be documented otherwise if it is just someone's opinion--forget it.
It all got started when a barrel maker that I know started putting break-in instructions in the box with each barrel he shipped a few years ago. I asked him how he figured it would help and his reply was if they shoot 100 rounds breaking in this barrel that's total life is 3000 rounds and I make 1000 barrels a year just figure how many more barrels I will get to make. He had a point; it definately will shorten the barrel life. I have been a barrel maker a fair amount of time and my barrels have set and reset benchrest world records so many times I quit keeping track (at one time they held 7 at one time) along with High Power, Silhouette, Smallbore national and world records and my instructions were to clean as often as possible preferably every 10 rounds. I inspect every barrel taken off and every new barrel before it is shipped with a bore scope and I will tell you all that I see far more barrels ruined by cleaning rods than I see worn out from normal wear and tear. I am even reading about people recommending breaking-in pistols. As if it will help their shooting ability or the guns'.
More from Gale McMillan: Barrel Break-In
MontanaRifleman
Well-Known Member
I have only broke in one barrel using the one shot clean method and I did notice that after the 13th round in this particular barrel (Sako) that it almost completely stopped copper fouling. So I was wondering if that helps to keep needed cleaning at greater intervals?
Guy M
Well-Known Member
Years ago I used to clean barrels a lot, perhaps excessively.
Got into NRA long-range shooting, and found that a lot of the top competitors wouldn't clean their rifle during an entire weekend of shooting, 120+ rounds. They were still shooting mostly 10's and X's on their last string of fire. One explained to me that such performance was what I was paying for when I sprang for a Krieger barrel... Hmmm.
Put my thinking cap on. Put my cleaning rod away. Shot better. I'll be darned.
Got into NRA long-range shooting, and found that a lot of the top competitors wouldn't clean their rifle during an entire weekend of shooting, 120+ rounds. They were still shooting mostly 10's and X's on their last string of fire. One explained to me that such performance was what I was paying for when I sprang for a Krieger barrel... Hmmm.
Put my thinking cap on. Put my cleaning rod away. Shot better. I'll be darned.
