Barrel Erosion

[Lenard]

I have in particular, two different guns that don't shoot in the .2 or .3's. One is a Sako with a douglas barrel. Went to the smith today and he scoped the barrel for me. I have had this gun for over 20 years and never fired anything but 4198 powder, 21.5 grains and 52 gr. Speer bullets. I need to add, I was the second owner. Apparently the original owner shot some mighty hot loads in the gun and got it very hot.

The scope showed what looked like cracks across the lands up to near 4" ahead of the neck. The strange part of all this is that I have shot less than 800 rounds thru the gun and able to get .250 sized groups until the last 100 or so rounds. One other note, the scope showed that there were minor pits in the barrel in the forward half. I haven't always cleaned and oiled after each outing, but kept them out of the rain/adverse conditions. My bad as I will always run a rag thru the gun with oil added, from now on. I am leaning toward condensation as the culprit for the pits.

By the way, the other gun, a mini mauser, had a very rough barrel and also had pits, though small. There were lots of tool marks, just a bad barrel to begin with. It would still shoot under an inch. Both were 223's.

[Captqc]

Ouch Sounds like time for new barrels. Good luck. Gary

[Lenard]

Gary, I just bought two PacNor barrels this morning. Since I have been shooting these guns for 20 years, they owe me nothing. And I like both of them. The mini will be a 223 and the Sako will end up being a 204 w/1-10 twist.

LL

[Captqc]

I hear nothing but good things about PacNor so it sounds like you will be in good shape for another 20 years! When you get them put back together why don't you share some pics. Gary