Who Needs a 26" Barrel?

[Rick in Oregon]

I'm not a fan of long barrels on rifles. It seems that to me at least, 24" seems about right for a varmint or hunting rifle. Much to my surprise, when my new Cooper M21 Montana Varminter arrived, it sported a 26" barrel, contrary to Cooper's website and catalog.

I shot "Wicked Wanda", my Cooper MTV this season on Oregon ground squirrels with her 26" tube. I really could not "feel" any distinct advantage in regard to any added velocity the 26 incher may have offered over my other three 204's with 24" barrels.......so off to Cooper to get her tube chopped and recrowned to 24". Excellent customer service, two week turnaround and the work done at no charge.

Anyway yesterday I decided to do a range day and experiment with H4895 and the heavy .204" bullets, the 40gr BT, 39gr SBK, and the 40gr V-Max in addition to testing to see just how much velocity I lost going with a 24" barrel from the 26" length. Guess what? I actually GAINED velocity with the 2" shorter barrel with the 32gr bullets! (Had never shot heavy bullets through this one, so dunno about any loss or gain here.) The velocity with a 26" barrel with the 32gr SBK: 4,035 fps......same load w/24" barrel: 4,068 fps (average of 10 shots).

Yes, I was surprised to say the least. Now this rifle handles much better, is just as accurate, and gives better velocity with the same 32gr load. This was my informal range setup yesterday "out back".



"Wicked Wanda" cooling off:



Cooper Porn: Flip side:



Re-Zero'ing target after re-mounting the scope using my usual load of RL-10X and the 32gr SBK as a baseline.



The heavy bullet testing revealed that in this rifle at least, the 39gr Sierra BK is the overall aggragate winner with ten shots almost in the same hole. The wind was very tricky, and if I had hauled my lazy hiney out of bed earlier that morning, I would not have to had to deal with the switchy wind that prevailed yesterday here.



With a Skippy-wackin' speed of 3,780 fps, I think I only need to tweak the seating depth a tad to get even better performance. Do note that this Sierra 39gr BK load is .4gr over book max, so work up properly if you want to duplicate.

When field conditions change, it's nice to have two bullet weights that print to the same POI. Even nicer to have a rifle that handles like a rifle should....24" barrels for me!

[Ray P]

Nice post and finding. Some fine looking rifles tooo!!!!!!!
Yep my powder of choice back here on the east cost 27.0/ H-4895.
Sorry I haven't tried any reloader 10X to compare it. You guys have having good luck with that powder R-10X.
Thanks for doing some leg work on 24" vs 26" barrels>
Later Rick and glade to see you out an about.
Ray P.

[Sagebrush Burns]

All barrels are different and each one is a rule unto itself. Conventional wisdom says that shorter barrels will develop less velocity than longer ones. Probably the only way to verify this is by sawing off a barrel and retesting. The variation between individual barrels is often greater than the variation caused by barrel length. As an example, I have a pair of 270s, one with a 24" barrel, one with a 22". The shorter barrel is consistently faster with the same ammo. Go figure. The only absolute conclusion you can draw is that the one barrel is faster than the other.

[Neil S.]

Glad to hear of your success Rick! A tackdriver that looks great too! I might have to try H4895 when I'm out'a school for winter break, although I'm pretty happy with RL-10x. Accuracy>speed for me, but when you can have both....

-Neil

[Rick in Oregon]

Ray: Thanks....yep, we have a bit of hassle finding RL10X here too. It seems to come in waves, and when a lot is gone from the shelves, it takes a while to see it reappear again. Besides you, I also see Silverfox makes good use of H4895 too in his PD quest. It seems to be a good choice for the 40's in any event.

All barrels are different and each one is a rule unto itself.

Sagebrush: True, I was well aware of that fact beforehand, and this case clearly demonstrates this rule. I was not trying to prove anything at all, I just don't care for long barrels on my rifles and wanted this one cut to my favorite barrel length. The fact that the barrel is "faster" after shortening is just icing on the proverbial cake. I fully realize that this case does not adhere to the usual dogma about longer barrels 'always' yielding higher velocity.

Glad to hear of your success Rick! A tackdriver that looks great too! I might have to try H4895 when I'm out'a school for winter break, although I'm pretty happy with RL-10x. Accuracy>speed for me, but when you can have both.... -Neil

Neil: Thanks, bud. Yep, RL10X is normally my go-to powder for the 204 also. But as H4895 is one of the slowest suitable powders for the 204 case, I wanted to see what it would do with the 40's in this 12 twist barrel. As I've got an 11 twist rifle dedicated for the 40's, this Cooper may not see too many of them down the barrel, but at least I know I've got at least one load using the 39gr SBK that it seems to like. Truth be known, this rifle will almost surely be a "32 grain bullet rifle" for it's foreseeable future. By the way, the Nosler 40's were dismal in this rifle, and the 40gr V-Max was not much better.

Good luck this winter should you decide to do some experimenting yourself.

[Clint E]

Rick thats some nice shooting .Looks like you got it figured out
I still like the looks of the wood on that cooper .
Thanks

[Glen]

RIO-- On one of my old computers I used to have a story about this fella,, I think down in Texas,, that kept cutting barrels down until he achieved maximum velocity. He used to shoot at night in a warehouse after everybody had left for the day. For the life of me I cannot remember his name or too many of the particulars but I THINK he settled on the 24" barrel as his length of choice for top velocity. I'm just wondering if you or anybody else had ever seen or read that story.

[Glen]

My apologies. The optimum barrel length for accuracy was 21 3/4". Here is the story I mentioned. I'm sure some of you will know some of these names. Excellent read for sure IMHO.

http://www.angelfire.com/ma3/max357/houston.html

[Clint E]

Glen that was worth the time to read very interesting.thanks for posting that

[Glen]

You're Welcome Clint. I've enjoyed that article a couple times over the years myself.

[Rick in Oregon]

Glen: I susbcribe to Precision Shooting and saw that article when it was published a while back.....still very interesting and thanks for posting the link; it's a very good read.

I bet we all would like to have our own abandoned warehouse for load testing, at least I know I would! Imagine a day at the bench testing loads without the dang wind?

Back before a certain bullet maker here got "corporate large", one of my best friends was their chief engineer, and I was able to use their underground tunnel in the ballistics lab occasionaly to test my loads. Those were good times indeed, and the zero effects of wind was a sincere blessing for load testing. But that was then, and this is now. My "range" now is what you see in the pic above......BLM land in the open desert......with wind always present. (dangit!)

Clint: Thanks bud, but I'm not sure if I've got anything figured out; occasionally even a blind hog finds an acorn.

[Glen]

That would be a dream set up Rick. I don't have anything that nice but I do have a 100yd range my Brother dozed into a valley. We're about 80' below the top & luckily the range runs into the prevailing winds most of the time. We can see the leaves flutter up high but nothing hardly moves down where we're shooting. But like you said,, our best shooting ranges are the ones littered in blood & guts.

[Rick in Oregon]

But like you said,, our best shooting ranges are the ones littered in blood & guts.

Ha! Right you are! That reminds me of all the times I've been out in the varmint patch checking zero or confirming a new load on paper, and looking through my scope I see Skippy sitting in the target vicinity looking about. The word "Temptation" is understated in this situation. Shoot the target as intended and keep the group going, or launch the rat for personal satisfaction......decisions, decisions.......

Case in point: Shoot the target, or engage rocky coming out of his den at 125 yards? Guess what I did?



Sounds like you've got a right-nice range setup yourselves there....nice.

[Guy M]

Dang Rick - you've got a couple of beautiful varmint rifles there - and I was a little surprised at your 24" vs 26" chronograph results.

Cool.

[Glen]

Guess what I did?