Performance Difference between reg and Shory M-14?

YOU AND YOUR STUPID QUESTIONS GET OFF MY INTERNET!!!!!!


18" is the sweet spot for 308. 18 vs 24" youll love some velocity not tons. Not necessarily accuracy just a bit of velocity.

Me likey the 18
 
You will lose significant velocity. You will go from perhaps just under 2700 fps for a regular 150 grain ball load to 2400ish fps. That are the results from my chronygraphing. The mileage may vary in your rifle. Accuracy? Well, that is rifle dependant as far as I have found. My last 18" m14 just couldn't shoot decent, but I have not had a regular length rifle not shoot well. Your mileage may vary. I just picked up a shorty and have high hopes for it.
 
Watching this thread with interest. I have seen so many shorties on the EE that it might be better to stay long to avoid the Fad. The I want to be different like everyone else. I will not slam anyone that has done the mod I would enjoy hearing the experiences during the build and the results. I also have a crony and live in Ed if someone wants to get together to do a side by side comparison of bullet velocity and accuracy. I also have a Norc M14, only mod is a USGI fibreglass stock (worth it for the reduced weight IMHO). I also roll my own ammo so an ammo comparison would be kew too, my m14 loves my reloads. I tend to load a middle of the road range, faster and slower I have had mixed results.
 
Chronographing both 21 inch and 18.5 inch barreled Norcs, I found a velocity loss of just over 100 fps with the shorty. My handload is a 168 gr Nosler match bullet with 40.0 gr Higginsons WC-735 propellant. It averages 2500 fps in the standard barrel, and just under 2400 in the 18.5 inch gun.

More difference than I was expecting, but the critter you shoot won't notice.
 
thats prolly why DMRs always have the long barrels, right? has to be worth it for them. For me- definitely not.

That and the dudes that carry those arent afraid of pushups
 
If you are using a scope, MOA may actually improve from a stiffer barrel, all other things being equal, so in other words chopping the same rifle back to 18.5 from 22. Otherwise,... every different rifle has it's own inherent accuracy abilities. If you are using the aperture sights these rifles were designed to fire over,..... the slight MOA accuracy gain from the shorter barrel may be lost and then some ,...from the shorter overall sight distance between front and rear sights. The longer the mesurement between your front and rear sights. the more accurately you can group. For extreme comparison, imagine a 2" barreled .38 revolver with a distance between the two sights of say 5", and a target rifle with a 28" barrel and a distance of say 34" between sights. You can see a sight error of .5 degrees means a much larger error on the target with the revolver.

As to velocity drop, my standard Nork M-14S chronographs 2804fps average @ 15 feet from muzzle using the Norinco 762X51 ammo. Considering the velocity requirement for 762NATO ball ammo measured at 25 meters, I'd say the Nork ball is bang on NATO velocity spec. I've never tried an 18.5" barrel with same loads. If I were to cut my barrel back to the shorty length, keeping all variables equal thus, I would expect a 40-45 fps drop, so that would mean a velocity @ 15feet from muzzle at between 2664 and 2646fps. Due to variances in chamber and barrel internal dimensions using the same loadings, they could stack in a shorties favour and make it chrony very close to a 22" barrel, or stack against it, and cause a 200 fps drop or more as noted by saskcop.

A chronograph is the authority, even if it if off a percent or two, it still gives relative data in real world side by side comparisons of shortened barrels.
 
Good points. I am wanting to get out and chrony some loads through both my shorty and my standard m14 when the weather gets better to obtain some actual data to share using the Norinco 7.62 I just bought. Of course no two rifles are the same so everyone's mileage may differ. The last time I chronied with these guns, they were different m14's so my own personal data may differ.
 
I just got my 22" M305 from Lever and still haven't had the time to shoot it. However, I have gotten these velocities from my Norinco Shorty from Canam (all loads with Hornady 168 gr HPBT):

- 41.5 gr of Hodgdon 4895 = 2,582 fps (SD 18.84 fps)

- 41.5 gr of Alliant AR-Comp = 2,612 fps (SD 4.0 fps)

- 42.5 gr of RL-15 = 2,473 fps (SD 5.83 fps)

- 42.5 gr RL-15 = 2,504 fps (SD 20.27 fps)

I haven't had the time to shoot them for accuracy, yet. However, I am putting my money on the AR-Comp load, for now. We'll see what type of results I get from the full length barrel and then I'll decide on which load to keep. :)
 
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