Barnaul 308 ammo ?

fishslinger

fishslinger

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I was thinking I buying these Barnaul Russian made ammo for target shooting out of my 308 bolt action rifle, it says on the box that they can be shot out of hunting rifles. There copper washed steel jacketed lead core bullets in a lacquer steel case, non corrosive. Should I have any concerns with this stuff damaging my rifle. Can the Steel jacketed copper washed bullet damage the rifling in my barrel ?
 
If you shoot a loooot of them, they can wear your barrel down a bit faster than normal. I use them in my Savage every so often when accuracy isn't too important.
 
A good rifle will not wear down, It takes 10,000 rounds to shoot out a cheap AR barrel. A good barrel double that. I shoot the MFS all the time which is made in the same factory as Barnaul. Shoot, clean enjoy.

Consider you save about $10.00 a box and the amount of boxes it will take to shoot out a barrel. The money you saved you can use to by a new barrel. I have seen them as low as $100 on the EE.
 
Fire away but keep in mind it's not match ammo, I have shot a fair bit of it in my savage with decent results, primers can be a bit hard I found with a few FTF on the first drop.
 
It depends on what you would call a "worn out barrel".
AR barrels are usually hammer forged and chrome lined so are more durable.
Regular hunting rifle barrels are middle of the road.
Match barrels can be useless for match accuracy after only a couple thousand rounds; no where near 10k.

I expect a decent bolt action rifle to be able to shoot 1 MoA with handloads tailored to it and at least 2 MoA with decent quality off the shelf ammo. Worse than that and I'd say the rifle isn't too accurate, possibly due to a worn barrel. Others judge a rifles accuracy based on different criteria. Often the 10" paper plate at 100yds test is what many consider the benchmark of if a rifle is "accurate" or not.

I would never shoot bimetal jacketed ammo through a premium match barrel but have shot them through various hunting rifles without issue. I wouldn't hesitate too much to shoot it through a regular hunting rifle.

One thing to consider is that Russian ammo often has harder military style primers. I once got a box of 308 for free from a guy at the range because he said they where all duds. I believe it was Barnaul but I don't remember; might have been Tula. Anyway he had a Browning and none of the rounds would go off. He was throwing them out when I asked if I could give them a try. They all fired first time in a Norc M305 and I have shot them in my Rem 700 as well without failure. From my reading the brands known for weaker firing pin springs that sometimes can't handle harder military style primers are Browning and Savage.
 
I also have a hard time getting the Barnaul to fire consistently in my Socom 18 (M305). I had three FTF in 80 rounds. No other problems with hundreds of rounds of Norinco.
 
fishslinger said:
I was thinking I buying these Barnaul Russian made ammo for target shooting out of my 308 bolt action rifle, it says on the box that they can be shot out of hunting rifles. There copper washed steel jacketed lead core bullets in a lacquer steel case, non corrosive. Should I have any concerns with this stuff damaging my rifle. Can the Steel jacketed copper washed bullet damage the rifling in my barrel ?
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The bullet itself has no steel content. The case itself is the only thing that is made of steel. The bullet is a non expanding fmj with a lead core. U will not damage anything shooting a NATO round out of a civilian 308 rifle. If the bullet contained a steel core it would be considered armor piercing and would be illegal to sell, own or use in Canada. Carefully re read what the description says on the box of Barnaul ammo.
 
eaglesnester said:
The bullet itself has no steel content. The case itself is the only thing that is made of steel. The bullet is a non expanding fmj with a lead core. U will not damage anything shooting a NATO round out of a civilian 308 rifle. If the bullet contained a steel core it would be considered armor piercing and would be illegal to sell, own or use in Canada. Carefully re read what the description says on the box of Barnaul ammo.
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You're wrong on pretty much all points.

The bullets in Barnaul are usually bimetal but without a steel core. That means a mild steel jacket with copper coating the outside and a lead core.
You will sometimes find some with true copper-only jackets. Same goes for Tulammo; it's whatever they had at the time to use.
Steel core and steel jacketed ammo is not necessarily armour piercing and tonnes of it is sold in Canada every year. It is not illegal in any way.
A mild steel core is for cost savings, not armour piercing. You will find it on a lot of Soviet surplus and even US made 5.56NATO 62gr green tip ammo. It is not classified as armour piercing.
A mild steel jacket is also for cost savings, not armour piercing. Copper is several times the cost of steel at current market values. Lead is also more expensive than steel.
A steel tip can cause a bullet to tumble when it hits a target causing more damage. So when expanding bullets where banned in war many looked for ways to increase damage without expanding.
Armour piercing ammo needs to have a core or tip made from hardened steel, tungsten carbide, or another steel-cutting material.
Armour piercing rifle ammo is not illegal in Canada. Only armour piercing pistol ammo is.
 
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The steel used in bullet jackets is far softer than barrel steel. It's not going to do anything to your rifle any other jacketed bullet won't.
Whoever told you AP ammo is illegal to own, use or sell is confused. The civil servants at NRCan have decided not to allow its importation but there 's no law that says that. And 'U' is not a word.
There, their, they're. Three different words with three different meanings.
 
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