Carbon fiber wrapping a factory barrel

DH Driver

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Has anyone tried wrapping a factory barrel? I've been doing some work with carbon fiber recently and have toyed with the idea or wrapping a factory barrel to make it stiffer.

Any thoughts?
 
carbon fiber is a great insulator.... it would be a "great" way to keep your barrel hot which is what you dont want

I'm not so sure about that. I recall reading that its thermal conductivity wasn't a problem. I just did some checking and I can find ref about its ability to withstand high temp and one ref to its thermal reflectivity, but nothing about it being an insolator. In fact one showed carbon fiber tubes having a thermal conductivity similar to copper, but that was just the tube in it's raw form I think. I also don't know enough about the units, I may be out by a few dec places when comparing.

If your barrel shoots exceptionally well then it may be worth it if your goal is to have very light varmint/bull profile barrel. That also assumes the carbon fiber as applied has a thermal conductivity similar to, or better than steel.

Anyone know anything about this?
 
I can't find an exact value (google fu isn't working today) but every reference I have found said it has a high thermal conductivity. But correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't carbon fiber have to be set in epoxy? If so epoxy has terrible thermal conductivity and therefore negates the thermal transfer properties of the material that is set within it.
 
Everything I've read has said that carbon fiber barrels are much better for conducting heat, including an article from shooting times, they claim the barrel life increases substantially because of it too. In the layup of carbon fiber the ratio is 2:1 carbon cloth to epoxy by weight, so there isn't a lot of epoxy in there.
 
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