How long should you let your barrel cool?

Camaro2010

Camaro2010

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I am rather new to shooting long range and I have just jumped into the deep end (from an AR-15 to a .338 LM), and I am looking for some insight on how long to let the barrel cool to get accurate groupings? As of this point I have only got the rifle to hit paper at 100M with a few quick hand loads and I have a several loads ready to test and I want to get the best results out of each load.

Thanks,
Justin
 
grunt19 said:
What are the Specs of the Rifle barrel length, contour, ect
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The barrel length is 24" with a 2" break, IMO it’s a heavy contour barrel (aprox .900"), and it’s free floated. Also worth noting is the loads I plan to test are from the base load to the max load.

Jusitn
 
Congrats on jumping off the deep end ;-) Are you making your own .338LM ammo?

BTW if you are looking for places in NB to shoot your rifles at long range, PM me and I can make a few suggestions.

There are different reasons to wait for a barrel to cool.

- in a factory rifle, especially one in which the barrel is not free-floated, it can happen that the point of impact shifts as the barrel heats up

- sustained rapid fire can cut into barrel life

- in dead-calm conditions, you can get something called "barrel mirage", in which warm air rising from your barrel can severely muddy up your sight picture.

In target rifle shooting, oftentimes shooters will fire as rapidly as match conditions allow, in order to "beat" changing wind conditions. In US and Australian target rifle shooting a skilled shooter can fire 15 shots in 5 minutes. Also, in Service Rifle shooting shots can be fired even more rapidly than that - in US "across the course" shooting it is 10 shots in 60 seconds, in Canadian Service Rifle shooting it is 10 shots in 30 seconds or so.

In summertime, firing 12 shots from a .308 target rifle in 15-20 minutes will make a stainless barrel almost painfully hot (but this is a routine pace). Higher capacity cases (.22-250, .243 Win, .338 Lapua) will get even hotter than a .308.
 
With your contour of barrel, a shot every 2-3 minutes should be ok. If the barrel feels like your Tim Horton's cup, let it cool down. You will find that depending on the breeze, barrel temp will vary alot. Last time I had mine out, there was a pretty steady cross wind and with a slow pace, the barrel never got hot just warm.
 
Thanks for all the help, just got back from the range and had rather good results. However I did wait a bit longer than suggested, just to be sure to achieve the utmost accuacry.
 
When I am working up a load I tend to bring more rifles. That way I can let it cool before I try the next increment. A .22 is a nice option for plinking while you are waiting, gives you an opportunity to work on form.
 
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