What base bullet do you think will burn out a bore quicker?

I notice no one has mentioned the most famous barrel burner of all time, the 264 win mag. If someone has one that they are selling for a firesale price, and it is not burnt out yet, I would be happy to store it in my gun safe.
 
22to45 said:
I notice no one has mentioned the most famous barrel burner of all time, the 264 win mag. If someone has one that they are selling for a firesale price, and it is not burnt out yet, I would be happy to store it in my gun safe.
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It just got a bad rap, no worse than a .220 Swift. Powders back then weren't what they are now.
 
"But as you already know, it takes a fair bit of shooting to destroy a good barrel if it is properly cared for. "

I guess it depends on each person's definition of "fair bit".

I get upset if a barrel does not last one season. Over the winter the rifles in use get borescoped so I can plan what to shoot next season, what needs replacing, and what is marginal so I don't go off to an important event with a barrel on its last legs.

I never experienced less than a season od use until I started shooting 22-250 Ackley, loaded with Win760 and the Sierra 80. About 1200 shots, maximum. Since I sometimes shoot 200 rounds in a day, the barrels were lasting as long as gumdrops.

On the other hand, in 1915 my grandfather homesteaded in northern B.C. He brought with him a Winchester M94 rifle in 30-30. That rifle kept the young family in meat (2 moose a year) until 1965. The rifle still has an excellent barrel. It lasted a life time.

I find 308 barrels last about 2500 rounds (blue)and about 5,000 (stainless). These are target barrels used in competition. They group under an inch. When the group opens to an inch or more, they are no good. Since the wear is all throat erosion in the first 2 inches, we cut the chamber off, set the barrel back and use it for another season. The set back barrel is as good as new, except for the shorter sight radius and the loss of 50 fps.

The other calibers I use (6.5-08 Ackley and 6.5-284) both have less life than a 308. They are loaded with 50+ grains of power.
 
Even 1200 rounds is "quite a bit of shooting" for the average joe. That is 60 boxes of factory ammo. Most casual shooters/hunters would not fire that in three lifetimes. Dedicated shooters/competitors are in a different classification, and as you said, 200 rounds in a day can add up round counts fairly quickly. I used to shoot Rifleman's Rodeo, which could easily eat up 300 or more rounds on a weekend, so that is where the 6mm barrels went. Like yourself, I prefer not to rebarrel half way through a shooting season. FWIW, I had a C-M Swift barrel that finally started to lose it's edge at just over 2600 rounds. I thought that was very good barrel life. Regards, Eagleye
 
I know that the 264 win mag just had a bad rap

And I also know that if I had one it would not see much more than a couple of boxes a year. I have rifles with much smaller cases that burn much less powder that are just as much fun to shoot. But with the variety of .264 bullets you can get now, and with the outstanding ballistics you can achieve with it, I am sure one would be welcome if it fell into my gunsafe.


Allen
 
OK a few questions and thanks for responding. Now if a certain cartridge has a max operating pressure determined by saami then say a like a 308 win with a 125 gr bullet is being pushed at the same max psi that a 180 gr bullet is. The pressure would be identical and the powder charges and velocity would be different to accommodate the different bullet weights operating at the same max pressure no? Then if one type of bullet wears out a barrel quicker can it be entirely blamed on pressure and temp alone? Does the formula P1*V1 over T1=P2*V2 over T2 apply? If so the pressure and temp would be the same with either bullet. One other bit of info I've stumbled upon is the premature pitting of SS barrels near the muzzle. Fred Barker PS contributer and I believe the title is "Ballistic Metallurgist" stated that SS barrels with overly large grains of MnS were pitting near the muzzle after as little as 100 rounds. He stated that it was almost certainly due to the decomposition of MnS grains. Its location only at and near the muzzle? The only reasonable explanation was the frictional heating of the bullet causing MnS decomposition. The outermost "skin" temperature of a bullet jacket was cited at 1400 deg F in a 7.62 bore after firing.. He went on to say and I plagiarize "Thus as a very hot bullet jacket passes over a sulfide grain and heats a very thin layer of of that grain above it's decomp temp those atoms are swept off causing a pit to grow. Furthermore, bullets having long bore-diameter shanks, like the 140 grain used in the 6.5 mm's will have their jackets in contact with any point in the bore longer than a short shank bullet. So this jacket heating and pit-growth will be at a maximum with long shank bullets and long barrels. Ok and last question I promise. If you were captured by a tribe of hungry cannibals and the only way they'd let you go was if you could push a copper jacked bullet through a barrel by hand using only a wooden dowel, and you had a choice of a long shank or a short shank bullet which would you choose? So anyway I agree with you that copper jacks aren't the main cause of barrel erosion but I don't think they can be ignored entirely either. And I don't want you to think I just dreamed some crap up to sound important. Splitting hairs and nit-picking isn't my objective either, just find all things bang bang interesting, maybe you do too. Most of my limited background comes from the written and spoken word. I've only had the internet since December but I'd like to dig around and find the references for the steel jacket bullets and the barrel wear (is it that outrageous?). I think it was a Military treatise. I also recall an article discussing the same thing with dangerous game solids. But if this is a dead horse or just plain old boring I wont bother.
 
sbtennex said:
Fact? Says who? Heck of a difference in the malleability and hardness of a bullet jacket and that of a modern rifle bore, and where in the hunting world would it make any difference anyway? The "overbore" term, big powder capacity for diameter cases leads to throat wear long before a barrel will be affected. But back to the original question, Eagleye put it right - there's little evidence to support bullet style making any appreciable difference in bore wear.
Click to expand...

Go to Lilja barrels, articles, 50 cal, materials for bullets.
 
sbtennex said:
Fact? Says who? Heck of a difference in the malleability and hardness of a bullet jacket and that of a modern rifle bore, and where in the hunting world would it make any difference anyway? The "overbore" term, big powder capacity for diameter cases leads to throat wear long before a barrel will be affected. But back to the original question, Eagleye put it right - there's little evidence to support bullet style making any appreciable difference in bore wear.
Click to expand...

Go to Lilja barrels, articles, 50 cal subjects, materials for bullets.
 
Those steel projectiles are pretty well exclusively used in the Big 50, possibly in a very small percentage of smaller arms. Additionally it is a Lead alloy steel, with a max of .015% carbon, which is slightly below mild steel.[.16 - .29% carbon] The added lead makes it "slippery" and other materials help it's malleability. I suspect this is similar to the Norma Jacketed Soft points I made mention of earlier. It may be slightly harder on barrels than are copper alloys, but I think it would likely be inconsequential. The caution about using them in C-M barrels may have some virtue, since 416 Stainless can "gall" when exposed to high friction that involves some other ferrous alloys. Regards, Eagleye.
 
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