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Another barrel life/replacement question

Ryguy

Sergeant
Full Member
Minuteman
Feb 1, 2013
143
6
Las Vegas
I am shooting about 50-75 338 Lapua rounds every week and at 1500 rounds that comes out to about 7 months of shooting. People that place well in competitions have to shoot more than 75 per week. Figure, they have to shoot 200 or so a week maybe more. Those of you that really do well in competitions, you must be getting a new barrel every other month. My next barrel will be due in September if I keep this pace. Pac Nor took 20 weeks to get the barrel I have now. Is it common practice to get three or four barrels at a time?
 
Not all matched are equal, look at PRS matches vs the intimidator at TVP. Being out west he might have a LR match.
 
Where i come from, we can normally extend the barrel-life a bit. By cutting off about 20 mm of the muzzle, and of course re-crown.
 
Never heard of a muzzle getting shot out. Banged up, yes, but not worn out from shooting. The throat is the first part to go, and lopping a few inches off the breech end and re-chambering can breathe new life into a barrel.
 
You don't have to practice with your 338 lapua to shoot it well. I dry fire A LOT in the winter, and it helps. I also shoot a 22lr trainer and it helps. It's more about trigger time than anything.

But yes, people that shoot that many rounds will buy that many barrels. I have a spare barrel for my match guns sitting in the safe, and I will order replacements to have on hand when I swap them out. Always better to have a backup ready than get in a bind and have to wait months to get one.
 
50-75 338s a week is pretty spicy. If you can build a practice rig that has similar wind calls you can save your 338 and maybe shoot it once a month rather than every week. Not to mention finding projectiles for 338 these days is a huge PIA (at lest for me it has been).

I buy more than one barrel at a time and have them threaded and chambered at the same time. when the first one dies I put the second one on with my barrel vise and action wrench. When I get to roughly 1/2 the life of the second barrel I order two more barrels. Its a never ending cycle. The nice thing about the Nevada desert you can store tubes and forget them ... they will not corrode like a tube would in Houston, TX.

Jeffvn