Advanced Marksmanship F-Class with dirty barrel???

D

DoubleGobble00

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Jun 29, 2009
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Brandon, MS
#1
I am shooting a 6br using RE15 in a kreiger 30 inch barrel. My first F-Class match I started with a clean barrel. During the first 5 shots I had to adjust my elevation about 1 MOA lower. As the day progressed, I continued to dial my scope lower as I needed less MOA to reach the 600 yard target. After the match, I left my scope along.

I shot the next match this weekend and started with a clean barrel. My first shot was about 1.5-2 MOA low and about 2 MOA right. The windage MOA can be explained from dialing into the wind last time.. the elevation I assume is because the barrel is clean and the velocity is lower. I then adjusted the elevation about 2 MOA. After 5 shots I had to dial the elevation down 1/2 MOA and continued to dial the elevation down during the day. This caused me to drop several points during the first 10 shots.. The last 10 shots I only dropped 1 point.

Next match I want to avoid this... Should I leave my barrel dirty till next match (got about 100 round through it)... Or should I clean it and shoot about 20 rounds somewhere before the match to dirty it up? What do you do with your F-Class guns? Will it hurt the barrel to leave it dirty?

Thanks for the help.. I want to get the vertical adjustments out of the equation so I can concentrate on the windage.

DoubleG
 
#2
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

You sure this isn't more of a barrel heat issue from firings and environmental conditions, rather than a clean bore?
 
#3
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

Some could be due to barrel heat and the increase in temperature. It was about 45 degrees when we started and about 70 degrees when we ended the match. I figure that is some of the factors but the barrel fouling has to be a part of it.

The barrel is 1.25 straight cylinder and the 6mmbr is running around 2900-2950 fps. So it is not a speed demon. The barrel does get warm to the touch after 25 straight rounds but not hot.

DoubleG
 
#4
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

There are some interesting threads around here about cleaning. To summarize, many guys don't until accuracy falls off. Having experienced something similar to what you describe, I'm now one of those guys. I don't know yet how many rounds it will be until accuracy drops on my rifle, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's many hundreds. Search around and you'll find some interesting data.
 
#5
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

When I was a kid and shooting the national match course, the AMU taught us to never leave a round in a hot gun because it will impact higher.

So, when shooting prone at the 600yd line slow fire, I'd always dope the wind between shots, let everything get just right then chamber the round and try to get it off in like 8 seconds or less.
 
#6
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

there is a thread on "to clean or not to clean".

I have several rifles that I shoot when in the mood, those are cleaned and butches gun oil in the barrel while they are waiting in my safe. when I put my first round through them it is usually 1 1/2" low for the first round (and is pretty consistant at that). my duty rifle and another that I shoot regularly are kept "dirty" and they are more consistant with first shot and warmer barrel shots. I would try maybe putting 10 or so rds through it then put it away. (I always dry mop the chamber though)
 
#7
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

Thanks for the info. I appreciate it. The more I think about it I believe I need about 8-10 rounds to get the barrel dirty. The rest of the increase in MOA is not very much. I would say I probably dialed 1/8 MOA about 3 times as the temperature warmed up.

Thanks for the tip jwoolf.... I need to remember that. I am bad about shot, reload, look at score, wait on wind, then shoot. I need to at least wait until I see my score before I reload in order to keep things consistent.

Let me ask this... If you do leave the barrel dirty.. Will the powder residue eat away the metal in your barrel? Can it do any hurt to the barrel?

DoubleG
 
#9
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: DoubleGobble00</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Let me ask this... If you do leave the barrel dirty.. Will the powder residue eat away the metal in your barrel? Can it do any hurt to the barrel?

DoubleG </div></div>

Nope. I have some guns that only get cleaned every 5 years or so. The barrels always look fine when I finally do clean them.
 
#10
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Sterling Shooter</div><div class="ubbcode-body">The day before a tournament, starting with a clean bore, I'll zero for LR expending about 12 rounds. On match day I'll shoot another 8 sighter shots before committing to record fire. </div></div>

I would do like Charles says and let us know if things turn out different for you, I myself clean every 500 or so, maybe longer.
 
#12
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

What Charles said! I found an Obermyer I was using for F-class to act just like yours. It shot perfect for the day/match and during the multi-day nationals I'd clean at night and run 6 to 7(or more) sighters the next day before going for record. Also found that powder fouling was more important to remove than getting ALL the copper out. I believe you'll find many barrels perform perfect with copper fouling.... up to a point.

JMHO
 
#13
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

It has already been said, but I'll put 5-10 rounds on the gun before a match. At the Nationals in Sacramento, I went with 32 rounds on the gun and my first sighter was an "X" and held level elevation from there. I was scoring for a guy that won FTR day 3 at 1000 yards and he had over 600 rounds on the barrel without cleaning. I'm not quite there yet, but I don't really hesitate to put 200 rounds on the barrel without cleaning. A factory barrel may be different if it picks up copper more readily than my hand lapped barrel. Keep a log book and see how many rounds it takes for accuracy to drop off and then you will know for sure about your barrel.
 
#14
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

Time was, when we went to the Carlos, no sighters were allowed. You fire 20rd for score and that's the whole ball game.

I would clean the night before, then on the way to the Carlos, I'd sight in at my local range, and continue on to the Carlos. Having a properly fouled bore and a valid, current zero were the name of the game.

Altitudes and temps made some difference; and not being able to see bullet holes, and not being allowed to have anyone spot for you made all the preparations doubly critical.

Yeah, that's right; you could see the target, but as for the rest of it, you flew blind and trusted your zero. Period. The whole idea was to treat the event as much like a sniper mission as you could do using a paper target at a known distance.

Nowadays they've dropped some of it, kept some of the rest, and it's a whole different ball game.

I gotta say, some of it seems to come across nowadays as a tad inconsitent and illogical, but then, who am I to criticise?

I mean, I only helped invent the danged thing...

So...; how does any of this equate to your question?

Like we did at the Carlos; we got to do it once a year, and it took a couple of years to get it right. You get to do it more often. My advice; don't take advice. See for yourself. Try it the different ways, and then you'll know.

Back a few, when I was still shooting 1Kyd F Class, I'd basically use the one rifle all teh time, and for nothing else. The sights never got touched, and the sighters period was for warming and fouling. I cleaned after each match.

Simply put, conjecture is a piss poor substitute for experience.

Greg
 
#17
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

DoubleG [/quote]

Nope. I have some guns that only get cleaned every 5 years or so. The barrels always look fine when I finally do clean them. [/quote]

Where does he live? Near the sea? Humid enviroment? You cannot simply state he won't have issues without knowing all the factors involved.



Clean it, take it out and shoot it until the accuracy drops off. You will then know how it acts and what you should do. Don't you practise?
 
#18
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

David,

I offered a couple times @ Sacramento to 'race' the F/Open shooters when they were cleaning... mainly because I was already done before they'd got started
wink.gif


Generally its not a problem for F/TR (talkin' .308 here, not sure about .223) to go an entire long weekend match (200-300+)rounds. I didn't clean the entire time we were @ Bisley last summer... things were still working fine by the end of our stop in Ireland (and a little over 500rds down the tube). After that the whole gun needed a tear-down to get the rust out more than anything. I did have to soak the barrel a good long time to get it clean
wink.gif


Monte
 
#19
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

I'm with the SHOOT IT DIRTY crowd.

I carried a Remingtion 700 Varment, in 223 in LE. No way in heck would I put it in my car clean. Its not as critical as some of my guns but you can still tell the differance.

You dont get sighters in police work.

Having said that, I got no problem keeping a coat of Rig on the outside of the gun. And I'm not beyond putting a coat of furniture polish on the (wood) stock. The gun is about 30 years old and looks new.
 
#21
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

Every gun has a personality. When I shot moly coated bullets in the benchrest gun, a through cleaning meant 30 rounds to get it back to shooting consistently again.
Meanwhile I have not cleaned my latest project, a 6.5x47, which I had the barrel nitro-hardened. Just over 200 rds fired and no noticable difference! And the bore looks rather clean.
 
#22
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

I always leave my BORE dirty when I know I'm gonna need it throwing straight from the get go,(match,hunts,ect.) I recently decided I needed to clean it since the last time I did was probably 4-500 rounds ago
blush.gif
so I ran a dry patch through it...... NOTHING, not even a smudge, so I ran a moist patch through, and I got a little black stuff, but not much. So I ran afew more just to make sure, and it just kept commin out clean. suprised me. Its a factory savage .308 barrel.
 
#23
Re: F-Class with dirty barrel???

A dry patch will not necessarily attract and dislodge glazed fouling. That's what solvents are for. I'd sugget saturating the bore with a benign solvent, like Hoppe's #9; and repeating the dry patch maneuver after at least a 1/2hr soak. Results might be more informative.

Greg
 
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