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How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

T

toofar

Private
Minuteman
Oct 3, 2011
26
0
66
Mississippi
I have a stock Barrett 82A1 fifty cal rifle with the Swarovsky 10X Barrett inverted Christmas tree reticle that is unfired/NIB. If I worke up a load, doing as much as possible to get uniform ammunition built for this rifle, what kind of (mechanical) accuracy could reasonably be expected at say 1000 yards? The rifle has not had any accuracy tweaks. I talked my wife into letting me get this safe queen as an "investment" probably 11 years ago and I am itching to shoot it As an aside, any idea what the Swarovsky scope would be worth if I decided to spin it off for another optic?
Thanks,
TooFarGone
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

I know a lot of people don't like to admit it, but the M82/107 isn't a precision rifle. They are 2-3MOA rifles at best. The barrel assists extraction and recoil mitigation by sliding rearward during firing. The M99s are more accurate, but you can't go "bang bang bang" with them.

That Swaro scope was the first useful scope we got for the M82s in the Army back in the mid-90s. The 16x Leupold was poop. I would honestly keep it with the M82 as a package - albeit it a somewhat anachronistic one.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

I was thinking that is not exactly a precision rifle. As I admired the sliding barrel/recoil mechanism, it looked to me that the design did not lend itself to precision return to battery- not saying that making the tolerances tighter wouldn't improve things accuracy wise, but likely would decrease reliability in operation. Mechanically, it seemed to me that having all that barrel hanging on the about two inch long steel block at the front of the receiver would tend to whip a bit at the muzzle. It does not have a match chamber either... That being said, I suspect that 3 moa would still cause zombies to have a bad day out to 400 yds or so. The rifle was sold as an "anti-material" weapon and not marketed as a tack driver and I knew it at the time of purchase. I have to admit that the scope with the 500 yd zero and the 1800 yd bullet drop reticle did get my attention. I noted that Ohio Ordinance has some Raofoss/Multi-purpose ammo for "only" $100 for 3 rounds., Hmmmm

Dogtown, I took a physics class once and the book stated "f=ma and all the rest of this book is just explanation...".

Cheers,
ToFarGone
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

What projectile were you shooting, and do you know if anything had been done to tweak the rifle for accuracy?
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

I have the M82CQ which has the 20" barrel and most that have shot both agree that the shorter barrel is more accurate. Not sure if it is because of less whip or motion when that cannon goes off or what but it is definitely more accurate. I have discussed this with Lin at Schryver and he also agrees. You dont get the velocity of the 29" barrel but i have consistently shot 1-1.5MOA and this is with 690gr Barrett ammo. I get 2570ft/sec with the 20" barrel which is still supersonic at a mile which is good enough for me
smile.gif
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

Interesting observation on the 20 inch barrel accuracy! Mine has the 29 inch barrel. I just wandered over the the Barrett retail price list and note that they would be happy to sell me a complete 20 inch upper for "only" $4850! A barrel in 20 inches for the current military rifle is "only" $4000. They are wanting $150 for 10 round magazines (with the 338 Lapua magazine only $40). Muzzle blast aside, I suspect chopping 9 inches off the barrel might offend the sensibilities of some potential purchasers if I ever decided to sell it.I am not sure that you could safely cut through the fluted areas and rethread the barrel for the brake anyway.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

For sure, match ammo vs ball ammo makes a difference in the M82, but it's the way the rifle is engineered that makes it less accurate than one would expect.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Spin Drift</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Ammo plays a huge role in the gun's accuracy. I have personally witnessed and shot 1.5MOA groups (repeated) with the right ammo.

Jacob Bynum swears it's a MOA rifle if you can shoot it.

</div></div>

That would be very optimistic for a gun that you can grab the end off the barrel and rattle it around in the action.

The bushing isn't even a close tolerance fit to the barrel.

I read a post somewhere of a guy who took his and made a custom bushing to take the slop out of the barrel and was able to get it to shoot ~1MOA.

Stock? 2-3MOA is standard. The Rafus[SIC] ammunition is the most accurate with the most clean burning powder of the military ammo types I've fired.

It might group 2MOA with Rafus ammunition.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

Thanks for the information on the accuracy potential of this rifle.
TooFarGone
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

I have only been behind an M82 on one occasion and it was shooting less than 3 MOA for me with match loaded ammunition. My experience on the M82 is limited but during the development of our HTI 50cal rifle I talked with a lot of veteran servicemen about rifle and ammo capabilities as they existed in the military. The general consensus is that they shoot between 3 - 7 MOA with mil-spec ammo and Raufuss is the most accurate hovering toward the lower end of that spectrum.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

My experience with the XM-107 when we got them was 2-3 moa with API ammo (Armor Piercing Incendiary) and a horrible 5-7 moa with regular ball ammo for the M2 that we de-linked. With actual match ammo you may get 1 moa but I wouldn't hold my breath.
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

I found it to be very accruate. We were hitting 8-9 inch targets at just under 1000 yards. I even had a 1st round hit. We were all suprised.
IMG_0395.JPG
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

i have a barrett m107 that i shoot and ammo plays a very big role with this weapond and yes i have been able to get 1.2 moa using hornady a-max and i have pulled 1.5 moa with ap ammo at 1000 meters but it was very hard to pull that off u was using a barett m107 with a leupold mark 4 4.5-14 x 50 with the barrett bors system

infantry for life
 
Re: How accurate is a stock Barrett 82A1?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: mrtoyz</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I found it to be very accruate. We were hitting 8-9 inch targets at just under 1000 yards. I even had a 1st round hit. We were all suprised.
IMG_0395.JPG
</div></div>

Sounds like Barrett has changed dimensions of the barrel or bushing for different batches of rifles. That would be the limiting factor. Sloppier tolerances = bigger groups.

~650meters was max range for a first round hit on a little Ivan in my experience.

The guns I fired were military guns with thousands of rounds fired through them.
 
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