An inside view...............

[HomerOz]

G'Day Fella's,

No shortage of reloaders, seem to be a bit in the dark about what's on the inside of a Rifle and Pistol barrel.
So I set up a used .308 Win barrel in my milling machine, and removed a bit of the exterior of it, to give you an inside look.

Here's a view of the chamber area (empty) and the first inch of the bore.


Here I have a .308 case in the chamber but not seated all the way to the shoulder (arrow 1).


Ditto but with the case seated all the way.
You can also see, a small amount of clearance in front of the case mouth here (arrow 2), this is to give you case length clearance.
Thats why you need to trim your cases, to the recommended OAL.
If you don't do this, when the case length grows (after repeated firing and reloading), it will eventually bottom out into this area and stop you from being able to close the bolt etc!


This time, I have a Remington 180grn (sorry Mr Nosler), seated base first, to show how the lead (arrow 3) area of the chamber, is slightly larger in diameter than bullet diameter (of 0.308").


Now I have a case with the same 180grn bullet seated in the case and in this position, the ogive of the bullet is touching the lead (arrow 3) but the case is not yet chambered up to the shoulder.


Ditto but with the case fully chambered.


FYI, arrow 4 shows the position of the meplat (tip) of the bullet, when it is in contact with the lead (arrow 3), of the bore.

Hope that helps

Doh!
Homer

 

[5shot]

Cool view

 

[DrMike]

Excellent pictorial tutorial, Homer. Very neat.

 

[gerry]

Thanks, that is neat to see.

 

[Gun nut]

Wow, way cool. Excellent learning aid. THANKS

 

[TackDriver284]

Good stuff, thx for sharing.

 

[c. schutte]

Thanks for doing this. It's one thing to picture in your head and another to see it.

 

[truck driver]

Thanks Homer , great explanation and pictorial of how it all looks.

 

[SJB358]

Very cool. Hopefully Fotis or Jim makes it a sticky. Well worth keeping this on top.

 

[hunter24605]

Thanks! A lot of time went into that...Well done!

 

[Michael C. Smith]

Nice work man! Very cool pics!

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[BretN]

Nice work Homer. I agree that this should be a retained thread in the reloading pages.

 

[longrangehunter]

Great write up, even better milling job!! Thanks for sharing it in a informed photo shop of what's going on Homer!

 

[HomerOz]

G'Day Fella's,

Thank You and no problems, happy this was of benefit.

Here is another image, this time of area forward of the chamber, and the Four groove barrel.


FYI, the gunsmith (Russell L-M) that donated this ex-Target rifle barrel, told me that it was shot out.
Once I got an inside view of it, I realised I considered it to be just fine!
Sure it has a very small amount of fire cracking but there is still a lot of perfectly good barrel there.
FYI, I'm still shooting rifles where the first 4" of the barrel, looks like the inside of a Coal Mine!
When I can get my hands on a seriously Shot Out barrel, I'll mill it out and post an image or two.

Regards
Homer

 

[cloverleaf]

Sticky this one please. I know some folks who will want/ need to see this. CL

 

[wvbuckbuster]

This is some quality information. Thanks for sharing. Dan.

 

[kraky1]

Excellent tutorial for early stage reloaders.... and a great review for even us old farts! Nice job!

 

[Kouros1]

Thank You for taking the time. Never seen something like this before and I think it should be included in every reloading manual. Perhaps a few more shots forward showing the rifling and perhaps the copper buit up (if it hasn't been removed), will complete the story. Agree that the rifling does not look bad at all.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

 

[HomerOz]

G'Day Fella's,

Thanks for your kind comments, and I'm pleased this post has been helpful to you.

Kouros1, as requested here is a view of copper fouling at the muzzle of a .45 Colt and .308 Win rifles of mine.
I'm not sure if that is exactly what you were hoping for but....




Also, yes the original sectioned barrel was thoroughly cleaned with Wipe-Out, Patch-Out solvent, prior to sectioning.
No bronze brush scrubbing was done (just solvent wet cotton patches), and I'm not sure if that explains the black carbon like stuff, in the neck and barrel area?

Doh!
Homer

 

[C.Smith]

Wow that is great, thank you.

corey