I have a plain Jane LH Safari Express that I just love to shoot. Most of my experience has been with the lighter and medium magnums, 7mm Rem and .300 Ultra, for example.

I load 300 grain Hornady and A Frames ahead of 76.5 IMR 4350, max book load in the Swift book. So far, I've put about 1100 rounds through it, allowing it to cool after three or four shot groups so that it's warm. I don't get it hot. It'll take me an hour to shoot ten or twelve rounds on a 70 degree day. Accuracy remains excellent and I run a good copper cleaner through it every 60/80 rounds or so. I clean it with powder solvent after each range session. Any ballpark idea on barrel life?

Thanks.

Hello,
Might suggest you obtain a throat erosion measurement at this time and then can monitor as to additional erosion w/ further shooting. It is most unlikely you will ever shoot the bore out from the throat area forward
but can become fouled and pitted with little care and cleaning and of course the climate has a lot to do with that as well. As to actual barrel life, long range match shooters will discard a barrel when the accuracy drops off, or have rear cut and rechambered to gain another thousand or so shots, but such a barrel is still just fine for a sporting rifle use. I would think your barrel would be fine for it's intended purposes for several thousand rounds, 6-8000??? If accuracy falls away, you may have a problem but again, if you have a throat measurement and keep seating the bullets out to compensate, be close to the lands and grooves, you are still in business. Most big bores are not shot that much compared to lighter calibers and perhaps someone out there has a record of most shots obtained with a 375HH??

You have a hammer-forged barrel on that M70, that is a plus for barrel life. I have two LH M70's in 375 but I only have 1000 plus rounds through them (hunting loads 68 grains R-15 with 300 grain Swifts). There are so many variables when it comes to barrel life but a ball park figure would be 4,000-5,000 shots. I have a 30-06 M70 with over 3,000 rounds (full loads 56g IMR4350) through it and I just this past month checked the throat, etc. and it looked great with the accuracy still the same as when it was new.

Life of your barrel?

I agree with the above, 5 to 10.000 rounds,

or August 31, 2017, whichever comes first.

I couldn't help myself. Sorry.

Thanks guys.

And you, too, will.

By 2017, I will likely have eroded out of the picture myself...

Jet,

I've got a M-70 .375H&H with well over 3000 rounds through it. It is showing no signs of quiting yet.

Thanks again. I'm going hunting in July, '09 and I'm going to be shooting it a lot getting warmed up. Didn't want to loosen anything up before the critical moment(s).

Jetdrvr,
I'll take the opposite tack, because I'm like that. I didn't care for my barrel on a CZ .375, getting it hot rapid fire, grinning like a lunatic and doing it again for 80-100 shot days. Seemed to me that the best way to learn to shoot a .375 rapid fire was to shoot a .375 rapidfire. Anyway, I washed .120" out of the throat with 1700 rounds.It took me 14 months but 5 months out of the year are too darn cold for steady shooting. Accuracy was always restored by chasing the lands, but I'm at the end of the ample magazine now so it is on borrowed time. You may well get 5000 or more rounds of barrel life with proper cooling, but abuse it like I did and you may get half of that, or even less with a 3.60" mag box. My way is a lot more fun though. They make new barrels every day.

Several lifetimes unless you abuse it...I have owned a couple of .375s that had to have over 10,000 rounds through them and they still shot great..I suspect accuracy opens up a bit at around 4000 rounds but from 1 inch to 2 inches ain't sinful for a big bore. All this is an educated guessimate however..but I have never seen a .375 with the bore shot out, I have seen some that suffered the abuse of rust etc.