Gentlemen
What would be the expected barrel life for a stainless steel 243 win barrel using 85-100 grain bullets from 2950-3200fps. The barrel rarely gets past a warm stage as well before being allowed to cool when shooting. A gunsmith told me to expect a life of about 2000 rounds vs 7mm08 at about 6000 rounds. Your thoughts / experiences would be appreciated.
Tom

quote:

A gunsmith told me to expect a life of about 2000 rounds vs 7mm08 at about 6000 rounds.

Your gunsmith may not be too far from the mark.....

Barrel life is a function of loss of accuracy.....no matter how eroded the throat becomes, the barrel is typically considered good as long as the accuracy continues.

If one has a peak accuracy of (as an example) 3/4" and the accuracy decays to 1 1/8" over the next two thousand rounds it may not be noticed or treated with little concern and the shooter will continue shooting it. However some shooters will become disappointed in the loss of sub MOA accuracy and rebarrel it. We see that barrel life becomes a function of personal preference.

In the classifieds a shooter sold a new Remington take off barrel for $40. The life of that barrel was extremely short as the shooter didn't fire it once. He wanted a Krieger immediately.

There is another negative about the .243.....it can be a extremely fine varminting cartridge and the demands for these barrels performance may be severe.....a 7mm-08 shooter on the other hand will be happy with 1 1/8" accuracy but the same person may not accept it from a .243.

There's so much "personal" and so much subjectivity in the issue that it's quite difficult to say. The actual barrel life may in fact reach 5,000 rounds.

Layne Simpson is on record as saying that his .220 Swift is still shooting great after 5,000 full bore loads. I can't see that a .243 would be any the less assuming proper care.

There are a couple of products, Microlon Gun Juice and Prolix, that are supposed to leave a durable, invisible, protective finish in gun barrels. After my barrel cleaning, the last thing I do is apply one of those and hope it will prolong barrel life. Unlike oil, you don't need to remove them prior to shooting since they're solvent based. Also, in at least some barrels I've used them in, I believe accuracy did increase a little.

A bit of voodoo I know but I'm entitled to at least one superstition.

Well if barrel life on a 243 is about 2000 rounds, then I have several that must be pretty shot out by now....

however no one told the groups it shoots, that they should be larger than they are...

another thing about a 243 or any other rifle..
by changing the load after the groups start opening up, to powders like 4198, RL 7, SR 4759 and Blue Dot, you can substantially stretch out the accuracy life of that barrel..

Burning faster powders in barrels like that, with smaller bores... I'll maintain, will have a longer service life than one burning powders like 4350, 4831 etc..

its no brainer, that the more powder the faster the throat erosion... so compare 45 grains of powder per shot, vs 35 grains per shot... and mathmatically figure out the difference in barrel life.....

2,000 rounds isn't a very long barrel life in my book.. I expect at least that out of a magnum...

the key to a long service life on a barrel is to not heat them up so that one can brand cattle, the neighbor's cat..

Thanks for the replies guys. I have to admit that I was surprised that 2000 rounds was theoretically the end of the barrel. However your logic regarding barrel heat / faster powders as well as owning rifles that have still shot well past 2000 rounds gives me some comfort.
I intend to put a suppressor on this rifle which I am guessing has had 600 rounds through it tops. I did'nt want to go to the trouble/expense and then soon after need to rebarrel it.
I have seen suppressors used on centrefires before and they are incredibly quiet. Somewhere between a 22 rim and magnum for noise.

20,000 rounds or about 10 generations of dedicated riflemen.

how does a .257 Roberts compare in barrel life to the .243?

For normal hunting use, I believe you will get far more than 2000 rounds. It should last you several generations of hunting. Don't worry about it and go shoot something. Lou

quote:

Originally posted by Tommo:
Gentlemen
What would be the expected barrel life for a stainless steel 243 win barrel using 85-100 grain bullets from 2950-3200fps. The barrel rarely gets past a warm stage as well before being allowed to cool when shooting. A gunsmith told me to expect a life of about 2000 rounds ...

Hey Tommo, I'd suggest the GunSmith is trying to drum up some Barrel Swapping business when it is normally not needed.

I do the same as you about not shooting when the Barrel gets Hot and have well past double the amount your GunSmith mentioned. I do use Moly Coated Bullets and I use the "Slowest", most effective Powders available to get the highest SAFE MAX Load for Hunting.

As a matter of fact, the last time I shot my 243Win, I'd put a new 6-24x scope on it and was able to shoot a series of 3-shot groups in the 3s using good old 90gr Speer Hot-Cor Bullets and some IMR-4831 that I was trying to use up. Don't take that as a Brag, cause I don't know if I could repeat it or not. It normally shoots in the 6s, but obviously the barrel still has some life in it.

Just keep doing what you are doing, clean it often/well, and it will last a l-o-t longer than 2k shots.

Good Hunting and clean 1-shot Kills.

If we're talking about real world accuracy and not some sort of bench rest accuracy, 2000 rounds sounds like an awful small number to get from a properly cared for barrel that is shot at a disciplined rate. If, when you reach the 2000 number, your smith pulls out a bore scope, find another smith.
I'm not much for counting stuff but I believe I've got magnums that have been shoot quite a few times more than that.

My 1000 yard prone rifle in 243 will go for about 600-800 rounds before the barrel needs to be yanked. Im shooting 105gr bergers at 3100fps. I have shot them to 3300fps with ease but the gun shoots best at 3100fps. Keep in mind this is for highpower target shooting and Im looking for top accuracy. Once accuracy or elevation starts to go the barrel gets yanked. For anyting else I would think 1500-2000 rounds would be about the norm.

My experience with these high intensity cartridges (.243, 6mm Rem, 6.5x284, 300win mag) is that they are all good for between 600-1300 rounds. After that the barrels get yanked and turned into paper weights. A good barrel will usually shot about 1-1.5" groups at 300 yards.

Bike Rider
Corbin