I have seen several references to twisting or somehow bending the barrels of a Baikal DR when one barrel is badly out of line vertically. I have two of them. The 30-06 puts all its shots into a 4 inch box at 50 meters. The 45-70 puts the shots from the left barrel a foot higher than the shots from the right barrel at 50 meters with every load I have tried. (It's even worse than my Chapuis.) I have tried shimming the right barrel but with little effect. Has anyone here actually tried twisting the barrels and what exactly did you do? For $700 I don't expect perfection and it is fun to shoot but I'd like for it to be more than a single shot.

Fortunately my 06 shoots into one inch but if it didn't, I would not hesitate to drive out the locating pin and twist teh barrels to wherever I wanted them. However, I would solder the barrels into the muzzle block; I would not use a pin. I would not try to twist the barrels with the pin still in the hole, especially on a 45-70. You could damage the barrel bores. I know there is someone who did it, but I do not recommend it. solder would be better, and safer, and adjustable.

I can't see how the barrels could stay in place unless they were soldered. I would assume that the pins, once driven out and the barrels adjusted either wouldn't go back in or if they did go back in they would force the barrels back to their original position.

I guess you would "sweat" solder the block to the barrel like a copper fitting?

That is my point; the barrels would not stay in place but one gent here said he did it, which I believe but do not recommend for that and other reasons. Yes, first remove the pin; I think it is on the left barrel. Remove the band and remove the blue from inside it and outside the barrels. Use Brownells force 44 solder and you can do it like sweating a copper pipe. Then you can later heat it and move it in any direction you need to. I have a fixture to regulate double rifles on, and as you know, you have to make sure you are not moving the barrels before the solder freezes or it won't hold. So after you move it, you have to have someway to hold it in place while the solder sets.

My Baikal DR 45-70 is just like yours,Bayou Bob-it cannot group less than a foot or two at 50 no matter what I tried.I gave up on it and the headaches its recoil caused me.I wish I never bought it.It did however show me that you can get more recoil with faster burning powders-something that I never experienced before-probably because of the light weight of the rifle.

I decided early on to use trapdoor loads for mine since it is so light. If I want big I'll use the 450/400 or the .458. Interestingly mine adjusted perfectly horizontally. At 50 meters the shots are an inch apart horizontally. The gun was cheap enough that I don't mind tinkering with it and making a winter project out of it. I'll have to build some kind of fixture to both hold the barrels and let me see what kind of adjustments I am making. If I can make it work I'll post a step by step. If not, it won't be the first $700 I've blown on a fun project. Any advice is appreciated.

It will work.

dpcd:

I might be one of the ones you mentioned "twisting" the barrels. I picked up mine when they first came out. Couldn't get it to regulate vertically for anything but horizontally the jack screw would work just fine. At 50yds the the left barrel would shoot anywhere from 6"-12" higher than the right depending on what load I was playing with.

I tried using automotive feeler gauges to make shims to fit into the gap around the end of the right barrel and found that I could move the horizontal spread only a couple of inches. Finally after screwing around far too long with it and as a method of last resort and "pissedoffedness" I did the twisting thing. It wasn't with out some "method to my madness".

First, I decided on settling on one load and one load only - 405 Rem's at 1650 fps. Why? The Rem 405's are (at least where) readily available in bulk and their designed operating/expansion velocity is somewhere around 1600 fps impact velocity.

Next, I took the barrels off the action and wrapped the chamber end in in a piece of thick leather and used a welders bubble level to get the chamber end set relatively level in a pipe vice.

I then used two levels, one set across the barrels as close to the chambers as possible and set the second one across the barrels at the muzzle end just behind the end band and visually compared the difference between the two bubbles and it was significant.

Next, took another piece of leather and wrapped it around the end cap and then used a BFw to apply the torque and kept re-checking/comparing the difference between the two levels. Once they were as close as I could visually judge I reassembled and headed to the range.

End result is that the twisting was enough to get me close enough that I could use the feeler gauge shims to take the rest of the vertical separation out. I also noticed that the jack screw on mine does not exactly apply pressure squarely to the barrels and will move the vertical spread a little as well to.

End of story is that while what I did is probably not good sound gunsmithing and probably violates multiple professional gunsmith rules, using what I had available to me it worked. I was able to get it "force regulated" to a barrel width spread at 50 yds with the left barrel about 1/4 high.

I mounted an old Weaver K2.5 on it and now at 100 yds it will shoot both barrels into less than a 2" group all day. It has been to Namibia twice and I've taken six cull Gemsbok with it out to 130yds and they have all been one shot kills. I've only recovered one bullet and that was a frontal chest shot that lodged in the spine. All the others were various degrees of broadsides and all pass throughs that you could push a golf ball through the exit holes.

I think the last time I had the rifle out was two years ago and it has had several hundred rounds through it since the twisting and it has held so far.

No doubt your soldering method would be by far the best and most permanent method but wouldn't it also negate the ability to use the jack screw to adjust the horizontal spread if you make a minor change to powder, primer or cases without having to do the soldering again?

I don't doubt that your rifle works; it's just that there is the distinct possibility of either damaging the bores, or having it not hold after you twist the locating pin. Will the horizontal adjustment still work after soldering? Yes, the barrels will still spread apart and back in; it might move the POI a bit as the right barrel can no longer slide forward and back. Worse case, you heat the solder again if you need to.
On DRs, you should not play with the loads once you have one that shoots. After all, all DRs but this one are permanently adjusted to one load.

quote:

On DRs, you should not play with the loads once you have one that shoots. After all, all DRs but this one are permanently adjusted to one load.

That is wishful thinking if ever I saw it !!!

It seems quite a few like to tinker.

The only problem is that every time you change anything in the load/lot of powder or primers the point of impact can change.
Bill

"Can" change.

Powder maybe, primers not so much from my experience.

4 shots will show whether the powder is vastly different from the last lot.

I have several double rifles and once I get a load that the rifle and I like, I don't change it. No reason to.

I'll be damned; it worked. Took the locator pins out of the barrel collar and relaxed the tension on the jack screw. The collar is too tight to tap off and I didn't want to use a BFH on it. I'm sure the locator pin holes were drilled after the collar was in place so there is probably a little peening in there. I took the BFW's and applied some twist to the barrels front and back after checking them with a pair of magnetic levels. They moved and I could here the left barrel move in the collar. First attempt they went too far and the left barrel shot as much low as it had high. Second attempt went back and forth several times until I got the levels exactly even with a .008 shim in the collar under the right barrel. I tapped the locator pins back in to see if they would hold. First 2 shots at 25 meters were dead level and 1 inch apart. Second 2 shots at 50 meters were the same. The last 4 shots at 50 meters went in a 4 inch box with the last two spreading about 3 inches horizontally which I'll blame on warm barrels. I'll take it to the range one more time to see if the adjustment holds but I believe it will. Not sure I could ever get the collar off to solder it but at least with my rifle the pins went back in and are holding it. Thanks for the advice. By the way, I also removed the ribs before I started on the barrels.

BayouBob:

Glad it worked for you. Like I said, not the most elegant method and probably wouldn't work with a conventional DR with fully soldered in rib but with the "floating" barrels on the SPR......I sure wouldn't try my method with a regular medium or high $$$ double.

Besides, if you think about the Russian manufacturing mind-set. How many would they sell in Russia, if the rifle had to be continually "fine tuned" by a gunsmith. Pretty sure the Russian hunters don't always have ready access to the exact same factory ammo or even reloading components so the rifle owner has to be able to make adjustments with tools they would typically have access to, BFHs, BFWs and BFRWs.

Like I said too, I resorted to my method out of pure frustration. I was not about to spend $500-$1000 or more sending a $800 gun to a pro-smith to regulate for a particular factory load only to end up it not working with what I ended up wanting to shoot through it.

Big difference; the last poster removed the locating pin Before he twisted the barrels. That is much safer than trying to twist the pin.

I just stumbled across this thread. I've had a couple of these guns, including one which I subjected to the bubba gunsmithing you're discussing here. No removal of the pin, just a vice, a big wrench, and some tactical application of brute force. I used a couple of maqnetic levels, but their input was not helpful...I think that the bore of one (or both!) barrels was not concentric with the outside. In any case, two such "precision adjustments" (IIRC, it was a "two-grunter" followed by a "one-grunter") and I had both barrels shooting on the same horizontal plane, and required only an easy adjustment of the jackwheel to get excellent accuracy. This lasted for over a year, and almost 900 rounds...and then the whole thing went south. The barrels returned to almost their original position, and the groups returned to their original 2-inch-wide 12-inch-tall shape. I traded the gun (full disclosure) to a friend who enjoys tinkering much more than I do. That was six months ago...he's still tinkering.

Wow, these guns are too easy to fix correctly by removing the pins and soldering the barrels to the front band. Why all the drama and aggravation? I do not recommend twisting the barrels with the pins installed.

My 20/20 hindsight tells me that you are absolutely correct!

My vertical displacement of one barrel of a Baikal 45-70 double was finally helped by inserting shims (made from a 22 case). 45-70 bore sighters in each barrel helped quite a bit as well. I would have preferred dpcd method mentioned above of soldering the barrel band in position but could not find anyone to try this. However this inexpensive double (scoped) shoots well with moderate loads and hope the fix will hold up for a while.

Put a few more rounds through it today and the fix seems to be holding. I'll see if an old boar hog notices the home brewed work in the next few days.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
Wow, these guns are too easy to fix correctly by removing the pins and soldering the barrels to the front band. Why all the drama and aggravation? I do not recommend twisting the barrels with the pins installed.

Interesting-I might try this.Can you describe what you did in more detail? Where are these pins?

I have not seen or owned a Baikal with enough room in the front band to take a shim. You don't need to "find" anyone to solder the barrels for you; it is as easy as soldering copper water pipe, which I just assume anyone can do. Step one; drive out the two pins on the left barrel band. Throw them away. Step 2; remove all bluing from inside the band and outside the barrel that will be under the band. Step 3. put flux inside the band and put it back on the barrels. Step 4; Heat the band until it sucks solder into it, for each barrel. Step 5. Shoot it and see where it hits. Step 6; If you don't like where it is hitting, heat it again and twist the barrels to adjust the POI; it is best to do this in a fixture so you can control the amount of movement. But a steady hand can do it. I usually tin the inside and outside first with Brownells force 44; if you don't know how to solder, read about it on the net. It is easy. Oh, first remove the top and bottom ribs and it is best if the horizontal adjustment is adjusted correctly; the barrels can't slip any more and if you move the adjusting screw after you fix the barrels into the front band it might cause a shift in poi.

Dcpd, Appreciate these detailed instructions. Some of us are not so handy however. This would be a permanent fix. Thanks much for your suggestions.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
I have not seen or owned a Baikal with enough room in the front band to take a shim. You don't need to "find" anyone to solder the barrels for you; it is as easy as soldering copper water pipe, which I just assume anyone can do. Step one; drive out the two pins on the left barrel band. Throw them away. Step 2; remove all bluing from inside the band and outside the barrel that will be under the band. Step 3. put flux inside the band and put it back on the barrels. Step 4; Heat the band until it sucks solder into it, for each barrel. Step 5. Shoot it and see where it hits. Step 6; If you don't like where it is hitting, heat it again and twist the barrels to adjust the POI; it is best to do this in a fixture so you can control the amount of movement. But a steady hand can do it. I usually tin the inside and outside first with Brownells force 44; if you don't know how to solder, read about it on the net. It is easy. Oh, first remove the top and bottom ribs and it is best if the horizontal adjustment is adjusted correctly; the barrels can't slip any more and if you move the adjusting screw after you fix the barrels into the front band it might cause a shift in poi.

Thanks for the explanation.What do you mean by twisting the barrels?

Just means changing the vertical planes of the barrels relative to one another. You are sort of "twisting " the front band; the term originated from another poster who first thought of twisting them with the pins still in the band, a practice I do not recommend for several reasons.