I think I will finally dabble in to some custom rifle work. For my first project I think I will have a rifle re-barreled. I have heard so much talk about, Pac Nor, Lija, Krieger, Shilen, Douglas, Hart etc. I don't have a clue as to which barrel to go with. So I'm hoping you guys will tell me which barrel you prefer and why? If the cartridge makes any difference I plan to go with either a 338-06, 338-06 AI or maybe a .338 WSM. I have not decide on which one as of yet. This will be my elk, moose and bear rifle.

Thanks.

C-ROY

IMO,
For a hunting type rifle I'd go with the Douglas or Pac-nor barrel. I can speak for douglas , I have one in SS in 257 wby. I couldn't ask for much better and it is less money than some of the others you mentioned. If I was building a bench gun I'd go Lilja or Krieger. FWIW.

Mike

I have used Douglass barrels on a couple of rifles and they are excellent. I have two rifles that are due to be completed in the next 30 days that will wear Kriegers--I haven't had that brand on anything else, but the man building them specializes in 1000 yard competition rifles and that's what he recommended. Haven't used any of the others, but have heard nothing but good things about PacNor. Hope this helps!

Good Hunting,

C-Roy,

I have been doing the same exercise, except I have had rifles rebarreled before. I used a Douglas Premium barrel on one rifle, and a Shilen on the other. Both shoot well.

This time around I have decided to go with a Krieger barrel.

If you check their website you can download their catalog (17 pp), which has some interesting information about their philosophy and practice in making barrels.

http://www.kriegerbarrels.com/index.php

jim dodd

I have used and worn out both Douglas Premium, Krieger and Obermeyer barrels. The Douglas barrels were absolutely satisfactory in every respect but remember they cost roughly half as much. The Obermeyer's and Krieger's were superb for lots of reasons. First, its a cut rifled barrel. This rifling method, while more expensive, will generally produce a better barrel with less internal stress than a button rifled barrel like a Douglas, Shilen, Lilja etc. That's not to say button rifled barrels can't be good...they can be outstanding. But a properly made cut rifled barrel is a step up IMO. Downside is cost. And depending on application it probably isn't worth the extra $150 or so. A Krieger's internal finish is also phenominal. This results in significantly less copper fouling and longer barrel life.
I only used the high end barrels on my match guns AFTER I shot my way into master class and could take advantage of such superior barrels. I shot the Dougals barrels for a long time after I made master and they performed nearly as well.
In hunting rifles the difference between a PAC-NOR, Douglas, Lilja etc will be slight compared to a premium barrel like a Krieger. Unless you are just one of those wackos (I mean that lightheartedly) that absolutely has to do everything possible to wring the last 1/1000 of mechanical accuracy out of a hunting rig you will be well served with a button rifled tube like a Douglas or Pac-Nor. OTOH, if that .0001 inch difference in groups turns your crank, well by all means head for the mountains! But expect to pay $150-200 more for that priveledge.

Unless the barrel will be fitted by the barrel mfg. I would pick the smith first and go along to some extent with his recommendations. Since this is a hunting rifle any good barrel will be better than what you need.

Since your in N.C. you might see how far John Lewis is from you. I would use the barrel he likes and if he suggests Douglas I would be very happy.

Kentucky Nimrod,
Thanks for the reply. A lot of good points in that post. What do you think of the Hart barrels? I spoke with them this morning and I really got a good feeling after speaking with them. I am in no big hurry to get this done so I plan to take my time and get exactly what I want. Thanks.

C-ROY

Kentucky Nimrod makes some really excellent points about barrel manufacturing, and accuracy versus intended use. For the hunting rifle I am building for this "project" I am more concerned with a barrel that doesn't change zero, won't foul and will clean up easily.

I think I will get that from the Krieger.

jim dodd

C-roy,
No personal experience with Hart. But I know they have a good reputation among the few friends I know who own/have used one. Personally, if I were building a hunting rig...I'd buy a PAC-NOR or a Lilja. If the barrel make offers fitting and chambering service I always let them do it because its a lot harder to deal with a problem gun when you have a smith and a barrel maker pointing fingers at each other! And most barrel makers offer superb and reasonable metalsmithing and chambering services. Dan Lilja doesn't do fitting any more but he stil does a dandy job lapping and finishing his barrels after the button goes through and his QC is very good.

Hi C-Roy, When I have a rifle rebarreled, I tend to lean towards the match quality barrels over the cheaper ones. Most barrel makers have hunting and match grade barrels. The cost between these two grades is usally between $35-$50. When you pay $150 to $200 to have the barrel installed and chambered. Then pay to have it blued. The cost between the two doesn't seem so bad. I've found out that by going with the Stainless barrels, you save the cost of having the barrel blued. I tried saving $150 by having an Adams & Bennett barrel put on a target rifle. I shot one match with it and got beat so bad that I'm now having a Pac-Nor Super Match barrel put on now. I kind of have to learn things the hard way. The Barrels I've had experance with are Kreiger, Hart, Nac-Nor Super Match, Douglas Match, Lilja. You can't go wrong with any of these. Find the barrel company that makes the length and contour you want and go with them. If I had to chose one barrel. It would be a toss up between Hart and Kreiger.

Hart makes very, very good barrels. The only downside to them is they only make stainless, which is only a downside if you want blued. Kreiger also makes very, very good barrels, but they won't make you one in stainless unless it has a very heavy profile. I don't agree that cut rifled barrels are inherently better than buttoned barrels. They both have the ability to be outstanding, like anything else it's the care that's taken in their manufacture that's important. For some reason (don't ask me why) the benchrest shooters tend to use buttoned barrels (hart and shilen mainly), while the hi-power guys tend to prefer cut barrels like kreiger. Since the accuracy demands of the benchrest guys are greater than the accuracy demands of the hi power shooters, I'd think that if better accuracy could be had with kreigers then that's what they would be using.

Of course, all of this is just gum flapping when it comes to hunting rifles, just pick a barrel from any of the reputable makers mentioned by the others here and it'll be more than good enough for a hunting rifle.

On a .338/06,you're talking about a 300 yard rifle,anything that will shoot 1 inch groups,or slightly larger is sufficient. Why spend the cash on a kreiger barrel,for this type of rifle and caliber.You'll never be able to take advantage of the accuracy outside of a benchrest and you may end up with an exspensive kreiger barrel that is accurate as a douglas costing less money.
As for Kreiger barrels,who uses these things? Most of the winners of benchrest,use shilen,pac nor or lilja.

Well, C-ROY....it looks like the only thing for you to do is to have a rifle built up with one each of the above-mentioned barrels, shoot them all extensively, and then report your findings back here! Yep, a switch barrel rifle with about 6 different makes of barrels--that way the only thing that changes is the barrel!
As you can probably tell, most any of the aftermarket barrels will do a good job when properly installed. Let us know what you decide!

Good Hunting,

I didn't see Cutrifle.com mentioned. Dan Pederson is the resident barrelmaker at Wells Sports Store. I have 4 of his barrels from .308 to .458 and he is currently making a .510 for one of my projects.

They are truely custom barrels that can have inegral sights, underlugs, sling mounts, and quarter ribs added to your specs. They are worth your consideration

I have used them all over the years but I am sure in my own mind that Lothar Walther is the best barrel in the world since they developed that polishing process...Everbody that tries one stays with them....Belk and Brockman got me to try one, the best favor anyone ever did for me...

I'll second the Lothar Walther LW-50 SS barrels.
They are great!
I have built rifles with a bunch of different barrels and now use the Walthers almost exclusively.
Here is an album with a bunch of targets from rifles built with Walther barrel. Most targets are shot with factory ammo and are from hunting and "tactical" rifles.
http://members15.clubphoto.com/j559355/954024/owner-fbec.phtml

Celt

For the uses you talk about , any barrel would work. My M98 with a Adam's and Bennet .35 Whelen barrel is sub moa, it does foul more than most other barrels I have though.

A hunting rifle IMHO needs to deliver hunting accuracy - that's not lesser accuracy but accuracy in more demanding conditions.

No waiting for barrels to cool, shooting from a fouled bore etc. Instead it must deliver a 3 round group where the first shot is from a cold clean barrel and shots 2 and 3 follow in short order without cooling time. ie How you shoot in the field.

My 3 shihlen chrome moly barrels in a lightened #4 profile will do half inch under these conditions.

More important than the barrel manufacture is the smith. The chambering and fitting has to be done right or you wont be able to tell the best from the worst barrel.

I prefer Walther barrels, but all of the ones listed will do on a hunting rifle. The Walthers seem to clean up easier and the ones I have seem to shoot anything I feed them. The difference in a bad load and a good one is in the 10ths inch range instead of one load scattered and the next grouping well.

The best custom riflesmiths I know of prefer Kreiger barrels to all other makes, and the most forgiving and consistently accurate rifles I own wear Kreiger barrels.

Therefore, I recommend Kreiger barrels with Hart in a close second place, especially if you want a stainless-steel barrel.

AD

You have some really good responses here. As you can tell, any of the barrels you mentioned should be very good.

I own a couple of Hart barrels, they are both extremely accurate. However, one just seems to shoot darned near any load and the other is the most finicky damned barrel I ever owned. With just the right loads it is GREAT, but only after a good deal of searching to find that load. Hart only makes one grade of barrel and they are a heck of a good product, but hardly necessary for the use you describe.

I also own a great Shilen barrel, so I know they will shoot as well.

But, for the rifle you are thinking of building, I would go with a chrome-moly Lilja tube. I have one on my 25-06 and it shoots so well I am continually surprised. My gunsmith put one on my 25-06 that I had shot out the factory barrel on and I am really pleased. He finished the whole rifle in a matt finish and it put it in a fiberglass stock, it is quite the hunting rig.

Having said that, this same gunsmith is really pleased with Krieger barrels.

Any decent replacement barrel will shoot plenty good for big game hunting. There are lots of good barrel manufacturers out there these days.

R F

I'll give a nod to Pac-Nor. They rebarreled a Win 70 for me and did an excellent job. The fit and finish are exceptional.

Another fine point is that the staff at Pac-Nor were very amicable on the telephone and answered any questions I had.

The top four barrels on the market at this writing are Hart, Shilen , Lilja , Krieger. Hart barrels hold many benchrest records. Lilja barrels holds many records in rim fire and long range shooting. Shilen and Krieger barrels are also very highly regarded by the benchrest community. Douglas, Pac-Nor and many more barrel makers that have not been mentioned make fine barrels but are not the equal of the top four. The choice is yours depending on what you expect from the finished rifle. If the very best accuracy is your goal, go with one of the top four barrel makers. If your making a nice shooting hunting rifle then the Douglas barrel will do you a nice job for less money.
Remember this, the gunsmith you hire to build the rifle has as much to do with how accurate your rifle is as the maker of the barrel. If the gunsmith you hire does not know his craft, he can turn the very best barrel ever made into a jack handle with each turn of his lathe.
You must do the research and find a gunsmith who knows his craft and will build you one tack driving rifle. The rest is up to you to extract that accuracy from the rifle with fine tuned hand loads. True masters in the gunsmith trade are not as plentiful as we would like them to be. I would be more concerned with quality rather than a gunsmith who lives close to my town or residence. You can ship your action and barrel to them. The shooting forums have a wealth of knowledge and can give you the names of several master gunsmiths to build your rifle. Mike Bryant from Wheeler Texas is one of those master gunsmiths.

C-Roy

what receiver are you using for your rifle?

RH

C-Roy,
Go ahead and dabble! You won't regret it, especially with a wildcat cartridge. I had a Remington 700 BDL in 25-06 that couldn't hit the broad side of a barn after it was stolen, then 12 years later returned. As I already had another rifle in 25-06 by that time, I decided to go up to a medium bore--338-06. The chambering cost was the same so I chose the Ackley Improved 40 degree shoulder version. The blown out body taper reduces brass flow towards the neck which means longer case life. I am very lucky to live only 75 miles from a family of gunsmiths--R. W. Hart & Sons of Nescopeck, PA.
www.rwhart.com
They are cousins (I think) to the LaFayette, NY Harts who make those fine SS barrels. www.hartbarrels.com
Hart the gunsmith, makes all kinds of bench guns, have their own cartridge, the .30 Hart, and makes hunting rifles. They have plenty of NA and African game animals to prove how good their work really is. I was impressed that the Connecticut State Police Swat Team would come so far to have their .308 tactical rifles worked on. It seems that they put so many rounds through them that they need to set back the barrels and rechamber on a regular basis. But I digress.
This was my first semi-custom rifle project. I wanted it to be all the things my current gun wasn't. I had Bobby Hart screw on a 24" stainless sporter weight Hart barrel. I had him chamber it to fit 250 grain Nosler Partitions. I had him put on one of his own muzzle brakes to tame the recoil when shooting from the bench. Feels much like a .243 Win. I bought a H-S Precision synthetic stock, which he skim bedded to the action. I bought some special matte paint from Brownells and covered both the blued action and the sandblasted stainless barrel. No glints from my gun! I put on a 2.8 x 10 Simmons Aetec scope, loaded some 250 grain Sierra BT spitzers (after fireforming .30-06 cases with IMR 4895 and cast lead bullets) and headed for the 100 yard range. The first five shots from a clean barrel were 18" from point of aim but formed one ragged hole. I was impressed. It does that well with almost any load using good bullets. Can I say it's cause of the Hart barrel? I'm sure it doesn't hurt. But most of the credit has to go to Bobby Hart (or one of his employees) for making my gun accurate. It's all about craftsmanship. So my recommendation C-Roy, would be to find a well-respected gunsmith who will listen to your ideas, then choose a barrel maker.
That's how I did it. Winning the elk lottery here in PA is like winning the Powerball jackpot. 80 gazillion to 1. But my .338 is going to Namibia in '04 for use on the larger plains game. I can't wait. If ya got any questions 'bout the .338-06 AI, just ask.

Rockhead,
I plan to build on a Remington 700 action.

Onefunzr2,
Thanks for the input and I'll take you up on that offer for more infromation whaen I get my rifle. I now what you mean about winning a PA elk tag but I still try, as well as KY and AR too. Thanks.

C-ROY

Lothar Walther barrels do not use resulphurized steel and as a consequence are harder to shoot out.

500grains,

That of course begs the question, harder than what to shoot out?

jim dodd