Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Barrel Cooling methods, What do you think JB?

Here in Texas it tends to steam right off in the summertime.

Well, if you go back to that J Burns discussion about scope ring spacing........

On second thought, DON'T !!!!!

I usually shoot mine until it is hot enough to light my Marlboro off of THEN... I set it in an asbestos gunrest on the bench and heat it ever so slightly with a propane torch on one side and apply dry ice to the opposite side so as to equally dist-ribute the cold and the hot. This is very important in these days of global warming. If it shoots to the left, the heat goes on the left, kind of like adjusting you iron sights. This method saves a lot of time in scope adjustment.

Do you reverse this method if in the southern hemisphere?

Jim,
Like you I carry a cooler with ice and a few soft drinks in it when I shoot on a hot day. Also carry a roll of papertowels in my truck. Was fireforming the other day which I normally wait to do when it is colder but I needed to prep some brass.
After a few shots (normally 4 to 5) I soak a paper towel in the ice water in said cooler and then ring it and lay it on the barrel. Usually 3 short leaves folded together and layed out on the barrel will cool it. Sometimes a couple of applications are required. Speed things up dramatically.
Next time I may try your method as it might be quicker. I have had no adverse reaction to this method. Rifle still shoots very accurately and I have been using this method for a long time.

Dave

Vic, Yes I do but is very important that you turn the gun upside down.

This summer I bought a Coleman rechargeable air pump and a length of surgical rubber tubing. The rubber tubing cost near as much as the pump which was about $25 at Wal-mart.

It helps

Alan

A buddy of mine who used to do a lot of prairie dog shooting would rub ice on the barrel (stainless only, of course) to cool it. Oddly, though, he said that inevitably the first shot from the cooled barrel would be off by a considerable margin. After that first shot, it'd go back to shooting where it was supposed to. I have no idea why this happened and neither did he but he assured me that it did.

When I work up a load I make sure the first two shots ALWAYS hit the same spot whether hot, cold or otherwise. If it don't I move onto another load.

The old buffalo hunters on stand, pissed down the bores to cool them off. I'm betting that is why the always shot by themselves!

I think the only intelligent way to do this is open the action and let it cool on its own..and don't get them "that hot" in the first place as that will take the throat out of a good barrel.

Like JB if I'm going out to shoot, I take a number of guns with me, and that way I always have one or two cooling while I shoot a cool one..Shoot a few groups, then switch rifles..All these cooling methods take on the picture of a screwball at work!

It is a little known scientific fact that in the Southern Hemisphere, you turn the rifle upside down to cool.

Something else I forgot....
The little pump bottles at Home Depot/84/Lowes? Pretty handy. I tried a strip of old towel one time with a spray bottle, it was excruciatingly hot and I could only get about 4 or 5 shots before the barrel mirage got ridiculous. So with the towel strip rubber banded on the barrel and the spray bottle handy, I just kept things soaked and had a GREAT time.

Ruger700,
I just take a rag that has been soaked in ice water and place it over the barrel. I would not pour water into the barrel to cool it from the inside. If there is still water inside when the shot goes off, it might damage your barrel.

With my .300 Wby and a very light barrel, the barrel was too hot to touch after three shots. Using the natural chimney effect took 10 minutes to cool. I got an air mattress inflater and four D-cells plus a piece of plastic tubing and could get it about as cool in five minutes.

I found the best solution was to shoot it as little as possible on the range. Practice dry firing or with a .223, which does not get as hot, produces skills which are directly transferrable.

I use the water bottle method, I have a piece of 3/8" ID tubing that I have epoxied into a 2 liter bottle. I take the bolt out, push the tubing in the chamber and lift the bottle above the barrel. Works in just seconds, two dry patches and the barrel is shiny clean and dry, no problems with following rounds.

I've used starting fluid (ether) to cool barrels for years. I buy it by the case to start an old Intertrashinol low compression Diesel tractor. It cools a barrel right down. Just don't breathe it too much.

A bike bottle works, albeit a little messy if you aren't careful.

I bring 4 to 5 rifles to the range and rotate guns every 3 shots. Plus I take a min or 2 and clean my brass after every shot....