As usual, I read an article a while back about fluted vs non-fluted as regards to stiffness. The correspondent used a rifle with a nonfluted barrel, installed it in a fixture not touching the barrel and hung a weight on the end of the barrel and measured the bend or deflection in the barrel. He then had the barrel fluted the same as a production, or normally produced fluted barrel and reinstalled it in the same rifle. He hung the same weight on the end of the barrel and it had MORE deflection than when in the unfluted state. This proves that fluted barrels of the same outside diameter as nonfluted are not as stiff as nonfluted.
