Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters .264 barrel life latest news

Thanks for the report. I've used Tetra for a few years and also think it helps.

I documented a .257 Weatherby Barrel once.

It was never a bench rifle, but would always shave MOA for 3 shot groups. The Mark V magazine only held 3 rounds so who cares where shot 4 or 5 would go. After all, in the field they would never be fired at the same animal anyway.

After 700 rounds, I fired a 3 shot .7 MOA group. No worries here.

At 800 rounds, I could see throat errosion beginning with the naked eye.

At 900 rounds it again shot a .7 MOA group. The throat wear was more obvious so I began to look more often.

At 950 rounds, groups openedto 1.5 MOA and errosion more obvious again, now taking a longer section of the throat.

At 1,010 rounds, it shot a 6 inch group so I burned up the last 5 rounds I had left, for a total of 1,015 and the fat lady had sung.

What does this mean? Not a damn thing of value until you read the following:

The rifle was purchaed 9-12-79
The last shot fired was on 6-24-90

The number of shots fired at the bench to test components and loads was 618.

The balance of 397 rounds were fired in the field hunting over those same 11 years.

So what does this additional info mean?

1. You will most likely never wear out a barrel by just hunting in the US.
2. If this rifle was used only for hunting after the initial loads were developed I would still be using it.
3. As MD alluded to, wearing out barrels just opens the door to another option or more of the same if it so pleases you.

That action went on to be rebarreled 3 additional times before I retired it. As my writing increased, so did my barrel wear testing components.

AGW

Thanks, AGW. By '79 Weatherby had gone to the 3/8" freebore, right?

The erosion really got going after 900+. Normal cooling between shots?

Yes,
The long throat version of the Weatherby's were related to the older 1:12 twist versions. The 1 :10 barrel twist I had, is still current spec's.

Normal cooling applied as I always took several rifles to the range to permit this as a routine practice.

Quite honestly, the .257 Weatherby cartridge is a tremedous round to use in the field. For deer sized game it killed better than the .270 and the .25/06 which I campared it to side by side over those same years.

I have a mate who has taken it tp Aftica on 3 safaris. Each time he goes lighter and lighter which is the opposite of most thought processes. When I met him back in 1990, he used the .416 Weatherby, then went back to the .300 then the .257 and pretty much stayed there although he uses a .264 Winchester Mag as well these days.

His .257 has taken many plains animals up to I believe, eland. The last load I knew of consisted of the 90gn XBT @ 3700 fps in a custom unthroated bench grade barrel.

In all, I myself loaded for 3 different .257's and I am happy to endorse the cartridge as everything Uncle Roy claimed of it shy of being a buffalo gun as although it is on record of having been done, we all have a good day in our past that we recognize as just that.

AGW.

Hey AGW. Good post. More of my same feelings. If I hadn't done so much load work with the Encore .264 it would last forever. How many rounds does the average hunter put through a rifle? The .257 unfortunately has the same curse placed on it that the .264 does. How many gents would actualy wera one out? Now if I didn't have a small arsenal to chse from and carried the .264 all the time I might have already worn one out but........ in this day and time there are very few one gun hunters. I go even further there are very few 3 gun hunters. If you have 3 guns to choose from you would have a favorite. Say it got carried 50% of the time. The other 2 rifles would split the difference. If this was a hunting rifle and you already had loads worked up how long would it last doing 50% ? We are in an unusual situation here. Our bag limit is 303 deer per year. On top of that I crop snipe which can account for 100 per year easily. During season I will usualy shoot 10 to 15. I think you can already see where I am coming from. I am back to my original theory. Prarie dog hunters will burn up anything. I can just see it now. The year is 1958. Joe and Melvin are headed to shoot prarie dogs with their .264 Westerners and a truck load of the factory 100gr loads that were loaded to 3700fps. After a couple of months they have a burned barrel. Hmmmm. 8-} reflex264

Well I hate to bring back a old post but I feel it is relavent. After playing with a 26" barreled 7mag for the last couple of months I have decided to go back to the .264 for this season of crop sniping. Same barrel. I simply could not get the trajectory I needed from the 7mag. This was my second try, the first was a 24" barrel. In my signiture I am going to start a counter to show the number of shots fired through the .264. I will have to update the total to include recent load work-ups. I am not knocking the 7mag. As a normal hunting cartridge it will serve nicely but as a crop sniping rifle it has not provided flat enough trajectories to satisfy me for the very long shots. I am now calibrated for 800 yards and with my field tri-pod should have no problem conecting on these shots. I figure between now and deer season somewhere around 200 more shots will go down the tube. reflex264

[img]http://[IMG]http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e328/reflex264/SUNP0214.jpg[/img][/img]

This is why I have to calibrate a rifle for long shots. This field stretches another 1200 yards beyond my scout.

Here is my typical set up for the long fields. Some of the fields are over a mile long.

Oh so good to here about the best caliber ever IMHO!!!!

Hey Reflex did you ever try out Those 140 gr Bergers??

Hey prdator. I got them loaded but during the times I carried it the deer were uncooperative. I am going to use tem and 130gr accubonds crop sniping. I don't even have to touch the scope. The first ones I loaded were with IMR7828. I have enough of them left to load some with Ramshot Magnum which I will do shortly. I tumbled the cases a few days ago for them. I am really interested in seeing what they do.reflex264

It may be tough to burn out the bore on a 264 but, it seems, I have managed to do that very thing.

My Winchester factory tube, ca.....1993ish, ( I bought it new in 94, who knows when it was actually built.) has always shot like a good varmint rifle. Last fall I pulled her out of the safe for some load development with the new slow powders and 140's as recommended by MD. Three to four shots are okay, but things rapidly go to heck thereafter. Until I scrub the bore.

Next three shots into 5/8 moa, four five and six open it up to 1 moa, 1.75 moa, and 2.5 moa. Scrubbed the bore and repeat. Scrubbed the bore and repeat.

Now it takes twenty to thirty minutes to clean out the copper with with Sweets 7.62 after just three to five shots. And the brush is very difficult to pull through the throat.

I do not keep records of every box of bullets purchased, and can only guess that I have shot about twenty five hundred rounds through the gun. That could be plus or minus three or four hundred. About five hundred rounds have been low velocity 100 gr or 120 gr ballistic tips for shooting ground squirrels. The rest have been max loads with H4831, H1000, Rl22, Rl25 and 140 gr bullets.

Most of my shooting has been range work with three shot groups fired. I have never had the barrel so hot that I could not carry the rifle by the barrel comfortably. And I have always cleaned the bore religiously every twenty to thirty rounds with Shooter's Choice and J B's or USP bore paste. I have only recently started using Sweet's when it became almost impossible to clean with S C.

Sounds about right. All that care and attention got you the bonus of that many rounds down the pipe.. Good job!

2500 rounds is pretty good. barrels are cheap. I would stick another .264 on it and let it ride. reflex264

I just cleaned up my 264 a couple of days ago.

Montana 50 BMG mixed with JB cleaned it up real quick.
I can leave the Montana in overnight as it is water based.

2500 rounds is awesome. The rifle in my avatar is a 260 Ackley, excellent round, phenomenal accuracy at distance (1000+ yards). It's seen 1200 rounds and shows some checking - primarily due to me and pushing the rifle in tactical matches to serious meltdown. (try 34 rounds in about 4 minutes at the last one... man was I upset they had that setup.) I feel so bad about that because it's a great shooter.

Nice part is another barrel is waiting for me to finish wearing this one out. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!

Anyway, my point is this cartridge has made me a total believer in the 6.5 as a long range caliber. I shoot 142's out of it at 2950, and the wind drift (or lack thereof) continues to make me smile.

It's great to read someone else has appreciation for things 6.5.

I think bore to case ratio your up their with the 7STW.Thank you for your report.Read it with interest.

I would be pretty disappointed if I did not get 10,000 rds out of an 06, and an 06 is what I would have if I were only interested in an economical hunter/shooter. But the Swift, 240 wea, 257 wea, 264 and 7STW are an entirely different type of critter.

Presently, my intention is to send the Win to Pac-Nor for another 264 barrel. But if they start chambering for the 30-375 Ruger at Pac-Nor before I scrape together the funds.......... well it just might be sporting a 30 cal tube if that happens.

Fascinating post, thanks to all for the details. Despite the handle, I do like to play with other bore diameters. I too, have yet to find a 7 Rem. Mag that will really impress for flat shooting. Also, have to agree on the 26" barrel on the .264. We tried a factory 24" some years back and found it wasn't much faster than a 6.5-06 built with a 1 in 9", 26" Douglas barrel.
Sorry if I'm deviating, but did I understand you can shoot 300 deer per year? Here on the mainland in BC, we have a 3 deer limit. Being a failed farmer, I'm just trying to wrap my head around the crop damage the farmers must have to put up with. Thanks again, very interesting reading.

I am in unit "L" which is the problem unit. The deer population has exploded beyond belief here in the last 10 years. There are several agricultural areas that have deer populations in the neighborhood of 1000 deer per square mile. They changed hunting season a few years ago to alow each hunter oppertunity to kill 303 deer during deer season. reflex264

Thanks for the prompt answer. 1000 per square mile! Great snakes!
Now I can't wrap my head around how there are any farmers left there. Keep up the good work and please continue to keep us informed. Thanks again.

Well maybe not quite 1000 per sq mi but you get the drift. In most of middle and west Tn we can shoot 3 does a day, everyday from the opening of bow season (4th weekend of September) until the close of Gun season (first weekend of January). Only 3 bucks though.

Thanks for the report Reflex. I was just testing the new accubond this week in my 264.

Pmc