Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Ballistic Advantage barrel shoots well.

The wind is howling here, but got out early this morning before it got really cranked up. Gusts were pretty harsh tho.
Loaded 3 rounds with leverevolution, under 105 gr bthp's, at 2.200, just like factory Black ammo.
They shot under an inch, but 5 shots of factory, did real well considering the wind. Left my 90 grain bt reloads on the counter but had 2.
The BA barrel doesn't seem to be too finicky.
Gonna concentrate on 95 grain Ballistic tips for a bit since I have lots of them. I'm hoping 90 gr Accubonds will like the same 0.020 off, as the 90 grain bt's. Changing from Varget to leverevolution as powder choice tho.



Tired of my facial hair getting grabbed by the CTR stock, I swapped with this one. Much better.

I'm really liking this 6mm ARC. I'll be going long after surgery, up at the range.

I am saving bigly with the 6ARC... I stopped at Brownells today and bought 80 rounds... It saved me from buying a bunch of other stuff!

Nice rig, I've wondered about the BA barrels.

My 6ARC is a 21" Odin Works, I've been running factory ammo and then using the brass from that. It's good for an average of 2,680 fps with factory 108gr ELDMs, and 2,705 fps with factory 105gr bthp. My loads with LVR are similar, and I've taken it out to 1,250 yds, although it was sucking wind at that point, 1k was more convincing, and it hammers at 750. All pretty fun from an AR.

Next I want a lighter 18" barreled upper that I can use for general purpose and hunting. Might have to look at BA, I thought the Wilson Combat Recon RLGS 18" barrel was going to be the ticket, but they cancelled my order for that barrel and discontinued it in favor of a MLGS version.....

We know BA makes some good barrels. Looks like yours is shooting well enough, as I've said before. I was just at the store a little while ago, looking at die sets for my new 204 Ruger and saw a 6mm ARC loading die set. I had to look away real quick!!! Splat, when you get a chance, shoot a couple 10 shot groups side by side. Thanks...

That's pretty much where I am too. Someone says they chamber 6 arc in a lightweight barrel but I can't remember who. Maybe X-Caliber.

A sub-6 pound ar in 6 arc would be a pretty dang cool rig.

BA barrels are about as good as a Bear Creek Arsenal barrel. Friends don't let friends buy BA, BCA, Faxon barrels

Here is the throat on a BA 223 Wylde barrel. Many reports of the same thing stretching back to around Sept of last year on the same throat in all 223 wylde barrels. That ledge goes all the way around the throat. They knew it and sent them out anyway

Bsa,
Here's an 8 shot with 95 grain bt's, lever, and 2 shots starting at 0.030 off, 0.040, 0.050, and 0.060.
I know the lower one at 0.050, I screwed up in the wind, but I over laid them, and the group, was 1.036 the best I could measure. Not bad for varied oal's, I'd say.
I'm going to stay at max powder charge, and revist 0.035 - 0.040.
The 3 in the middle are 90 grain accubonds over lever, at 0.020 off.
The hole on the right is the first shot out a fresh scrubbed barrel. Then 2 touching. Gonna try that combo again, with 11 rounds down the barrel. No fouler off group I hope.

Looks pretty consistent, even for the oal difference. I think it is showing good potential. Better than my 6x45. That reminds me, I need to load up some 87gr Vmax's for that one. Just bought 400 at Scheels the other day.

After my PT, I'm going to try a few accubonds.

Seems not many consider the A2 rifle stock a viable option anymore:

Nothing wrong with an A2, except guys like having the adjustability of the other stocks. I prefer the second gen PRS myself, but have one rifle I've kept with the A2 because its an original Colt. The new Magpul rifle stock is pretty nice and won't break the bank, however it's non adjustable. I threw one of those on my Armalite AR10t, because I'm sending it down the road and I did not want to let it go with one of my $260.00 PRS stocks on board. Its not bad, but a little short in LOP.

Stocks are subjective to everyone's needs. I got by with an A2 for years but an adjustable stock just works better for me. I comfortable with about a 13" LOP, right about where the A1 was before they added the 5/8" spacer...

I get a much better cheekweld with the SOPMOD stock shown above but I still have one simple CTR stock and it works well enough.

I used my 6mm ARC upper on the lower for one of my .223s, that has a Magpul MOE rifle stock and a velocity trigger for a while. I like that setup, but recently built a lower up for the ARC with one of the new Magpul PRS Lite stocks, and a La Rue MBT-2S flat bow trigger (3lbs) that I love. I think the PRS Lite is pretty tough to beat for these kinds of uses for $100 -$110, I'll definitely buy more.

For reference:
https://www.brownells.com/rifle-par...r-15-prs-lite-buttstocks-prod139681.aspx

I get a better cheek weld too.
I have solid stocks on my rat, and coyote guns.
I'm liking the collapsible ones for fair weather shooting, and when cold, and wearing heavier garments, I can shorten the lop, to keep my eye box the same.
So I upped the charge of leverevolution to 30.0 grains and loaded 5, at 0.035 off. I know Varget shoots well in this barrel, so I loaded 5, with 28.0 grains.
Varget is on the right. That wild one was shot #4. No idea what happened ???
Leverevolution is going to be over a hunert fps faster than Varget, so I'm happy it grouped well. The wind is still an issue here.
Well BSA ? I'm thinking I have a 2750 fps or so, 95 grain ballistic tip load.

The BA barrel on my AR is flat out MOA all day every day. I"d buy another so fast it would make your head spin...

buy a WOA and you wouldn't

If I'm not mistaken, WOA, stopped arc, and Grendel barrels, or bolts, or ?

Never started the 6 ARC. Warned against it and high pressure loads. Something I'd be cautious of as well... The reason I went 6x45 instead.

I like the A2 stock, and in competition I don't adjust my adjustable stock. The adjustable doesn't offer any advantage.

But for a hunting gun I appreciate adjustment. In going from a tee shirt to insulated coveralls and sitting against a tree, I find it really helps to be able to shorten the stock.

They pushed out that statement and too this day they still haven’t tested the 6ARC like they said they were. Their last statement was from October 2021, they said they were to busy, which is understandable.

I do see their concerns when it comes to high power shooters. They will ride the edge of pressure majority of the time they go over it.

Now normal folks who adhere to hornady recommendation not to load over 52k will probably be fine.

Or ?
Means, or never started or ?
They don't sell anything Grendel or ARC.
They don't want to be held liable for reloaders over pressure.
Just a little too much leverevolution, seems to cause real high spikes, real quick !
Thank you for the stuff. I'm going to load some more bt's to make sure they shoot that good again, then do a quantity load so I have ammo on hand.
Chronograph should be here today !

That's a good thing to check those loads and make sure you aren't giving it too much beans buddy. Then after that, load all the ammo you want. Looks like you are getting it dialed in. On to the subject of the 10 shot groups that I brought up earlier, I haven't been shooting them much anymore, since I am shooting more long range and trying to conserve my ammo. But its always a good idea to shoot them when verifying a load. Then, when you find a load you are happy with, load a chit ton. With my AR's, I set the bar at sub moa 10 shot groups. That way I know if I shoot 3 or 5 shot groups, the load is fully capable of sub moa. Even at long range, which I also verify. I also try to work up loads that work that well in multiple rifles. For me, a 10 shot group tells me far more than a 3 or 5 shot group. Now in my new to me 30-06, I've been shooting 3 and 5 shot groups. With ammo that was loaded for another rifle. This was under the fine tuning process and to make sure bedding was correct. Now its on to load development, where I will shoot multiple 5 shot groups. If I get a string where 2 shots are 1 1/2+ inches apart, I'll stop shooting that load and pull the bullets and save components. I'm glad to see your 6 ARC is shooting acceptably well for your needs. Makes me want to pull my 6x45 out again. I recently bought some 87gr Vmax's to play around with, since they were a pretty good deal at Scheels. I'm also glad you are posting pics and getting out and enjoying our shooting sports buddy. Even with a hurt back. I know that sucks. I've still been shooting my competitions as my ribs heal up. They are not 100%, even after a few months. I felt that on the last shoot and have another one coming up next saturday.. Laying in the dirt and shooting isn't my favorite thing to do, but I'm keeping up with the guys there. Even with my mostly bone stock Tikka... The only one shooting without a chassis..

I have to get out !
I'm going stir crazy in the house.
I've tried to get anything lifting, bending, or twisting done.
I gotta call the urologist on Monday. I don't have an appointment til June 16th ! Back surgery won't be done til that kidney stone is out !
That means into July maybe !!!
Then minimum 3 months to mend, before pt starts.....
That puts me into October ...
No hunting for me this year, other than waterfowl. Finn should be ready for simple retrieves by then, maybe started casting ?
I'm just playing with range toys, and maybe calling coyotes ?

Sounds like a plan. I'm going to go and work up some new loads for my 6x45:


I was ringing steel with it at 400 the other night. Shooting along side a guy and his girlfriend. He was using his DPMS AR308 and was not hitting jack chidt. After a while he asked, "what yardage is the coyote target"? I said 400:



He said, "oh chidt, that is why I'm not hitting anything, I thought it was 500!!". Then his girlfriend says, "I could have told you it was 400". Oh, it was interesting. The guy was in shorts and getting down on the cement pad and shooting prone:


As the sun was going behind the hill, it was getting chilly. Probably around 40 degrees. He said, "damn its getting a little too cold out here to be laying on this cement, I should have been more prepared". His girlfriend said, "well you are a marine, not a boy scout". I almost started busting up.. Strange guy, but the girlfriend was hot.. ha ha.. I was using my 85gr SGK load for my 6x45. That seems like a very popular bullet, works great on deer and the like I guess.. It was definitely tagging that yote silhouette at 400 yards with every shot though. Almost too big of a target for most rifles I shoot...

Always a good time with the general public !!

I love BA barrels for their accuracy, I just hate they are so damn heavy. Not all are that way, I have several of their pencil barrels that are accurate but 3-5 shots and they begin walking, great for deer or hen house intruders, but wouldn't want to go cyclic with one.

I wished there were some midweight choices in their ARC options like this Grendel barrel I have

I surely do loves pictures of targets well shot and of the guns what done it.

Hey Darryle,
I've not had it done, but is it possible to send an AR barrel out, and have it fluted ?
Normal rifle barrels get it done, why not an AR ?

They can be done, there was a group over on another forum that got together and did a group buy. I don't remember the shop that did the work because I didn't have an unfluted barrel to send in. I did buy one from another member that sent one in and got ansy and bought one fluted and finished his build. The work was really nice and deep, but sharp. I ended up taking it to a machine shop buddy of mine and tumbled it in his tumbler, after a serious tape and seal job, it came out perfectly fine with nice edges on the flutes. It was still heavier than I liked but shot excellent. We also used a steelabrator on another stainless barrel to see what would happen, apparently nothing, no improvement or no harm either. We kinda were thinking stress relief, but other than a weird finish, it was a waste of time.

If BA would copy that Grendel barrel profile and fluting in 6mm ARC, I would buy 3 or 4 just to have. That 20" barrel is just a few ounces heavier than my 16" Faxon 6mm ARC barrel.

Can you please specify some details, how many flutes, flute width, barrel OD behind gas block, and flute depth, thus groove to flute bottom measurement? Anything else, weight, length... Please & Thanks


Edited

Boomer, I will measure them tomorrow. I have the calipers sitting right there with it because I was wondering myself about actual weeight savings.

Boomer,
If yours turns out nice, and no loss of accuracy.
How much to do mine ?

I'll have to see how it goes. I'll reach out to you directly to let you know what's happening.

Awesome !
Thank you.
I'm looking forward to this.

Chronograph results from this morning.
90 grain Nosler BT, 2.195 OAL, 28.0 grains of varget. 18" barrel.
Average of 3 shots, 2685 fps.

95 grain Nosler BT. 2.208 oal, 30.0 grains of leverevolution, 18" barrel.
Average of 5 shots, 2838 fps.

105 Grain Hornady bthp, 2.210 oal, 29.5 grains of leverevolution, 18" barrel.
Average of 3 shot. 2675 fps.

OK, it's hard to measure flute depth with a pair of calipers alone, but with a couple of drill rods, it becomes exponentially easier.

Front Flutes:

Width .250"
Length 5"
Barrel diameter .730" forward of the gas block journal
Minor diameter at base of flutes .640"

Rear Flutes:

Width .375"
Length 10.5"
Barrel diameter .850 aft of the gas block journal
Minor diameter at base of flutes .640"

Weight listed is 33.3oz
Weight with gas tube and low profile non-adjustable gas block was 2lbs 5 oz

Link to the barrel:

Ballistic Advantage fluted 6.5 Grendel barrel DMR contour

Thanks for the details! It's much appreciated.

Played with my oal a little with 105 grain Hornady bthp's, and went to 2.220 over 29.5 grains of leverevolution.
Yep, that'll do pig !
90 gainers are still shooting well.

Looking better splat..

That looks good.

F'yes

I broke down and ordered a lightweight 18" RLGS 6ARC from X-Caliber to go with my heavy 21", during their Memorial day sale.

It's such a fun cartridge, I was hitting at 1k pretty easily at the range on Friday. I'll probably pick up some 103gr ELDx and use something between them and 95gr BTs for deer in the 18".

I'm liking it too.
For how small, and little recoil, it sure seems to lob bullets pretty well.

How is a Hornady 105 grain bthp for hunting.
I know it's a target bullet, but any expansion from them ?
Bigstick ?
You shot anything living with one ?

I run the 105bthp outta a 243. Blacktails dont like it

5 shots of 29.5 grains of leverevolution under a 105gr bthp averaged at 2676 fps, and was only using 2 mils to hit at 400 yards today.

What kind of accuracy are you getting at 400? Just curious, as where I do a lot of shooting now, I generally test my rifles at 400 yards too, when the wind isn't howling too much. Even though at my last match the wind was 16 mph off and on.. Making it a shidt load of fun. I generally don't give two fu cks about the wind, but there are a lot of guys that fall apart when shooting in it. At the range though, you can't expect groups to look tight or even land where you want them to, if the winds are howling. The other day I had to hold 2 moa off target at 400 and was still not dead nuts:

That was with the baby bullet (32gr) from the 204 Ruger. Funny thing is it did not really affect the 7mm rem mag shooting 162gr ELDX pills.. The reason I ask is because I wanted to compare your 6 ARC to my 6x45 at 400. I don't think my rifle shoots as consistently as yours does, but it is sub moa for 5 shots at 100 yards with loads it likes. I still need to take that rifle out and do some more shooting past 400 to see what it is capable of.. I think its capable for what it is, just no where near as capable as your ARC. Thanks for posting your results buddy. Its interesting to me. Also, I should add what I'm seeing at the shoots is the 6mm cartridges are prevailing in the wind. They require very minimal wind correction, so they dominate. Guys using the 6GT, 6 Creed, and other fast 6mm's do quite well. I hear them talking and saying they are not correcting for wind much at all. Where with my 6.5, I had to hold off a bit, depending on what the wind was doing at that moment. Its not too hard to figure out, if you pay attention to your environment, but those fast 6's are fun to watch. I believe they were at the top of the heap on scores too, then I fell in 4th with the lowly ol 6.5...

They have these things called ballistic calculators, try it out it. It will blow your mind.

https://www.hornady.com/team-hornady/ballistic-calculators/

If you want to blow minds take a little scratch find a fast twist 22 caliber barrel 1-7 or 1-6.5 have a 22-250 made then buy some of those 90gr SMK bc of .559 one should have no problem making 2900 with that bullet out if a 22-250 I finish the barrel at 26-27 inches.

Sure thing..

You are quite the funny guy.

The BC on that 90gr SMK is actually .563. LGS has a model 670 in a 06 priced pretty cheap was thinking snagging it and having fast 22-250 barrel screwed on it. It would be a straight up high-power match rifle for 1000yd matches.

Cut flutes today, (still a little more to do). What happens under the handguard stays under the handguard, right? Right? Next time I will have a clue.

Oh, forgot to weigh it first. LOL spec is 41.3oz.

So, it's 0.850" diameter, minus 0.243" = 0.607" / 2 =>0.3035" walls. I cut six 0.250 width flutes 0.150" deep. Up front of the gas port, I cut to the same depth, though the outside diameter is a bit less.

Ended up deciding to use a billet receiver set from Noreen who's fairly local here. Not overly impressed. I dinked around breaking some edges and ground off the nubs for the port door on the upper. It's sans forward assist. Too rough a blast before their anodizing. Really didn't notice beforehand, but, they say they are 6061 T6, which is fairly unusual. Cerakoting later.

We'll see. Might get it together late tonight, or not. Will follow up with details.

Nice.
Keep us up on how it shoots now.
I may still want my barrel lightened up....
A 10 pound AR isn't what I want to lug around.

Ended up at 31.7 ounces. So, almost 10 ounces below spec. FDE in the oven.

Yeah, I wish Tikka would have went just a hair faster on their twist. I've been watching videos on those 90's for a while now. Sierra advertises them at .563 bc. I can run the 80gr Hornady ELD match with a bc of .485. Not quite a good, but will stabilize in the 22-250 I have on hand. I'm sure any of those bullets will work well for the varmint silhouette's I'm shooting at. Hell, the 53's do pretty damn well when the wind isn't howling..

Think Berger...

Don’t leave everyone hanging, what is the best AR barrel to buy ?

7.55 pounds, barrel accuracy, per thread topic TBD. I don't seem to have an ARC-appropriate scope on hand. Could be a long while.













Noreen billet receivers, barrel extension fit was tight as hell, assembled upper to lower fit tight as hell.
BA 18" 6mmARC, rifle gas, flutes
Melonite gas tube, Aero 2nd gen AGB, with a small relief for the adjustment screw...
WOA Varmint Float Tube
Toolcraft BCG
NBS billet charging handle
FAB Defense JooJoo buttstock
RRA NM two-stage trigger, Dirty Bird antiwalk pins
Misc other stuff, about a 4oz buffer, ASC mags, Magpul + grip.

Ok.
So when do you want my barrel to cut flutes !!??