Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Anybody use a barrel cooler

Make one or a buy one? Air mattress pump with a hose?

I use the flexible ice packs you get for sprains. Take 3-4 of them to the range and lay two over the barrel after each shot

Yep

Sham Wow soaked in ice water

Tikkanut- yeah. Some cold water nearby and a rag to soak in it.

Tikkanut- yeah. Some cold water nearby and a rag to soak in it.

Would be nice to:

A) have the powder and components I need to go shoot more- seems like its been forever.

B)go when the temperature isn't 110 degrees. Right now feels like any soaked rag would burst into flames before it made it to the barrel.

pack a 5 gallon bucket....throw in some ice.& water........GTG

I have used wet cloths to cool barrels if I'm shooting several rifles that say, but if only shooting one or two just pour ice water on 'em. If you hold the rifle with the barrel angled downward, most of the water will tend to slide along the barrel, which cools it very quickly.

When killing prairie dogs in a target rich environment, Chub and I always used a surgical tubing hooked up to the drain of our Coleman ice chest.

Remove the rifles bolt and insert a cleaning bore guide ... then run the surgical tubing in the back of the guide and let the ice-cold water run down the inside of the bore.

Man, that cools the barrel off most rickey-tick.

And, when developing loads for my gun articles, I had free use of the Leupold Underground Rifle Range. They had a powerful air compressor in the loading area of the range. Again, insert a Sinclair cleaning rod guide and turn the high-pressure air down the bore.

Cold in a minute and you are off to developing loads again.

Blessings,

Steve

We would often have ice water in a small cooler in which we would soak a rag to lay on the barrel. If we were set up near the house, we would have a fan blowing along the table top where we would lay the rifles. Both times were when the rifles were resting after a three-shot (insert apology here) group.

Steve,

Dunno if I ever told you about the time Ron Spomer actually shot a walnut-stock rifle so hot on an industry prairie dog shoot that the forend started on fire. We were all shooting newly introduced .22-250s that were actually designed as coyote rifles, with medium-weight barrels, but the rifle company wanted to get some publicity out on 'em so threw a PD hunt in mid-summer, and the temperature that afternoon rose to around 100. Suddenly we started smelling smoke--which was coming out of inletting of the barrel channel. There was a big cooler full of soft drinks and bottled water and ice cubes--which had melted enough that Ron stuck the entire barrel and forend underwater--and then went back to shooting....

Hope you are doing well!

John

I just pour half a bottle of water directly into the chamber. It’s dry almost instantly. I peek down the barrel to be sure. People think I’m crazy but it works!

Used an air mattress pump for a while & it worked great. Tired of its bulk & switched to a mini-cooler running on a 9 volt. It works great, quickly & is about the size of a Zippo lighter.

I use a battery operated air pump that is designed for fish tanks. I poke the tube into the chamber and turn it on.

It doesn't blow air real fast, but works surprisingly well at the range.

Posted this here a few times.

In Tucson it can get quite warm. I got sick of the wet towel approach and built a CO2 system over 15 yrs ago.

Originally saw a small CO2 tank advertised in Precision Shooting magazine. Turns out the small tanks don't work very well. A 20 lb tank works great and is good for many range sessions. A hose is attached with the tip tapered which will allow it to seal inside the chamber. I use it when I bring one rifle or working up a load. If multiple rifles are on hand I don't use it.

It takes 15-20 seconds of moderate flow to get the barrel back to ambient. Don't need a regulator, a ball valve will work just fine.

Link?

I use this: https://magnetospeed.com/products/riflekuhl

It's not as fast as some of the other methods posted here but it works. On the downside, it eats batteries like a fat kid eats cake.


Okie John

'Yo buddy!

When it's hot at the range and I'm working with a big cased rig, I bring my portable air tank with me. Insert bore guide, direct the rubber tipped air nozzle into the rear, give it a few 5 second blasts. You're cocked, locked and ready to rock on in about a minute.

Funny aside...you may remember my pal Marc Norlin that made the Winter Breeze CO2 cooler...he used to be at the VHA Jamborees. Marc's 'demo subject' was a wood stocked Model 70 in 243 that he'd heat the beejeebers out of the barrel on, then cool it off with his cooler.

Anyway, the Model 70 he had was one that Winchester did their version of 'hot glue' bedding on. One Winter, he brought it to me to be pillar bedded...that's when it got interesting. It had been heated so many times that the factory epoxy had reflowed...effectively making it a 'glue-in'!

Good to hear from you, my old friend.

Good shootin' -Al

Having a battery operated fan blow on them is a big plus

I use them but when I freeze them I put a dowel down the middle about the same size as the bbl.

Sits nicely on the bbl that way.