Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 30-06 Twist Rate

A friend of mine is getting his rifle rebarreled to a 30-06 and was wondering what twist rate to go with. It seems like most factory rifles are around 1-10 or 1-11. He will mainly be shooting 165-180gr bullets. Is either of these twist rates better for these bullets, and would both be decent choices if he decides to go up to 200gr bullets? Thanks in advance for any input!

With my custom 30-06,I have no problem shooting 150-200 grain bullets.
I have a 1-11 twist 3 grove Lilja #2 Stainless.

A 1-10 would do it all with no issues.

Hope this was some kind of help to you.

It was - thanks!

Roy Dunlap in one of his books told that one batch of
03 Springfields was much more accurate than usual.
They found out that a rifling machine was out of adjustment.
Since the barrels were non-regulation they changed the
machine. As you probably the 1/10 comes from the 220
grain round nose Krag bullet (why change all the paper work)?.

Now I'm curious, did he say what the unintended twist rate was?

I have a Rock Creek 1-11.25" on my 30-06 - its shoots anything I feed it!!

Jack O'Connor had a 1:12 Sukalle barrel on an '06 that shot 125-220gr bullets to the same POI at 100yds. One of his most accurate rifles. Opposite that, my gunsmith is using 1:8 barrels on their .30 cal. builds with great accuracy and terminal results. Evidently, voodoo is still a very real aspect of barrel science.

My current and probably last Model 70 is accurate with 125s, 150s,165s & 180s with a factory sporter 1-10 barrel. Haven't tried any other weights. I've only owned 1-10s. All shot the 150s, 165s & 180s good enough.

CZ uses 1x12 for their '06's. I don't any compalints or accolades one way or the other ...but CZ 's are known to shoot straight. Euro thing? Since all the US Factory products are allus 1x10's.
Ron

Fraser sorry I spipped over that. The new twist was as I
recall 1/11. My Dunlap gunsmithing book is out on load but
I'm pretty sure it was 1/11.

Actually, the CZ 1:12 is a mis-print. My CZ 550 measures at 1:10, which is the same as their .300 WM barrels. Only their .308 Win is 1:12.

But, yeah, they shoot quite nicely.

My rebarrel is the same except a much thinner barrel and it shoots 180 and 200 quite well.

Alan

My custom FN commercial Mauser 30-06 has a 1 in 1" barrel and it will shoot very nice groups even when shooting 220 gr. bullets. So does a Husqvarna M640 I have laying around as it too has a 1 in 12" from the factory. So much for that old myth that a 1 in 12" twist won't shoot decently or stabilize 220 gr. bullets. I even have a Winchester M70 in .308 that has a 1 in 12" twist from the factory and it's a .375" to .50" shooter all day long with a stiff load of W760 and the 220 gr. Sierra round nose.
Paul B.

Yah, that's what I remember Roy writing.

He also pointed out that modern bullets and loads have higher
muzzle velocity and require less twist.