Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Hammer Forged vs Button-rifled vs cut rifled

We used to believe in blood letting too SCIENCE is not made up [bleep]

Frankly, the quality of the tooling and the expertise of the operator, have far more to do with the quality and accuracy of the barrel than does the method of rifling. I've seen a number of pronouncements here that hammer forged barrels are "cheap" barrels. If one amortizes the cost of the machinery necessary to produce such barrels, they are anything but cheap.The cost of the necessary machinery to produce hammer forged barrels start at in excess of a million bucks and go up from there. A mandrel for a specific cartridge and twist rate cost around $1500 twenty years ago. I have no idea what they cost these days, probably at least double, if not more.

Some of the most consistently accurate barrels that I've owned were hammer forged. Given the same level of care and precision by the operator, and the same quality of the equipment, I doubt there is anyone alive that could tell the difference in a top quality barrel produced from any of the rifling methods.

Yes just do a search. This has been thrashed to death.





Hogwash is someone claiming they can tell how a barrel was rifled by shooting it.

The next custom you build you can just pop over to europe and bring one back.
dave

I had a Hart that had that super high gloss finish.Very accurate.
I have two Obymeyers in 30 cal. The finish is more of a satin.
My first Obymeyer has 2059 rounds on it and doesnt look awhole lot different than when new. ie It takes longer to clean it now. That it takes longer to clean is about the only thing different. I would have expected it to look alot different .But it doesnt.

dave

a newbie smith without decent training can jack up the best barrel in the world.

So in the end the barrel has a great amount of dermination as to if the gun can shoot, but there are so many other things involved.. a good crown, stress relieved or not, and if it's chambered aligned with the bore or not....

one thing in common though, is that the custom guns tend to be made of the best parts, and tend to shoot better.

Hand lapping can fix a problematic barrel, but I'd rather start with good stock barrels - cut that is.

No, just empirical data.

Pulling a button through a barrel induces a lot more stress than shaving grooves one ten thousandth at a time. Consequently, the thin cut rifled barrels are mostly stress free and will shoot good hot or cold if they are going to shoot at all. I have seen button rifled barrels that really go wonky when heated up. It doesn't seem to affect the heavier ones as much.

Made up? How? You seem to be completely sold on a cut barrel, and where is the science in that? How can anyone scientifically prove a cut barrel is more accurate than a button barrel. You can't and you know it. What you are doing is trying to spread your OPINION in a manner which is not shared by others.

The worst barrel I ever onwned was a cut barrel made by the biggest cut maker in this country. I've also had a number of excellent barrels from the same. The same thing can be said for button. Both good and bad. There is NO certainty.

This

My question is this....when it comes time to spend $300-$400 bucks on a barrel, and another (what?) $200-$$350 for installation, what barrels are guys buying?

Also for the avid match shooters, what barrels do they see on the lines most often?

+1. Had a buddy in Florida that owned a Custom golf store, I once asked him what golf clubs were most popular? He said 'whatever Tiger Woods is using'.

Dave, I pretty much did just that. The current rifle I have in the works has a Lothar
Walther barrel which I got from Ralf Martini who got it from Europe. It is a button rifled barrel however, and not a hammer forged one. It is chambered for the 9.3x64 Brenneke cartridge. I have another Lothar Walther barrel on one of my 9.3x62 customs, also button rifled. It shoots lights out and I expect the 9.3x64 will do the same. I have several rifles with cut rifled bores by Danny Pedersen. They are all excellent. As I wrote earlier, I believe it is the skill of the maker and the quality of the tooling that is mostly responsible for the quality of the finished barrel.

I see it even at the local level, at one local club there are a couple of guys who are more successful and the other shooters copy their equipment. One of those guys is home smith and he chambers adams and bennet barrels and because he can shoot well and places well there are a couple of other guys that shoot the A&B barrels copying him. They are probably the only A&B shooters in the world.

According this list it looks like a toss up between Broughton and Kreiger.

http://www.pa1000yard.com/results/r...p;showshoots=No&tops=No&topct=10

RD yeah it seems that way. Interesting. Broughtons are button rifled right?

Yep. Pull buttoned as said on their website.

Pretty sure they are button rifled.

Tom,

As I mentioned earlier, and as you well know, Americans aren't as demanding as Europeans (especially Germans) when it comes to factory rifle accuracy. But an average German factory rifle will usually shoot as well as the typical rebarreled, restocked Remington 700 now considered a "custom" over here. My present .300 Winchester Magnum is a Heym SR-21 that shoots better than any of the other .300 WM's I've owned over the decade, including two American customs. It has one of those schittdy hammer-forged barrels. A lot of Americans also rave about how well Tikkas shoot, and they also have HF barrels.

Ruger is getting pretty good at hammer-forging barrels these days, one of the reasons their cheap American Rifles normally shoot so well. Most people looking through a bore-scope would be hard-pressed to tell the difference between the inside of many Ruger barrels and various lapped custom barrels these days.

All,


An observations, When I first started reloading (in the early 70s) I would read a lot of the books my dad had collected from the "olden days". Back when button rifling was getting it's start, It was the "Black Science". A statement from that time, "Anyone can pull a button through a pipe".


And a Question, If someone wanted to buy a Hammer Forged barrel for a custom build (not a factory take off) are there any available? And if so at what cost compared to the cut and button customs?

8mmwapiti

John,

Ain't it the truth. Strange you should mention your Heym .300 Win mag. My current .300 Win mag is one of the most accurate rifles I've ever owned or ever hope to own for that matter. It shoot far better than my tired old eyes can. My son shoots it consistently in the .2s. It's barrel is an E.R.Shaw that folks are constantly bitching about. It is button rifled of course, but still not normally held in high esteem. Score another point for expertise and tooling.

Hope Santa left a Purdey under your tree. TT