6 Dasher No-Barrel-Cleaning Test

[Brucebarker024]

How do you think this chambering will compare to say a 22creedmoor suppressed, in terms of powder burnt for bore size etc.

Which will be more overbore… saum or creed?

Is your saum suppressed?

Honestly I haven’t looked at the overbore comparison but I imagine the 22 creed is more overbore.

My saum has been suppressed for the last 200 rounds. Before that it was just a brake.

 

[Carl Ross]

Made it across the 2000 round line. I'll keep shooting it as my match rifle but with 105 Hybrids till I'm ready to switch to the next barrel, and am keeping 100 rounds worth of the current lot of 109 Hybrids and Varget to test as it gets further rounds on it. Funny enough it finished up with the single tightest 20 round group of the test. The velocity spreads and vertical at distance do seem to be creeping up.



Got my scatter plot working. Note, at 500 rounds there is a step change of ~ 20 fps less when I stopped jamming the bullets. At 1332 there is a step change of ~20 fps more when I switched to a can from a brake.





And...if you'll forgive the brag, this barrel has accumulated it's share of regional PRS & WPR match hardware along the way:

 

[MEdude]

Given the wealth of knowledge conveyed via this thread, seems reasonable to dismiss any minor incidental display of hardware, and just say "Thank you very much," for sharing your results.

 

[khuber84]

I've been not so far behind Carl in a lot those matches. An accurate rifle is just a small piece to the equation that earned them, he's a great shooter.

 

[Carl Ross]

I've been not so far behind Carl in a lot those matches. An accurate rifle is just a small piece to the equation that earned them, he's a great shooter.

I have my moments, and you do too.

One of the things I often say I like about PRS/NRL is there is a “good enough” when it comes to rifle accuracy. I don’t especially enjoy sifting through the component combinations to find what shoots the best, I like that you can do the good barrel/good smith/Berger/Varget/decent loading practices path and expect to be competitive with it.

 

[eric1115]

Made it across the 2000 round line. I'll keep shooting it as my match rifle but with 105 Hybrids till I'm ready to switch to the next barrel, and am keeping 100 rounds worth of the current lot of 109 Hybrids and Varget to test as it gets further rounds on it. Funny enough it finished up with the single tightest 20 round group of the test. The velocity spreads and vertical at distance do seem to be creeping up.

View attachment 1021255

Got my scatter plot working. Note, at 500 rounds there is a step change of ~ 20 fps less when I stopped jamming the bullets. At 1332 there is a step change of ~20 fps more when I switched to a can from a brake.

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And...if you'll forgive the brag, this barrel has accumulated it's share of regional PRS & WPR match hardware along the way:

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Yeah but just wait. That carbon ring is gonna show up aaaaaaany day now and start causing issues.

In all seriousness, I truly appreciate you taking the time to track this and share your results. It definitely tracks with my observations (which are nowhere near as carefully tracked) and your skill level certainly separates signal from noise much better as well!

 

[Lawnboi]

Every hand loader needs a dasher!

 

[Carl Ross]

2500 round update. Using up smaller batches of bullets and shooting my share of 1 day matches has accelerated my round count on this barrel somewhat. The 2481-2500 group though is with the same batch of components as everything I published after 1000 (and the same "everything but bullet lot" since round 1). I've shot some good to very good groups (and matches) in the last 500 rounds but I am thinking the best days for this barrel might be in the rear view, though it certainly isn't dramatic. I zero'd and doped a 105 SMK load after this and shot another match with that load this weekend, we'll see how much longer I go before I retire it to practice/dust collection.

Also, switched from a TBAC Magnus to the NHS since the 2000 round group, I expect the NHS adds a little less velocity than the Magnus though I didn't test them back to back.

 

[Castle Rock]

I would be so itchy to clean that now and see what it will do.

 

[Carl Ross]

I would be so itchy to clean that now and see what it will do.

Unfortunately you can't have your cake and eat it too. I'm honestly not that curious how it would shoot if I cleaned it, being as it has been pretty stable for large groups the whole time. Still, barrels aren't their best forever, and I think we're approaching the point we can tell. Could be wrong.

 

[Tanner]

2500 round update. Using up smaller batches of bullets and shooting my share of 1 day matches has accelerated my round count on this barrel somewhat. The 2481-2500 group though is with the same batch of components as everything I published after 1000 (and the same "everything but bullet lot" since round 1). I've shot some good to very good groups (and matches) in the last 500 rounds but I am thinking the best days for this barrel might be in the rear view, though it certainly isn't dramatic. I zero'd and doped a 105 SMK load after this and shot another match with that load this weekend, we'll see how much longer I go before I retire it to practice/dust collection.

Also, switched from a TBAC Magnus to the NHS since the 2000 round group, I expect the NHS adds a little less velocity than the Magnus though I didn't test them back to back.

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Are those 105 SMK’s truing up close to their advertised BC for you Carl? They are pretty slickery, if so.

 

[wind gypsy]

Are those 105 SMK’s truing up close to their advertised BC for you Carl? They are pretty slickery, if so.

Was also curious about this. Saw glasscock had a youtube vid where they measured basically the same as a 105 hybrid for him in BC but hadn't looked much.

Thanks for sharing Carl and that is an impressive stack of trophys for 1 barrel.

How filthy does the brass look coming out of that thing? I feel like my 6.5x47 brass gets pretty sooty after a few hundred rounds without a chamber cleaning. Not that I care that much but it's noticed.

 

[Carl Ross]

Are those 105 SMK’s truing up close to their advertised BC for you Carl? They are pretty slickery, if so.

I actually didn’t see what they published. I eyeballed it vs a 105 Hybrid, put .280 G7 in AB, and it was right on at 1000 on Friday. Didn’t attribute any misses to elevation during our match yesterday out to 1100.

Was also curious about this. Saw glasscock had a youtube vid where they measured basically the same as a 105 hybrid for him in BC but hadn't looked much.

Thanks for sharing Carl and that is an impressive stack of trophys for 1 barrel.

How filthy does the brass look coming out of that thing? I feel like my 6.5x47 brass gets pretty sooty after a few hundred rounds without a chamber cleaning. Not that I care that much but it's noticed.

It’s behaved itself even if it isn’t about to set benchrest records. There’s a LOT more trophies to go around than there used to be, and more talent to contend for them too.

My brass has been coming out quite clean, kinda surprisingly clean. The last five from yesterday:

 

[Carl Ross]

3000 round update. I think I've shot like 5 different bullets in the last 1000 rounds since I ran out of the 109's I set aside for the test (aside from the handful I set aside for these spot checks). There's been a little weirdness here and there, I honestly expected this one to show the barrel has lost a step. But...the data doesn't really jive with that. I'm still planning to switch over to a Lilja I have sitting here for match use, but I'm thinking more that I'll put this barrel on my trainer (currently a 223) and continue this test to see when it really shows that it's dropping off. Won't lie, I'm a bit surprised. My controls haven't been perfect, but they're good enough to trust that when it's going like this it isn't coincidence.

 

[solarshooter]

3000 round update. I think I've shot like 5 different bullets in the last 1000 rounds since I ran out of the 109's I set aside for the test (aside from the handful I set aside for these spot checks). There's been a little weirdness here and there, I honestly expected this one to show the barrel has lost a step. But...the data doesn't really jive with that. I'm still planning to switch over to a Lilja I have sitting here for match use, but I'm thinking more that I'll put this barrel on my trainer (currently a 223) and continue this test to see when it really shows that it's dropping off. Won't lie, I'm a bit surprised. My controls haven't been perfect, but they're good enough to trust that when it's going like this it isn't coincidence.

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Man, as a guy who really appreciates real data and the work it takes to stay consistent and methodical with your process, record keeping, etc, THANK YOU. At some point I'm going to mine all the data you have here and do some work with it. The apparent sinusoid in the MV vs shot count plot is so interesting. Maybe that's annual environmental changes. Either way, really cool stuff, thanks for doing it.

 

[MCGHeel]

Thank you for your contribution to the cultural learning of the people of Rokslidistan

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Lawnboi]

Cleaning or no cleaning, it’s cool to see a dasher barrel continuing to shoot well 3000 rounds in. Will be interesting to see what you get out of it at the end.

 

[Carl Ross]

Man, as a guy who really appreciates real data and the work it takes to stay consistent and methodical with your process, record keeping, etc, THANK YOU. At some point I'm going to mine all the data you have here and do some work with it. The apparent sinusoid in the MV vs shot count plot is so interesting. Maybe that's annual environmental changes. Either way, really cool stuff, thanks for doing it.

I can send you my spreadsheet with the raw velocity data if you want.

Here's where I made changes that seemed to impact velocity (the middle two largely explain some of the curve shape):

@ 21 rounds - Started jamming bullets to control headspace, the brass was looser in the chamber than I liked. Ave velocity increased 23 fps, but the barrel was also speeding up consistently in this portion of the test.

@ 501 rounds - Stopped jamming bullets, switched to second firing of brass (bumped to my preferred fit). Ave velocity dropped 18 fps.

@ 1333 rounds - Switched from a muzzle brake to a TBAC Magnus. Ave velocity increased 18 fps.

@ 2481 rounds - Switched from the Magnus to a NHS. I also trimmed the brass which somewhat improved velocity spread. It seemed to be touching the end of the chamber, should have done it earlier. Ave velocity dropped 8 fps, but this wasn't a back-to-back test like the above were.

There's a correlation between temp and velocity. Imperfect, but it's there. I'm not the type of statistical nerd to be able to quantify it without having to learn some new things.

Glad it's appreciated. It's easier to justify the effort when it benefits others too, not just my own curiosity.