Acurizing a rifle that won't shoot?

[mooman76]

A couple of recent post by Joe B. and Crabo have inspired me to pose the question, How do you go about getting a rifle to shoot cast bullets well.:coffee:

I believe that most any gun that doesn't have obvious defects can be made to shoot. There is always the exception of coarse and I'm not trying to say you'll make any rifle a bench shooter but shouldn't you be able to take a gun and be able to get minute of pie plate accuracy at 100y. What would make a gun shoot so bad, one that is old and worn, but not worn out barely be able to hit a 4x8 sheet of plywood at 100y?

More importantly, what are some of the first steps would you take to get it to shoot well when it doesn't seem to want to?:castmine:

[Char-Gar]

The possible causes of a rifle not being able to shoot well are so numerous, that it's makes no sense to try and give a list. You will need to be more specific and talk about what rifle and what ammo.

Even a smooth bore musket should be able to hit a 4 X 8 sheet of plywood at 100 yards.

[leftiye]

You should probly start by looking the barrel over as to smoothness, etc.. Take it out in the sunlight and hold it at an angle so that you can see the machining marks if any. If it looks nice and smooth with no obvious defects, then slug the bore at the muzzle and breech and run another slug clear through, and chamber cast it. Now you can know (preliminarily, might have to try larger or smaller boolits later) how big to size the boolits. From the chamber cast, you can see how to set up your cartridge (depending on what you get, an approach might-should become apparent) to fit your chamber, and leade, and bore. Innacuracy as upsetting as what you describe almost always lies in the boolit not fitting well, the bore being "gone", or the boolit deforming badly for some reason, or improper amounts of spin (keyholing).

[NVcurmudgeon]

A couple of recent post by Joe B. and Crabo have inspired me to pose the question, How do you go about getting a rifle to shoot cast bullets well.:coffee:

I believe that most any gun that doesn't have obvious defects can be made to shoot. There is always the exception of coarse and I'm not trying to say you'll make any rifle a bench shooter but shouldn't you be able to take a gun and be able to get minute of pie plate accuracy at 100y. What would make a gun shoot so bad, one that is old and worn, but not worn out barely be able to hit a 4x8 sheet of plywood at 100y?

More importantly, what are some of the first steps would you take to get it to shoot well when it doesn't seem to want to?:castmine:

Assuming your first go-round on the 4X8 was with cast.

1. Is it completely clean of every trace of copper?
2. Have you slugged it? Is the boolit a thou or two fatter than groove diameter?
3. Crown OK? Rifling OK at the muzzle and a ways back?
4. Bad or loose scope or sights?
5. Bedding gossly off? Have you tried shimming it up in the stock?
6. What caliber and load? Maybe one of us could send you a sample of known-good boolits.

[mooman76]

I do have a bad rifle that brought up the question in my mind. Mostly I was talking of guns in general. Some people have little tricks on what they do to improve accuracy. The Gun I am talking about is an old Spanish mauser in 7mm mauser. The 4x8 remark may have been a exageration but it does shoot remakably bad even with factory ammo. At 50y and can't keep the rounds on paper. The bore is oversized which would also account for the factory rounds being bad sooters as well. They shot bad enough I could barely hit paper at 100y and it would certainly not be good enough for deer hunting at a distance of over 75y. The bore is not shiny, it is dark and porous which is common for allot of guns of thet period espesially spanish mausers. The bore may be porous but it is not pitted and the rifleing is pronounced. I have tried oversized bullets but with no luck. There was no evidence of key holing either.
I was mostly just looking for ideas on some of the first things people try to get their CB's to shoot well. I have cast some good pistol rounds and done well there but Have had limited success with rifles.

[montana_charlie]

The bore may be porous but it is not pitted
Don't know about others, but I could use some clarification on that statement.
Would it be accurate to say it's pitted, but there are no big chunks missing?

When trying to determine why a rifle is inaccurate, I look first at the crown. Small defects can make big groups.
Then I move to how the barrel is bedded. Wedge a piece of cardboard between the barrel and the forend and see if that changes the group size (on a military rifle, remove as much of the wood as is practical before doing this test).

And - of course - sights can get loose.

CM

[mooman76]

By porous I am meaning the bore is not shiny smooth. There is no pitting. I can get a dull shine out of the barrel and the metal it is made of is softer more porous metal like maybe in the old muzzle loaders or early cartridge rifles.

Anyway I seem to be getting off track or maybe I didn't clarify the question or maybe it is really too complext to even ask. I was just speaking of a gun in general you may have a gun with no visible signs or obvious signs that it would shoot bad but does anyway.
What would be some of the steps you would take to get it to shoot reasonably well. By reasonably well I mean make a plinker out of a gun that wouldn't shoot well before.

[Junior1942]

I'm betting it has badly worn rifling at the muzzle due to cleaning rod wear.

[Blammer]

first-clean the inside of the barrel till it's absolutely positively clean!

2nd, check rifling, make sure it has some, and slug barrel, and check to make sure crown is in good shape.

3rd, make sure your sights on the gun are solid! not maybe but definitely solid and repeatable.

4th, develop loads for it in your usual way.

[Pilgrim]

I rather suspect Jr is correct.

There is an old saying about accuracy (BR Folks originated this one)...Barrels, bedding, bullets...and in that order. I would lump the crown in with the "barrel" list. For me, if I can't get the rifle to shoot with known good bullets (virtually any commercial jacketed bullet), average load with normal (for that caliber/cartridge) powder, and a cursory look at the crown, the bedding, and the sights, then I stop fooling with it and go get another barrel for it. Bedding problems will show up readily if you see an area that is rubbed, or if the barrel moves when you tighten up the action screws, or if the sights are loose. Bad crowns will show unevenness when you look at it squarely, or chips and dings in the metal. Rifling wear at the muzzIe will also show readily. If you have a spare scope, try it. I've had scopes (even Leupolds a few times!) go bad. Never 4' X 8' bad, but ~1' bad.

Accurate rifles almost always want to shoot accurately, with nearly any load or bullet. CBs will nearly always shoot accurately in an accurate rifle IF the barrel is clean of copper, the boolit is .001 to .002 over sized, well filled out, square based, and gas checked, any good lube, and you aren't trying for high velocity. High velocity results in other "stuff" coming into play with CB's, but not at normal to low rifle velocities (1500 to 2000 fps or so).

I've spent untold hours and many hundreds of dollars trying to get a rifle with a bad barrel to shoot accurately. A Ruger #1 in .223 comes to mind, as does a Browning BLR in .358 Win. They both wear new barrels now. I suspect in some very rare cases there is a "special load" that will make it shoot, but that is so rare as to be discounted. You can easily spend as much money as a new barrel trying to get a bad one to shoot accuraqtely. And when you are done, you still have an inaccurate rifle that needs a new barrel. Also FWIW...You don't need a match grade barrel in order to have an accurate rifle, unless you are defining accurate as BR accurate (less than .1" for 5 shots at 100 yds). Nearly any barrel from a reputable maker will produce 1" (or less) accuracy nowadays if the shooter is up to it. Pilgrim

[joeb33050]

My hobby is to acquire a gun, get it to shoot cast bullets, then sell it. I've been doing this for a long time, with a lot of rifles. I've had failures, but not many. When A gun won't shoot as well as can be reasonably expected after trying to fiddle with the load, I have take instruction from those who seem to know, and fiddled with the gun.
I have inserted cardboard shims, glass bedded, free floated barrels, re-crowned barrels, fiddled with scopes and mounts, added target triggers and other stuff.
Now I've been reading this thread for a while, because I want to know about the subject.
I didn't just sit down and write this. I thought about it long and hard.
For any rifle I've had or used that wouldn't shoot reasonably well by fiddling with the load, I have never, ever, had it start shooting well after changing anything to do with the rifle or scope. Never. Now that's me.
I had a Springfield 03 with a Lyman 48 and ?77 front that would shoot 100 yard five shot groups of 1 1/2" average, then shoot a 3" group, then a 1" group, then whatever it wanted. There were men about who knew about these rifles, and I filed barrel bands, sanded out stock and handguard parts, used other barrel bands and stacking swivel front things, changed stocks, Timney trigger, back and forth. I sent it down the road, never fixed.

I'd like to believe that with a rifle that won't shoot after trying the loading variations; that some one or set of changes to the rifle and/or scope will fix it. I've never seen it.
Anyone seen it happen?
joe brennan

[waksupi]

Altering various things on rifles do indeed change the way they shoot. Generally a bedding problem. All of our rifles are test fired before shipping, and maybe half need some work done to get them to sub MOA before they go out the door. Home gun plumbers can't necessarily run down the problem. That's why you hire a professional. Someone recently stated they could never get a certain brand of rifle to shoot. I got a chuckle out of that one, as we have never failed to get good accuracy from those particular arms. Blaming the barrel is generally wrong.

[Bass Ackward]

Altering various things on rifles do indeed change the way they shoot. Generally a bedding problem. All of our rifles are test fired before shipping, and maybe half need some work done to get them to sub MOA before they go out the door. Home gun plumbers can't necessarily run down the problem. That's why you hire a professional. Someone recently stated they could never get a certain brand of rifle to shoot. I got a chuckle out of that one, as we have never failed to get good accuracy from those particular arms. Blaming the barrel is generally wrong.


Absolutely. And the same tune doesn't always work for every situation. A tight bored rifle that creates more bore friction creates more muzzle flip. That is different from a larger groove where the jacketed bullet for all intents and purposes is riding the rails. I have seen guns that liked tight fitting actions and those that wanted to be lose with the same brand of action. And that's the gun. Now imagine when the bore breaks in and smooths up if your bedding was adjusted in the beginning?

I have honed scope mounts and had dramatic improvement, and others that didn't. Awhile back I also tested scopes. I took 3 brands of scopes of similar power and the average of one scope was 1/2 the group size of the worst of the three. A 223 that was a 1/2" performer with a 10X Bushnell could be a 1 1/4" with a this Leupold, if I remember correctly, using the same factory ammo. I followed that up with three different Leupolds of the same power and had 3/4" variance between those three. And I am not picking on any particular brand. I have good scopes and turkey's in a lot of different brands.

IF there is that kind of difference right out of the box of the same brand, what happens two years down the road as the springs settle in? And if your barrel changes it's bedding requirement, did you compensate? The life cycle can do many things to you.

So as you get detailed, there can be SO many things.

[MT Gianni]

I had a Savage 110 in 30-06 that was a tackdriver. The stock broke and i replaced it with a cheap ramline. I filed it, fiddled with it, rebedded it and finially sold the stock when I bought a wooden take off and it went back to good groups. I have had Weaver scopes fro the late 70's early 80's that would not hold their adjustments and the gun improved when the problem scope was replaced. I have not had a fair shooting gun turn into a tackdriver by going to a different scope. Gianni

[andremajic]

First thing, try and shop around and get a mil-surplus barrel and get it switched out, that is, if you want to keep it original military.

If I had a bad shooting small-ring mauser, I'd buy a brand new heavy varmint barrel in .308. True up the receiver on a lathe. Cut a new muzzle crown on the new barrel, making sure to keep the crown in allignment with the rifleing.

Next, I'd lap the receiver and bolt locking lugs to get 90-100 percent contact. Then, get a synthetic stock and glass bed it. Replace the original mauser trigger with an aftermarket adjustable one, and set it to about 3 lbs.

Next, I would anneal the holes that I would drill in the receiver for the scope mount holes with a carbon rod, and a tig welder, and drill and tap the holes.
The advantage over using a carbon rod to anneal instead of a blowtorch, is it's localized to the exact area you are doing it to, not the surrounding area as well.

After the scope is mounted, with a good barrel, and a decent glass bedding job and trigger set, you should have a tack driver capable of sub-moa accuracy.

I'm still in Afghanistan, otherwise I'd offer to buy your mauser off of you. I need a project for my gunsmithing class. Well, maybe in May when I get back.

Andy.

[MtGun44]

If the rifling is worn at the muzzle a cheap fix is to us a normal drill and
counterbore the barrel about 1" maybe 2". Nothing fancy, just pick a drill that
will remove around half the barrel thickness and try your best to drill straight
down the barrel. Given the value of a Spanish Mauser that won't shoot,
there is little to lose, and no cost, and you may make the rifle into a decent
shooter. Lots of Mosin-Nagants have this done and they shoot OK.
It won't ever be a tack driver, as most of these guns shoot about 3" at 100
or so even when everything is right.

Costs nothing to try, can't ruin a junk barrel. Same result as cutting off
the barrel and recrowning without having to fiddle with sights, etc.

Bill

[racepres]

Mooman: I also have a Spanish 93 7X57 that suffers from abysmal accuracy! First problem] I put it into a stock that I have learned, is guaranteed to make even my most trusted small ring shoot terrible! 2nd] The bore [and even the neck of the chamber] are pretty large. as in way out of spec.
3rd problem is.. the sights are so terrible that even w/ my reading specs. I can't see 'em too good!!
My next step is larger diameter boolits w/ a known reliable loading, in a stock that is at least decent, probably w/ my youngest shooting it... [he has the best eyes!] But!!! Not till it gets a bit warmer!! [4 degrees now!] good luck... I'm w/ ya on this!!! MV

[andremajic]

If you want to save money and don't have a barrel vise or action wrench, you can use molten lead to surround the part that you don't want to mar in the vise, then just chuck it in a vise and start wrenching away. (Make sure you know which direction to torque to unfasten the barrel.) If you're throwing away the barrel, just chuck it directly in a vise. I would strongly recommend that you just take it to a gunsmith, who would have the correct wrenches, and who you could blame if anything goes wrong. If you want to do it yourself, ebay sells action wrenches for gunsmithing.

If you're having problems with a barrel rusted to the action, spray penetrating oil around the barrel and action and let it sit overnight. If that doesn't help, keep it in the freezer overnight, and try again in the morning. If that won't work, use a torch, and heat the barrel where it connects to the action.

The heating works 90% of the time on badly rusted barrels and actions.

Then you could just buy a decent barrel for it from a surplus outlet for a couple bucks.

Andy.

P.s. always headspace before trying to shoot.

[racepres]

When ya get one of those barrels for a couple bucks LMK cause I will give you a few bucks plus shipping! OK MV