6mm Rem vs 257 Bob rebarrel

[RC20]

I agree. What kind of inept hunter does not sufficiently plan for a hunt that they have to seek on-the-shelf ammo? To those who consider availability, how many times have you "forgotten" your ammo when going hunting?

It happens. In my case I thought I had plenty of reloaded until I tried to dig it out and found I had nothing.,

I had to pack a truck for a weeks camping and hunting, make sure the rifle was on and I had no time to dig out the reloading equipment and load anything.

Off to Freds I went, they had my ammo on sale and I got two boxes.

I also got my Caribous.

Probably a million variations to it including my wife didn't put the box in the truck.

 

[dvdcrr]

have had both a 6 MM Remington in a single-shot Browning B-78...the most accurate rifle I have ever owned, about 1/2 five shot groups at 100 yards. Killed a lot of deer with it using IMR-4350 and an 87 grain Hornady varmint bullet. I expected the varmint bullet to "blow-up" and shower the vitals with bits and pieces of the bullet however, in actual practice, (I always did a post-mortem), the jacket would separate from the core and usually stay in the chest cavity whereas the core would exit on the off-side causing a quick kill.

Also owned a circa 1976 Ruger M77 in .257 Roberts. The Ruger had excessive freebore, could not get anywhere near the rifling with the longest bullets. It got spooky when working up loads inasmuch as there were never any pressure signs, even way beyond max data published in the loading manuals. I finally backed down, for safety's sake. I killed a lot of deer with that rifle also using a 120 grain bullet (cannot remember the manufacture of the bullet now), before gifting the rifle to my son.

In all, they both killed deer efficiently and I could not realistically see any difference in their performance. However, it should be noted that I always shot the deer behind the shoulder, where there is but ribs to resist the bullet.

This rings pretty true to me in all respects. The heavier bullet of the 257 is slower with only the same SD.

 

[Mobuck]

"an 87 grain Hornady varmint bullet. I expected the varmint bullet to "blow-up"

Which Hornady 87 grain was that?
The older 87 grain spire point flat base had what was often referred to as a "coke bottle core". The lead core was shaped like the old time Coca Cola bottle with the smaller diameter in the middle. I found that design to be one of the best dual purpose bullets ever made for 243/6mm.

 

[oldscot3]

Go 6mm Rem. Ammo isn't as common as it used to be but PPU and Hornady are usually available. I bought a bag of PPU brass for my 6mm and it looks good, shoots good.

The thing about the 257 Roberts that I don't like is the chamber leade cut for the old roundnose bullets, also (usually) too slow of a twist rate. Of course a skilled smith can correct both those problems but why bother, the 6mm Rem is already "fixed".

 

[Three44s]

Really though, what is wrong with the existing tube?

The first thing if accuracy has fallen off is to up the ante on bore cleaning.

A good many magnum barrels were mistakenly pitched before the advent of bore scopes. They did not need rebarreling but rather re-cleaning.

Also the crown should be looked at.

I am a big fan of JB Bore Paste. With a barrel you are about to throw away, what do you have to lose?

Three44s

 

[RC20]

If it needs cleaning, this is the stuff

http://www.slip2000.com/blog/precision-shooting-magazine/

For my background, I took up target shooting 6 years ago or so. Its recreational, never going to be good enough or afford to be good enough to do competition though I may play at it if I manage to retire.

I think I have picked up a lot that makes common sense as opposed to the Urban Legends of the shooting business.

If I have an opinion, its stated as suchy (or a feeling or its just how I like to do things because it suits me, not because I have decided that what suits me is the end to all things

For barrel break in, Shilen (one of the top aftermarket button rifle custom barrels) had the most honest answer that makes sense to me, "it makes no difference". People keep bugging us so here is the wisdom.

I have done 3 custom barrels (all stainless) , it did 't make any difference how I did it, the best shooting one (Shilen) I just shot and cleaned a couple times during 50-100 rounds of shooting.

So, shoot it 10 or 15 rounds and clean it, repeat. That barrel shoot as good the first shot as the rest. The others like a fouling shot or two.

No one has setup up a real scientific study and proved anything. So its really supposition unless someone does (not likely, they know how to make good barrels and doing a definite study would cost a lot)

As for copper, I have not run into it, I don't shoot any of the calibers that go over 2800 fps so I am not into that arena.

As for cleaning, this article was by far the best, he went about it right, used a boroscope to confirm (I have a Lyman now, his was the better Hawkeye)

http://www.slip2000.com/blog/precision-shooting-magazine/

What I found agrees fully with his findings, the Carbon Killer 2000 works better than anything on carbon. The Bore Tech Eliminator
does copper the best I have seen (and he does not say but it has a decent carbon component as well). I do get older guns with some copper in them so I have tested it.

Both are non haz, non toxic (my wife was having issues with Hoppes in the shop leaking into the house). They use focused chemistry rather than brute force dissolving to do the job from my view.

Without a boroscope, the bore may look shiny, but the boro scope tells you what is down in the groves and you can see the CK2k or BTE working.

I have developed my own variation on how I got about it, partly as I hate to clean at home as I need to get to the range ealry to get a bench and I run late and don't get them cleaned, so I clean after I shoot X rounds (usually 25-50)

This is for the CK2K as I don't have copper. I shoot when the barrel is warm, that helps the process and about 3 cycles and the barrel is clean. If I can time it I run the CK2K through and soak the barrel as a cease fire is called, then it soaks while people go down range and I resume cleaning when the line is hot again.

I use a nylon brush, I have an eye dropper bottle, I drizzle the CK2K on the nylon brush which holds it pretty good, run it through the barrel, drizzle it again on the other end, then 3 to 5 strokes, the nylon brush is out the barrel on the last one, I drizzle again, pull it out and run a dry patch through.

I repeat that about 3 times and its clean. No black and a light color stain on the last patch. I run a final patch through to get the last chemical out of the bore.

You can do the same at home, takes a bit more.

We had a family 270 (Finnbear) that the best I could get to shoot with handloads was 1.5 inches.

Once I put the gun through the regimen its shoots 7/8 at 100.

It had been cleaned after each shooting with Hoppes, it just never got it all out. With the boro scope I could see the 50 years of carbon that had never quite got cleaned out build up. That one took some time as I wet the barrel with CK2K and then let it sit. There was no copper to speak of in it and what there was came out with the BTE.

The Lyman runs $170 or so on sale, worth it if you have a lot of guns and need to see what you are doing.

 

[J.G. Terry]

Sell orTrade?

Looks like there are folks looking for a 722 in .244. Why not sell or trade the 722 and buy a new 243 or "Bob" rifle. The $ figures would be in your favor. Rebarreling can get pricey.

Addendum: Beware of worst load/best load comparisons. On equal terms the Roberts (AKA "Bob") rules.