Ok, so I'm having some issues. I recently bought a Marlin 336. When I bought it, I ran a bore snake through it, checked the bore and went to the range with a variety of ammo.
The sights were primitive, but I was shooting 1.5" groups at 50 yards with Hornady 150gr soft points (marketed as whitetail rounds). With any 170gr round, the groups opened up to 3-4". I also opened up to 2-3" with Hornady Lever Evolution rounds.
I was wondering why the heck the 170gr were so erratic and someone suggested there might be copper fouling in the barrel. I took a brush and gave the barrel a good scrubbing. It was filthy. I'm not sure if it was the 50 or so rounds I put through it or just the fact that the shop didn't clean it, but it was pretty bad.
Since I've cleaned it, I really haven't seen any tighter accuracy, in fact it's mostly been looser, even with the 150gr Hornady rounds it seem to like before.
Since my first couple range visits, I've also changed the sights, so I've sort been blaming it on that and thinking I should just change back to the original sights, however, I thought of something today.
Did that first intense scrubbing ruin some of "seasoning" of the barrel? Since that first cleaning, I've been cleaning it with a brush after every range session (which usually only consists of 20-30 rounds or so.)
So what's the deal? Should I stop cleaning my barrel as often? I'm just not sure what's going on here. I have some lead reloads that I'm working out, and I'm really not see too much accuracy out of those either.
Please help!
The sights were primitive, but I was shooting 1.5" groups at 50 yards with Hornady 150gr soft points (marketed as whitetail rounds). With any 170gr round, the groups opened up to 3-4". I also opened up to 2-3" with Hornady Lever Evolution rounds.
I was wondering why the heck the 170gr were so erratic and someone suggested there might be copper fouling in the barrel. I took a brush and gave the barrel a good scrubbing. It was filthy. I'm not sure if it was the 50 or so rounds I put through it or just the fact that the shop didn't clean it, but it was pretty bad.
Since I've cleaned it, I really haven't seen any tighter accuracy, in fact it's mostly been looser, even with the 150gr Hornady rounds it seem to like before.
Since my first couple range visits, I've also changed the sights, so I've sort been blaming it on that and thinking I should just change back to the original sights, however, I thought of something today.
Did that first intense scrubbing ruin some of "seasoning" of the barrel? Since that first cleaning, I've been cleaning it with a brush after every range session (which usually only consists of 20-30 rounds or so.)
So what's the deal? Should I stop cleaning my barrel as often? I'm just not sure what's going on here. I have some lead reloads that I'm working out, and I'm really not see too much accuracy out of those either.
Please help!