Gunplummer
New member
I dropped a barrel erosion gage down an M2 50 barrel and it actually protruded out the front of the barrel about an inch. The gages are about 8" long, slightly tapered, with rings cut into the gage at varying thicknesses along the gage. It should never have gone past the KNURLED handle. I have seen M2, M85, and M60 barrels with huge areas in front of the chamber missing lands. Just plain gone. Sooo, maybe the absorbing of carbon into the lands is causing the erosion. The use of stellite liners in about the first 8"-10" of the 50 barrels helped stop some of that erosion problem. As for hammer forging 4100 series steel, just what hardness do you start out at? Barrel steel is commonly 26-28 RC before drilling and rifling. I believe there was an Austrian company doing hammer forging on high power barrels a few years back, but it does not seem a common practice.