Remington 700 barrels

C

Casey

New member
I recently posted the fact that I am getting a used Remington 700 in 22-250. Those who responded to the post were positive, which makes me feel even better about what I thought was a good situation.

I am curious, though. I have heard from some folks that the possibility of buringing out the barrel if using "hot" loads. Now, I am not sure what I will be loading, but it may include hot loads. In addition, this is a used rifle and I don't know what the previous owner was doing. The rifling looks good, but....

How much money and hassle would be involved in putting a new bull barrel on a Remington 700? This is a plain wood stock, nothing special. Are there any options; ie, could I change to a stainless or fluted (?).

I know next to nothing about the Remington 700 (except EVERYONE I have talked to that owns one either has another or wants to). I am an experienced pistol owner, but rifles are kind of new to me.

Thanks.

Casey
 
Casey,
The average accuracy life of a 22-250 with factory or factory duplicate loads is around 1500 rounds. Slow the bullets about 200fps and that number goes up alot, but you lose the whole purpose for owning the rifle.
When you do burn out the barrel, things get markedly better, as you have your choice of selling the rifle and buying another factory gun, rebarreling the action to another caliber, or staying with the 22-250 and changing the twist rate to use heavier bullets. The cost of rebarreling is going to vary ALOT, depending on whom you speak to, and who does the work. A quality job will run around $600.00 and you'll have an incredibly accurate rifle.
When I burned out my Remington barrel, I had SG&Y do a rebarrel using a Shilen match select stainless in 9 twist, and now use it to shoot 69 and 80 grain bullets.
With a reduced load 80 grain load (3000fps)
I shoot 1000 yard comps, and win alot of them.
Go ahead and shoot out the barrel, get a quality builder to rebarrel it, and enjoy it more.
 
Michael, did you really mean 1500 rounds as an average life span? Just want to confirm. That seems like a very short life to me.
 
Yuppers, 1500 rounds. Now that's about right for accuracy degradation based on benchrest accuracy. It is not to say that the rifle won't shoot after that, but a reasonable expectation would be to see groups open up, alittle at 1st, then get progressively worse
on a geometric scale.
When my Rem 22-250 was new, with 52 grain loads at 3725 fps it would group in the high 2's to low 3's consistantly at 100 yards, in short, 3/10's MOA. Around 1610-1613 rounds it began to open the groups by throwing flyers; groups were high 3's, mid 4's.
At 1800 rounds or so it was a 3/4 moa rifle.
Most folks won't ever notice that, but I like
bughole groups, and track my aggregate for each rifle, so I could see it going south real fast.
If you shoot long range, as a barrel degrades the results can be devestating.
 
Casey, what do you mostly plan to do with the .22-250? Granting that the serious prairie-doggers must buy a lot of barrels, I'd think that a coyote and woodchuck hunter wouldn't shoot full-house loads all that much.

If you figure on a good bit of paper punching at 200 to 400 yards, you can do as the man said and load down to around 3,500 ft/sec and save the barrel...

Just a thought, Art
 
Art,

I plan on shooting ground hogs in the midwest with this Remington. I don't have a lot of experience at longer ranges (I have been shooting at less than 100 yds with a 22WMR Marlin), but I don't think I will be needing to reach out any farther than 300 yds. I will also be shooting some paper, but want to keep it at similar ranges to what I think I will be shootin at ground hogs.

I may manage to go out West and get some shooting, as there are several people here who are considering such a trip.

Thanks.

Casey
 
For what I'd call "general purpose" shooting, I've always loaded down a bit from maximum. Less recoil in 30-caliber or in pistols, for instance. Less "burning" of barrels. These loads are for working on eye-hand coordination, stance, multiple-target acquisition/transition, etc.

For the hot .22s, the difference between max velocity and 200 or 300 feet/second less is a small percentage. Why worry? If you're shooting at 100 to 300 yards, the bullet's effectiveness is still greater than a max load at 400 or 500 yards, right?

I'd always have a box or two of max loads available, and the data as to point of aim compared to a lesser load already written on the box. You might see something interesting waaaayyyy out there!

FWIW, Art
 
My experience is limited to one .22-250, an FN Supreme action with a Hart stainless 26" bbl. Throat erosion was noticeable at about 2400 rounds, at which point bullets were seated farther out. At 4000 rds it is still 1/2 minute grouper with strong loads. From prone with a bipod, when I haven't had too much coffee, I am a 1 minute shooter, so it really is irrelevant. Also, the guys at Hart's tell me stainless is more resistant to erosion than chrome moly.
 
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