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Old 04-17-2012, 2:36 PM
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Richard Erichsen Richard Erichsen is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by akjunkie View Post
What is the difference between the 3?

I'm looking for an 16in A3 Mid Length upper with A2 FSB, 1:9 twist, chrome lined barrel.
All I see is Chrome Moly. Doesnt anyone make it with a chrome lined barrel?

Something similar to this:

http://www.dsarms.com/DSA-ZM4-Forged...M4CBUMIDNONFL/
There are plenty of chrome-lined barrels, though for the average civilian user, it really won't make much difference (none of my old hunting rifles had chrome lined barrels). The unlined barrel, whether truly "plain" or Melonite QPQ (nitrocarburized) or plasma nitrided will tend to be slightly more accurate due to greater end to end bore consistency (chrome adds a slightly variable bore thickness which is costly and impractical to fully restore after plating). Barrel life for the unlined barrel will be in the order of 5000-6000 rounds before accuracy drops off significantly. A chrome lined barrel will be at least twice that number and as much as 25K rounds. The nitrocarburized barrels will last about as long as the chrome lined barrel without many of the disadvantages. Given ammunition prices, you're talking about a healthy ammunition budget to wear a barrel out and by the time you wear out the barrel other parts groups in your rifle are going to be up for overhaul as well.

The average shooter might only put a few hundred rounds through their rifle in a year, especially if you have several rifles in your arsenal to get range time on. As a practical matter you can only shoot one at a time and most range rules limit just how fast you can hurl lead without getting yourself in trouble. As a general rule, rapid fire and the heating of the barrel resulting from same is what eats barrels. Allowed to cool a bit between shots, a well made plain barrel can be very long lived indeed.

If you are authorized for a full auto weapon, or pump enough rounds through the rifle in a year to really worry about going through a barrel more than once per year, the chrome lined or nitrocarburized barrel might be of some benfit to you. On the other hand, if you can go through a pallet of ammo on a single rifle, the cost of a barrel is just a minor additive cost. You probably have all the necessary tools to rebarrel your upper or your favorite gunsmith on speed dial if you go through the kind of round counts we're talking about to eat a barrel. For most of us, the plain unlined barrel will last decades with only a modicum of cleaning after use.

Look carefully at your needs before you plunk down money for something that may or may not add much value. With the cost of ammo going up, I'd advise increasing the percentage of your firearms budget to ammo rather than fancy parts (boron-nickel treated bolt groups and the likes) that you'll probably never get the value out of. Probably not a bad idea in an election year, if we go by what happened in 2008, to load up on as much ammo as you can before the prices spike for awhile.

R
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Last edited by Richard Erichsen; 04-17-2012 at 2:39 PM..
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