Match grade barrel accuracy?

[marklbucla]

So how big of a difference does a Match Grade barrel make over a standard one, i.e. how much tighter would my groups be? Do I have to shoot Match grade ammo to see any difference?

 

[10-Ring]

You should get a marked improvement over stock depending on how well it is fitted to your gun

 

[Tamara]

Depends on the gun, the barrel, and the ammo.

Putting a true tack-driver in the hands of someone who's never shot one before is a gratifying experience...

 

[RogersPrecision]

I think it depends heavily on the shooter.
If you can only 'hold' 3" groups at 25yds, a match barrel capable of
1" at 25yrds will show no improvement.
Clean, crisp sights and trigger will usually help more.

 

[Lennyjoe]

I have entertained the thought of dropping in a Bar-Sto barrel into my G19 just to see what the difference would be.

Of course thats one heck of a price ($194) to pay just to see a difference

 

[George Hill]

I spent a day at a racing school once. I thought I was pretty good. Then I got behind the wheel of a Formula Ford. We had been learning in Formula Dodge racers, that are less than 1/2 the grunt of the Ford... I thought I could handle it.

As I was doing pinwheels across the grass about 100 feet off the track outside of turn 1, I paused to reflect upon my initial arrogance. This inner self examination made me realize that it truly isn't the spoon that bends, but myself.
This made me study with more determination during the next lecture.

My point being, is that you really need to ask yourself if you are ready to drive that Formual Ford yet. Or are you going to go off the track on turn 1?

 

[stans]

We need a little more information here. First, how good are your shooting skills? Second, what type of pistol are you shooting? Third, what type of ammo are you using?

A match grade barrel will not automatically make a gun a tack driver or give you instant skill. Accuracy is a combination of shooter, gun and ammo. If any one of these three are lacking, then there is no accuracy.

 

[Will Fennell]

trigger, and then sights

Mr. Rogers has it right, you will probally notice more improvement in you shooting from getting a first class trigger job and making sure you have good, easy to use, well regulated sights, than from adding a match barrel.

After the trigger job, and good sights, then if you are happy with your blaster's performance, look into a new barrel.

 

[marklbucla]

Stans,

I'm still relatively new to shooting and would like to know a bit more about how much the different components affect the precision of the firearm.

So, let's just say that we stick the most precise gun in the world into some sort of vice. Take ammo and everything else out of the equation by using the very best in order to nearly eliminate their contributions to error. How big of a difference in group sizing would it make to switch between a standard barrel and a match grade barrel?

 

[Jim Watson]

A match barrel, PROPERLY FITTED, will cut group sizes in half or less.

But a good factory barrel will do pretty well. A friend's Colt 1991A1 will shoot 2" from Ransom Rest at 25 yards with good ammo, 2.5 - 3.5" with most anything decent. I have a fully accurized .45 that will do that at 50 yards, better with true match ammo.

 

[Sean Smith]

Actually, a shooter who could shoot 3" groups with a perfect gun who goes from a 3" @ 25 yard gun (i.e. that's what the gun does from a properly machine rest) to a 1" @ 25 yard gun would, on average, see the groups they shot with that gun go from 6" to 4". On the other hand, if you are already shooting 3" @ 25 yard offhand groups, odds are your hardware is already hella accurate.

This article is about bullseye pistols, but does a nice job of explaining the relationship between shooter skill and hardware in accuracy.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Dreyer_infonet/cstomgun.htm

From firsthand experience, factory guns can have their accuracy vary wildly from one gun to the next. And I mean WILDLY. I had a Glock 35 that was truy horrible; the mechanical accuracy of the thing was like 8" @ 25 yards on a good day. Swapping the barrel out made it a 2" gun... even as a relatively crappy shooter, I could easily see the effect of THAT hardware change. On the other hand, there are also folks with sub-$1,000 guns that could shoot sub-2" @ 25 yards out of a machine rest all day long.

I guess the bottom line is, you have to know how accurate your gun (not you) is before you know how much help a match barrel will do you. Both the quality of the barrel, and especially how it is fitted, can have a huge effect on how much improvement you can get, too.

Biggest limitation is usually shooter limitation, not hardware, which is why stuff like trigger and sight improvements can result in the shooter using the gun much better. But every so often a gun is a true mechanical accuracy dog.

 

[marklbucla]

Thanks for the link, Sean! It looks like an amazing site!

 

[happyguy]

My G36 shot patterns, not groups, at 25 yards. I ended up buying a drop-in Jarvis barrel and it tightened the groups up to 3 or 4 inches. With the original barrel lying in the slide you could wiggle it all sorts of ways and feel plenty of slop and hear it rattling around. The Jarvis barrel goes in and locks up like the proverbial bank vault.

My Colt 1991A1 is as accurate with the factory barrel as the Glock is with the Jarvis barrel, and more reliable than the Glock could ever dream of being.

Regards,
Happyguy

 

[444]

Nothing new here

Obviously, how much improvement you get depends on how the gun shoots now. If you have a tackdriver right now, odds are, a match barrel isn't going to make much difference. If you have a dog now, odds are the match barrel will make a tremendous difference.

I own a number of 1911s. I purchased a new Springfield Armory that wouldn't shoot for beans. I was able to confirm that it wasn't me by firing another one of my 1911s right next to it with the same ammo. I had a match barrel installed and it made a world of difference. On the other hand, I own a Colt that I bought years ago that shoots almost as good out of the box as my Springfield does after the match barrel install. I can't see any point in replacing the barrel on my Colt when it already shoots very good as is.
There is no pat answer to this question. The barrel you have now might be of excellent quality and it might be properly fitted. If that is the case, there is no reason to replace it.

 

[Longbow]

I have entertained the thought of dropping in a Bar-Sto barrel into my G19 just to see what the difference would be

Make sure you make an effort to lighten the trigger pull too, otherwise you might not see much improvement at all. I've seen 1911's with factory barrels that shoots good groups due mainly for it having a light trigger pull. Good trigger pull makes half of the equation for having great accuracy, IMO.

 

[Porter Rockwell]

"Match Barrels" - Glocks Aside-

The term match barrel is almost as overused and overated as the word tactical.
Ed Brown (famous 1911 smith) once published an artle in American Handgunner comparing many stock barrel with so called match barrels in a special barrel vice action to purely test the inherent barrel accuracy.
Surprise, surprise, all barrels tested pretty much equally accuracy wise.
Bottom line is the mechanical platform that the barrel is connected to...ie lock up fore and aft with slide to rail fit only contributing less than a half share of the total.

 

[444]

Keep in mind that in this "test" mentioned, only a small and finite number of barrels were tested. Peter makes no mention of Ed Brown specifically testing any barrels that were known to shoot poorly. In my previous post I mentioned getting a Springfield 1911 that was a lemon. I left out one part of the story. The first time I shot the gun, I went with a guy that worked part time in the gun shop where I bought the gun. He had the identical gun with the exception that he had a BarSto barrel in his. It seems he had stumbled on two Barsto 1911 "match" barrels on-line and bought them. He didn't have the barrel fitted. He just dropped it in and used his original bushing. I fired my new gun and complained about it's accuracy. He blamed it on my shooting. I took out my Colt and immediately fired a group less than half the size of the one I shot with my new Springfield. Eventually, we field stripped his gun and tried his barrel in my gun. No other parts were changed and no attempt was made to fit the barrel. We just field stripped both guns and dropped his barrel in my gun. The groups fired were half the size of the inital groups. So, I bought the other barrel he had purchased on-line and sent the whole gun to Clark's and had the barrel fitted. That gun now shoots like a laser.

 

[Sean Smith]

The terms "drop-in" and "match barrel" shouldn't go together. Since so much accuracy comes from how the barrel is fitted to the gun, it is almost an oxymoron. The only time I saw a drop-in barrel produce a big accuracy improvement was when it wouldn't drop in & had to be fitted by a pistolsmith. That said, a drop-in barrel could do some good if it (by sheer luck) fits the gun better than the stock barrel, or if the stock barrel had something fundamentally wrong with it that made it inaccurate.

 

[Ankeny]

Sean is right. If the wobble zone stays constant, the more accurate the gun the smaller the groups. He also nailed it on the drop in barrels. Fit is a huge part of the accuracy equation.

 

[444]

I have seen a drop in barrel produce a dramatic accuracy improvement as I noted above.
"That said, a drop-in barrel could do some good if it (by sheer luck) fits the gun better than the stock barrel, or if the stock barrel had something fundamentally wrong with it that made it inaccurate."
I thought that was the whole reason for changing the barrel in the first place. If it wasn't inaccurate, why change it ?

 

[Sean Smith]

I thought that was the whole reason for changing the barrel in the first place. If it wasn't inaccurate, why change it ?

Accuracy comes in degrees. For some folks, 3" @ 25 yards is accurate. For some folks, that's considered atrocious. A 3" @ 25 gun isn't "broke" by most standards, but a match barrel could take you down to 1" or even 0.75" @ 25 (rough numbers obviously).

A drop in barrel might have no effect on accuracy (because its drop-in fit doesn't fit any better than the stock barrel), some effect on accuracy (because it fits better than stock, has a better bore or crown, etc.), or a dramatic effect on accuracy (you've instantly got a 1" @ 25 yard gun). Because it drops in instead of being properly fitted, it is a total crap shoot what a drop-in barrel will do. You can call a drop-in barrel a "match" part, but to do so is a complete joke... and if you get right down to it, dishonest as hell.

Fact: Accuracy is largely determined by how barrel is fitted.
Fact: Drop in barrels ain't fitted.
Conclusion: Accuracy is indeterminate with drop in barrels.

This, of course, is why factory guns can vary so wildly in accuracy; the barrels are all drop-in dealies. Depending on random variations in barrel, slide, bushing and frame tolerances, the results can be all over the place. Some folks get 1" @ 25 yard Kimbers out of the box, and some folks get 3.5" @ 25 yard Kimbers out of the box.

To be certain of an accuracy improvement, you need to have an oversized barrel fitted by a pistolsmith. A drop in barrel can easily provide a big improvement, especially if the stock barrel is truly hideous. It can also easily give you absolutely nothing.

Looking at it another way, it is obvious that for most folks, or even very serious shooters, some factory guns won't really gain squat from a match barrel, and some will see a little improvement, and some will see huge improvement in accuracy. You can't judge the usefulness of one or the other if, like most people, you haven't quantified how good the gun is in the first place (group size at distance independent of shooter skill).

If you decide you want more accuracy, a drop-in barrel is an iffy proposition as far as improving it goes, and a good one (not some brand-z slag) will cost anywhere from $150+. A match barrel typically costs exactly the same as a drop in barrel, but you have to give a pistolsmith about $100 or so to fit it to the gun (depending on the configuration). You are spending more money, but the certainty of getting the deired result is vastly higher... something important to consider.

 

[444]

Another avenue to consider is the one I took. I initally bought a "drop-in" barrel. If you do this and notice a dramatic increase in accuracy, then you have acheived your goal with very little fuss. However, my barrel didn't drop in. So, I sent it to Bar-Sto to be fitted; I think it costs $35.

If I had it to do over again, I don't think I would screw around with a drop-in barrel either. I fully agree with the idea of just paying to do it right, but there are other options. One such option which I have also tried is to send my gun to Clark's and have an accuracy job done on it using the factory barrel. They make the following guarentee: Accuracy guarantee: 10 shot group measuring 2.5" or less @ 50 yards with match grade ammunition. And they include the Ransom Rest test target to show you what your gun is capable of. Of course this was with a 1911, I never researched similar work for another gun. The price of this work is $300. The price of a Bar-Sto barrel is somewhere around $200 plus fitting.