in several rifl es, and even had used the FinalFinish system to remove some light pitting in the throat of my New Ultra Light Arms 30-06. I’d hunted with the rifl e for several
days in New Zealand, often in pouring rain. A piece of electrical tape was kept over the muzzle to prevent raindrops from entering the barrel, and I left the rifl e next to a heat source each night, with the bolt removed so the bore would dry out thoroughly. But some light pits still formed in the throat, right where the bullet of a round sat while hunting, probably from atmospheric moisture. A few rounds of FinalFinish bullets removed the shallow pits completely. Eventually it occurred to me to
Lately I’ve been experimenting
with another delaying tactic that’s less expensive. For a number of years the well-known centerfi re target shooter David Tubb has been selling his Final- Finish kit with abrasive bullets to help break-in new barrels and to smooth out the throat area in eroded barrels. I’ve used both the FinalFinish system and a NECO fi re-lapping kit to smooth out the tool marks from the chamber reamer
use lapping bullets to remove cracked (but not chunked) throat erosion in the barrels of some of my favorite varmint rifl es. The fi rst was a Remington 700 Classic in 221 Fireball that had been purchased used, then shot quite a bit on both ground squirrels and prairie dogs over two years here in Montana, as well as for an article on 221 handloads for The Varmint Hunter Magazine®. There’d been some light cracking in the throat when I bought the rifl e, but by the end of the second season the cracks were deeper right in front of the throat, obviously moving toward the chunk- ing stage. Accuracy also has noticeably declined, with more fl iers. So I got out my NECO Economy Abrasives Kit (NECO, 108 Ardmore,
Benicia, CA 94510, 800-451-3650, www.
neconos.com).This includes four dif- ferent grits, ranging from 220 to 1,200. Bullets are treated by spreading a tiny amount of grit on a small steel plate, then rolling the bullet firmly across the grit with a small steel bar. I used Winchester 55-grain softpoints because they have a fairly long bearing surface, and there should be as much contact as possible between the gritted bullet and the bore. Since lapping bullets create more pressure than normal bullets, a starting load of Hodgdon Li’l Gun was selected for the job. After 10 rounds with 220-grit, I
looked at the throat through my Hawk- eye. The surface of the cracked throat was smoothed considerably, but the deepest cracks were still very evident just in front of the chamber. Another five rounds of 220-grit made all the cracks disappear. In conventional fi re-lapping, the
next step would be to shoot a few more rounds with 400-grit, then a few more with 800-grit and 1,200-grit. Instead, I treated the bore with Dyna Bore-Coat (formerly known as Ultra Bore-Coat), a solution of very fi ne ceramic particles in a quick-drying glue (Dyna-Coatings Group, 5000 E. 59th St., Kansas City, MO 64130, 816-444-1255, www.dynamic- fi
nishes.com). The solution is slathered generously into a totally clean and dry bore, then after the glue dries for 30 min- utes or so, fi ve shots are fi red to push
The Remington 700 223 has become Eileen’s favorite rodent rifl e over the years, and she’s happy to see it shooting so well again.
Page 116 Spring 2012
The NECO Economy Abrasives Kit will rejuvenate a bunch of barrels.
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