# Carbon Fiber Barrels, What do you think?



## bighands (Dec 12, 2005)

What do you guys think of the Carbon Fiber Barrels?, I don't know who all makes them, But I was just reading about the new Howa Varminter Supreme with a Carbon Fiber Barrel. Sounds like it's supposed to be pretty good. Does anyone have any experience with them?


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

Accuracy is generally sub par compared to full metal barrels


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## Burly1 (Sep 20, 2003)

These guys disagree strongly with your statement MT. Burl
http://www.christensenarms.com/faq.asp


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## Longshot (Feb 9, 2004)

Burly1, I took a look at those rifles at Scheel's last weekend. They sure look nice, but the sticker shock was a little hard to take. I sure would like to try one out.


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## Dave_w (May 25, 2005)

Theoretically speaking, you could make a barrel that was stiffer than steel using three layers: one layer of Kevlar sandwiched in between two of carbon fiber. We're doing this with car trunk lids, and those lids are tough enough to support a GT-style wing producing 100-200 lbs of downforce. The resulting material is super-strong because while CF bends very easily, it doesn't like to expand or compress. The Kevlar forces one layer to expand and the other to compress before anything bends. Thus--a trunk lid that's stiffer and stronger than a stamped steel one, with a total weight of eight pounds. Fourteen if you include the giant honkin` wing.

Now, are they good for guns? Yeah, theoretically. You would need to know how to shape the layers very precisely, and how to glue them to each other, but you could do it. And you'd have a super-light, super-strong barrel.

Do I want one? Hell, no. Any of the ones that are any good are more expensive than an equally-good steel barrel. And besides, having the barrel be feather-light would just screw up the gun's weight balance.

Seriously...this is really just a bad solution for a problem that doesn't exist. Maybe in 5 or 10 years when the rest of the gun is light enough to keep up with this technology, but for now, it's more of a gimmick. They only way I'd consider it is if I absolutely had to minimize weight to ridiculous levels.


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## bighands (Dec 12, 2005)

The link Burl posted is great, it adds to what I was reading about these barrels. In my way of thinking a gun that would shoot like it had a full bull barrel and it only weighed about as much as a standard rifle would be nice wouldn't it ?


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## Militant_Tiger (Feb 23, 2004)

From all the real world evidence I've seen you lose a considerable amount of accurcy. If I was trying to sell carbon barrels I suppose I would say that the accuracy was on par too. Comes down to which you want to believe.


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## Longshot (Feb 9, 2004)

I've seen carbon barrels shoot and very well. I have not seen any loss in accuracy at all. Most have shot as well as any of my heavy steel barrels. I'm sure you can get a lemon barrel from most any manufacturer.


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## tgoldade (Jul 28, 2004)

my biggest concern would be the recoil of the gun because of the weight, if you have a 4.5 lbs gun in 300 win mag its going to hurt, bad. Other wise I haven't heard to much about accuuracy problems.


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## Burly1 (Sep 20, 2003)

Carbon barrel ads and media stories Tiger? Burl


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## Dave_w (May 25, 2005)

I'm with tgoldale on this one. I like bull barrels because of the weight balance, which dampens the recoil and translates to less flinching, and less movement in the milliseconds after the shot (which will screw up accuracy). If I want light weight, I'd be more inclined to go with a sporter barrel. And since the only place I'd want light weight is in the field, where the small bump in accuracy a bull barrel provides is unnecessary, well...

I'd consider a superlight CF bull barrel on either a super-long range hunting gun or a varmint .22, but nothing beyond that.


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