20” lightweight barrel?

[peak98]

So if I offer you 20 dollars for it. You will sell it to me right?

The BCA barrel I had, I gave away to a friend who couldn’t resist “free”. No way I’d have sold it to anyone for $20. I’d have felt guilty... Hell, I felt guilty giving it away and I paid the shipping.
peak98

[peak98]

I’ve been thinking about that myself.
For the extra weight I’m not sure the ballistic juice is worth the squeeze, especially with Grendel.
I like 20” rifles but the way things are at the moment I may get the 18”. I’m unsure about it but that 18” faxon at 1.7lbs is really appealing.
Especially with the Gibbs upper, which are about twice the weight of a regular upper.

One thing I didn’t ask, at what range(s) are most of your shooting done at? Inside 300yds, inside 500yds? If you’re mainly shooting shorter range, I’d go with a 16” barrel as it’s lighter, and more maneuverable, especially if shooting out of box stands/blinds in my opinion.
peak98

[myrifle]

The BCA barrel I had, I gave away to a friend who couldn’t resist “free”. No way I’d have sold it to anyone for $20. I’d have felt guilty... Hell, I felt guilty giving it away and I paid the shipping.
peak98

Ok cool.

Now OP would you be willing to sell me the barrel for 20 bucks? I can make something out if it.

[Grendelshooter]

Ok cool.

Now OP would you be willing to sell me the barrel for 20 bucks? I can make something out if it.

No thanks.

[montana]

I’m not asking “why does my rifle shoot badly”.
I was simply asking what the options are for a lightweight, rack grade, 20” barrel are.
I know why the gun won’t shoot, because the barrel is garbage.

Without empirical evidence, your opinion is questionable..Did you contact Faxon and offer to have them look at the barrel??? There can be a variety of reasons why a barrel won't group well and not all of them has to do with the barrel quality. Here is what is posted on their web sight:

We also offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee! If you are not satisfied with how your barrel is performing, just let us know and we will work with you to make it right!

[Grendelshooter]

Without empirical evidence, your opinion is questionable..Did you contact Faxon and offer to have them look at the barrel??? There can be a variety of reasons why a barrel won't group well and not all of them has to do with the barrel quality. Here is what is posted on their web sight:

We also offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee! If you are not satisfied with how your barrel is performing, just let us know and we will work with you to make it right!

Well, process of elimination dictates it as the only variable.
I don’t think that guarantee applies to the barrels sold in the group buy section from six five arms. They’re made by faxon but not branded as such as far as I know.

No biggie.
????*??

[montana]

Well, process of elimination dictates it as the only variable.
I don’t think that guarantee applies to the barrels sold in the group buy section from six five arms. They’re made by faxon but not branded as such as far as I know.

No biggie.
????*??

So you didn't even try to contact Faxon or 6.5 Arms? I had a problem barrel from BCM and Faxon and both companies were quick to resolve the problem..I have had excellent results with Faxon barrels, but QC can escape even the best of them..I won't trash a brand or company unless they refuse to back their products.

[myrifle]

No thanks.

Ok. So it must not be garbage afterall.

[lazyengineer]

Lol, not in my experience.
I get about 6 MOA from the faxon group buy barrel I’ve got. The old AR Performance barreled SPR does 2 MOA with the same ammo (wolf)

Experiences differ, and I think FAXON can at times be better than others. I will say, in my experience and opinion, I consider them one of the better BBL's out there for the money. I like their engineering, and think they do a nice job of balancing weight to performance with a pretty thoughtful design. They also have a freakishly polished bored (extremely smooth when examined under a scope, compared to most), and I like that they Malonite all their BBLs, and stress relieve. I will say, a FAXON 2020's LW barrel in 5.56 with a pencil front end, has given me 1 MOA level performance with no zero-shift when heated up. A performance undreamed of 20 years ago - due to metallurgical, machining, and stress relief processing I personally think. All for pretty cheap. I'm kind of a big FAXON fan. That said, they do botch things too, they made a bad batch of BBL's for Desert Tech MDR that have very rough chambers and caused many nightmare problems, that should have never happened. And I did get one once that had a very none-centered chamber (where one side of the lands starts 1/8" earlier in the throat than the other, due to being non-centered. Which btw, is WAY more common than people think.

To OP's question, the PSA 20" 1/8 Grendel BBL is actually pretty light. Mine didn't really shoot that great (others have happier experiences), so I replaced it with a TEAM Monster BBL, shown in this comparison - which was a good bit heavier. To be honest, I couldn't ever get it to shoot as well as I wanted either (probably my fault), so eventually sold it too, and went with an Alexander Arms 20" in 1/9 twist HBAR (not shown), and all of a sudden my groups got a lot tighter. Just my experience.


MONSTER 20" BBL and PSA 20" BBL


With regards to your 14.5" project, good luck. For whatever reason, nobody commercially offers one, which is a shame. So I took a 3000 round shot-out PSA 20" 6.5 Creedmoor BBL, had a friend turn it down and rechambered recrowned, and tapped and plugged the original gas-port, into this BBL. Which I absolutely love and shoots like a dream. For 14.5", 1/8 is a good twist.

FWIW, I'm not a fan of it in 20", and prefer 1/9 in a 20". I'm the only one on the forum who actually thinks that, and lots of guys with more experience than I are happy with 1/8 - I'm not. But then, I'm also the one guy on the forum who prefers Hornady brass over Lapua/Starline.



Custom 14.5" BBL (made from a recovered 6.5 CM HBAR a barstock)


Pin and Weld to keep it legal


Final light weight field usage gun configuration, running on a Magnesium lower, for weight savings there too. (ultimate general purpose gun you can get, IMHO)

[Grendelshooter]

So you didn't even try to contact Faxon or 6.5 Arms? I had a problem barrel from BCM and Faxon and both companies were quick to resolve the problem..I have had excellent results with Faxon barrels, but QC can escape even the best of them..I won't trash a brand or company unless they refuse to back their products.

It’s not my intent to trash either company honestly.
Sample size of one and all that. It sucks that my sample sucked.
Honestly I don’t think it is the responsibility of either to honor any product warranty when I, the consumer, sat on one of their products for years before wringing it out and having issues. It’s not like I bought this thing yesterday-iirc it was 2017 or 2018 and I haven’t been in a position to really give this barrel an honest try.

[Grendelshooter]

Ok. So it must not be garbage afterall.

If you’re ever in west Oklahoma PM me and you can have it.
Otherwise you aren’t worth a trip to the post office.

On a happier note and on the topic of this thread-
I took a shot in the dark and tried a barrel from tactical kinetics.
20”, nitrided with conventional rifling (after reading something purportedly from Bill Alexander saying that wolf ammo preferred conventional rifling to 5r). Put it in the same upper/lower as the old group buy barrel, took it to thee back yard and put about 15 rounds through it.
Didn’t have time to take it to 100 yards but at 25 and 50 it made quarter sized groups with wolf ammo. Much, much better than the last barrel.
Seems I may have been blessed. Barrel weighs about 2lbs. Call it a medium profile I suppose?
[ATTACH=CONFIG]18705[/ATTACH]
Both groups are 5 rounds-right is at 25 yards, left at 50. If that translates accordingly to 100 yards I’m still in the 2 MOA range (God willing) which is plenty good for my needs.

[peak98]

On a happier note and on the topic of this thread-
I took a shot in the dark and tried a barrel from tactical kinetics.
20”, nitrided with conventional rifling (after reading something purportedly from Bill Alexander saying that wolf ammo preferred conventional rifling to 5r). Put it in the same upper/lower as the old group buy barrel, took it to thee back yard and put about 15 rounds through it.
Didn’t have time to take it to 100 yards but at 25 and 50 it made quarter sized groups with wolf ammo. Much, much better than the last barrel.
Seems I may have been blessed. Barrel weighs about 2lbs. Call it a medium profile I suppose?
Both groups are 5 rounds-right is at 25 yards, left at 50. If that translates accordingly to 100 yards I’m still in the 2 MOA range (God willing) which is plenty good for my needs.

Glad you found the barrel you were looking for, keep us informed how it’s shooting after breakin and with any different ammo you decide to feed it please.
peak98

[Grendelshooter]

Glad you found the barrel you were looking for, keep us informed how it’s shooting after breakin and with any different ammo you decide to feed it please.
peak98

I will. I have some 130gr Berger match ammo kicking around…somewhere…when I find it I’ll see how it shoots and post it.
Wolf to Berger fgmm-the two polar opposite sides of the spectrum lol.
I’d try some Hornady black but I haven’t seen Grendel ammo of any sort in store for quite some time.

[Grendelshooter]

Well first opportunity I’ve had to shoot today was promising.
Conditions really couldn’t be much worse-ersatz shooting bench, sitting on a cinder block, 75-80 degrees ambient with 90* cross winds of 20+ mph gusting up to 50…it’s Oklahoma in March, the wind blows lol.
Wolf steel case turned in 1.75” 5 round groups at 100 yards. Berger shot a bit better at 1.5”, but given the conditions better than I hoped.
I’ll post pics shortly