I have a Buckmark Target Rifle with a Cmore railway sight. I am going to have the barrel threaded for a can by Gemtech. It has an 18" barrel. If I cut it down to 16" will it make that big a change in velocity or accuracy? Thanks for the help.
Brian


Feel free to tell me what you think of this project. I have already had a slick trigger job done on this rifle and the Cmore sight is a blast!

IMHO if done properly NO.

Mike

From previous discussions on the 20" versus 16" AR topic, you loose velocity with a shorter barrel.. BUT you can loose accuracy if you have a shorter sight distance (that is why bushy has the disapator models - 16" barrel, but sight distance of a 20").. Not sure how much velocity you would loose though.

Hope this helps. www.gunsmoke.com/scot/guns/1022/22ballistics.html

There has also been some discussion that for .22LR, anything over a 16" barrel actually loses velocity (but not accuracy).

I don't know the facts, but it makes sense that barrel length adding velocity has to have a limit.  Gas expanding from burning powder can only expand so far before it has reached it's limit and could actually cause a vacuum behind the bullet.  In the extreme case, imagine a 10 foot long barrel shooting .22LR.  The bullet might not even make it out the muzzle.

I do not know the optimum barrel length for a .22, but have heard 16" for velocity, if accuracy is more important then go with a longer barrel and less velocity.


Again... all hearsay... Feel free to correct me if you have the facts.

If cut down and properly crowned you'll  velocity.
Depending on range you may also lose accuracy.

I' a little more familiar with the AR-15.
With the carbine vs. the rifle you'll always lose velocity but accuracy won't be much affected until you shoot over about 300 yards.
Over 300 yards and the decreased velocity will begin to tell and accuracy will diminish.