OzFclass

My sincere thoughts go out to the barrel makers with so much going into the makings, and then going out to have sooo many other components SHOVED into them , Chop.

Howdy Folks !!
I apologise for the lengthy absence. You can only vaguely understand how bloody hard it has been for this black duck to go for two weeks with effectively zero Internet service. We have very poor signal where we are currently living, and have just spent $820 two weeks ago, and another $210 today trying to rectify the problem. Slowly we are winning, and tonight for the first time I can actually get pages on ozfclass to open fully.

PETE SMITH : Wow !! Thank you very much for the work that you have put in with your stereo microscope. It adds another dimension to what we are all talking about. I am amazed at the clarity of your photos.

UNDERSIZED BRONZE BRUSHES : never ! No one in Australia puts a new bronze brush on quicker than me ! I have literally dozens of bronze brushes put aside that are probably .260-.270 in size. They started out as 7mm brushes, but as soon as they started to "feel" wrong, I pull them off and replace them with a new one.

KG2 POLISH "GRIT SIZE" : I still have a little of the original bottle of KG2 Bore Polish. Could Dave McNamara or Pete Smith....or anyone else on here....possibly measure the "grit" (if that's the correct terminology) of the KG2 as used ? I wouldn't even know where to start to try to actually gauge it, or measure it, but that just might be interesting.

Thank you to everyone who has maintained an interest in this topic, and to those who have contributed with comments, but particularly to Frank Green, Dave Mac, Alan Fraser...and that new boy, Mr Smith. I am continually gob smacked by your knowledge, logic and common sense.

Almost 4 weeks since my operation, and leg is going pretty well. No weight bearing for another 4-5 weeks, but with the staples out and wound healing well, I am in a lot better headspace now. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Alan Fraser who came out and stayed with us for two nights after his NRAA Queens win, and to Jason Mayers who came and joined him for a day. Between them they sorted, marked, packed up, transported and then unloaded ALL of my " shooting stuff". Everything except the rifles themselves, was their responsibility. God alone knows what sort of stuff up it would have been if a "Non F Classer" had tried to pack all of my toys and tools up, but Alan and Jason did a phenomenal job. Thank you.

While Alan was there, we did manage to borescope and photograph his "Champion" Bartlein, so I will just have to find the camera, and will then post two short videos and some photos of what the inside of his looks like, in comparison to mine.
Fortunately for him, it's nothing like mine !

He's alive! And more importantly, he's online! Welcome back Tony. Things have gotten far too serious on the forums since you've been away. There are still no really convincing theories about your barrel, and as promised I didn't tell them about the other 10 barrels Jason and I found out the back of your shed with the same weird pattern, or about that book called "Barrel Lapping for Idiots"... . The best thing you can do right now is obey the doctors and get that leg back to full strength. Hopefully you'll make the Queensland Queens? If not shooting then at least reporting?

AlanF wrote:He's alive! And more importantly, he's online! Welcome back Tony. Things have gotten far too serious on the forums since you've been away. There are still no really convincing theories about your barrel, and as promised I didn't tell them about the other 10 barrels Jason and I found out the back of your shed with the same weird pattern, or about that book called "Barrel Lapping for Idiots"... . The best thing you can do right now is obey the doctors and get that leg back to full strength. Hopefully you'll make the Queensland Queens? If not shooting then at least reporting?

None of this concerned me as mush as Alan Tony.

What concerned me was the half empty 20kg bag of stainless tumbling media...

Welcome back Tony, good to hear you are on the mend.

Cheers
Danny

After looking at the new pics it does look a lot more like something/ some things have been lodged in the cleaning brush or between the rod and barrel.

Out of interest, how long are these steel tumbling rods? Long enough to get caught sideways in a 7mm barrel? Is that possible? If so that would mean they could follow the rifling and cause the gouges on the lands?

Sorry just thinking left field. So many theories. End of the day the barrel is toast, Bartlein are doing a fantastic thing and getting Tony another barrel, and Tony will get it shooting and be ready to flog us all with it!

Brad,
The s/s pins in mine are right on 1/4", or .250" long so yes it is feasible that they technically "could" fit down a 7mm barrel traveling sideways and should be too short to actually get caught.
You are right about Bartleins response. It is a wonderful gesture from them to replace the barrel and I sincerely do hope that the generous replacement shoots as well as the others that I brought in ......which are all good enough to be seen around the top of the Leaderboard when the nut behind the butt does his part
Cam McEwan and Mark Fairbairn both have one, as does Victorian long range specialist Paul Deehan so I expect that Frank Green will see Alan Fraser's hummer of a Bartlein get challenged by a handful of its "brothers" sometime soon.
I did a bit of a deal over a 280AI barrel with Macguru, that saw him end up with a 6mm Bartlein that Matt P chambed into a 6 Dasher for him. I heard that he shoots at least one "possible" every time he shoots it
Looks like another bloody hummer that I let get away

Tony- I think its high time that you got more and shared them around. I need another 6.5mm barrel and probably another 7 some time early next year.

Tony's replacement barrel that we offered will be done this week. Just have to finalize the export paperwork and all can ship.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

Frank Green wrote:Tony's replacement barrel that we offered will be done this week. Just have to finalize the export paperwork and all can ship.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

Frank,

Tony has moved house and its well into the outback where they probably don't have deliveries. If you send it to me I could pass it on to him. In fact I could do some testing with it to make sure its well run in for him.

Alan

Frank Green wrote:Tony's replacement barrel that we offered will be done this week. Just have to finalize the export paperwork and all can ship.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

That is wonderful news. Thank you Frank Green and Bartlein barrels !! Craig McGowan from 7mm.com.au will probably find me sleeping outside of his house, once the precious package gets shipped along with some of his barrels.

As Dave Mac hinted, keep watching this thread for some definitive news about "that barrel of mine". What some of our North Queensland based F Class geniuses have documented will shock some people, and probably lead to a rush on borrowed bore scopes to "just check".

AlanF wrote:

Frank Green wrote:Tony's replacement barrel that we offered will be done this week. Just have to finalize the export paperwork and all can ship.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

Frank,

Tony has moved house and its well into the outback where they probably don't have deliveries. If you send it to me I could pass it on to him. In fact I could do some testing with it to make sure its well run in for him.

Alan

Oh, and Frank, could you please block Bartleins email accounts from receiving any mails from that Fraser fellow in Victoria. I am sure he does not mean me well and things have been known to just disappear in that hillbilly country that he comes from.

OK folks - we have promised some results and here they are. We are now very confident in stating the cause of The Death of Tony's barrel is the use of the abrasive polish on a bronze brush. The rod not spinning is what has caused the tracking of the brass/bronze fibres over the lands as hypothesized earlier (possibly originally suggested by Marty or Mark Fairbairn over a beer and campfire in Townsville).

Peter and I have been working on this for a little while now and feel we have pretty conclusively identified the issue. It was a bit of work but we both felt there could be great repercussions for the industry and worth the effort.

We have put a brief article together on Craigs website on the following link.

http://www.7mm.com.au/death-barrel/

we hope you enjoy the read and look forward to the aftermath and discussion. (You can click on the photos for a higher resolution image)

It was a wake up call for us as well and hope it is enough to challenge most on their cleaning methods and cleaning rod quality.

Dave, Peter,

Nice work. We all owe you.

John