Henry Rifle Forums

Heny instead of replacing the barrel on my Frontier again decided to send ne a brand new rifle. When I cleaned the bore before shooting for the first time i noticed this barrel had tight spots near the chamber but they were not as tight or as long as the old barrrel, other than the tight spots the bore looked great. My first range trip was disappointing as my best group was 1.5" the worst was almost three. This was the fourth trip back to Henry with accuracy problems so I did not want to send it back again.

i have had good success in the past fire lapping barrels with tight spots and improving accuracy problems so I tried it with this gun. I fired a few fun round out of it then did some bench shooting. When I bench a lever gun I place the front bag as close to the action as possible and used a rolled up towel as my rear bag. I was using peep sights so I will give at least a quarter inch on my groups because of sight alignment (probably more than that).

I was happy with these 50yd groups. Still annoyed by this gap.

That's some pretty good shootin.
Have you tried any other ammo types?
I was playin with some of my 22's here last mon., shootin different ammo and had very different results.
Hey, these are lever guns and not bench rifles.
If like me not all days shootin are not the same.

Hope this one ends up a keeper for you, I know the last experience was a trying one.

RP

Looks really good for .22 shootin' with a lever rifle! I haven't missed too many cans with mine yet.

50 yards….peep sight…… that’s some good shooting.

Could you explain "fire lapping". I'm not familiar with that process.

Frie lapping is putting a grit on a bullet and shooting it through a barrel. The grit is made to degrade as it travels down the bore leaving the muzzle end slightly smaller than the chamber end. There are different grits that you use from course to fine. There are two different ways to get the grit that I know of one is made by Wheeler that you put your own grit on your bullets and the other one comes with the bullets already with the grit in them.

There is a lot said about fire lapping both pro and con. I even read about a gun guru that used it on his air gauged target barrel to prove that it didn't make fire lapped barrels shoot better. I would not recommend using it on a barrel that shoot good already. In my personal experiences it can usually make a rough barrel with tight spots shoot better. I use it as a last resort with guns that barrels are not up to par. I have used it on one barrel that was rough, it didn't shoot better but was a LOT easier to clean. It has done a good job for me on a Remlin barrel, a stainless 10-22 barrel and a Smith Victory barrel that shards of steel fell out of when I did an initial cleaning.

Here is the stuff i use for lapping a 22lr barrel, The Wheeler kit and a 22 60 grn Super Sniper round that is set in a 22 short case. It allows me to get a good amount of grit on a bullet.