Does anyone know how many rounds of jacketed ammo it would take to wear out a barrel in common calibers like the 9mm,38/357, 44 mag & 45acp?

I understand that steal & stainless steal will wear differently, I'm hoping someone would have a general round count for the different caibers.

Does anyone know how many rounds of jacketed ammo it would take to wear out a barrel in common calibers like the 9mm,38/357, 44 mag & 45acp?

I understand that steal & stainless steal will wear differently, I'm hoping someone would have a general round count for the different caibers.

stainless is a bit softer than chrome-moly gun steel. i have never seen a barrel worn out in those calibers, only certain rifle barrels due to throat damage. welcome to the forum.

I've never worn out one myself, but some of the experienced competitive shooters have mentioned 50,000 rounds.

Ball life estimates contain a whole bunch of variables: definition of accuracy, serviceability, ammunition used, maintenance, etc.

When I used to work on light armoured vehicles, the barrel life on the M240 7.62 NATO caliber machine guns were considered to have a barrel life of 20,000 rounds. The current service rifles M16A2 and M4 series are considered to have 20,000-30,000 barrel life between replacements.

Submachine guns in 9mm and .45 ACP can show extreme barrel throat wear and still be very serviceable. Their barrel lives are measured in the several tens of thousands of rounds.

When I used to hang out with Navy small arms armorer types, the word was that match-conditioned M1911A1 pistol barrels were considered competition quality up to 5,000 rounds. The service ammo fired then was 230 grain ball using guilding metal clad steel jacketed bullets for service pistol competition. I remarked that it was quite a number of rounds, and the armorer guys said that was typical barrel life for TWO accurizing rebuilds.

In my limited experience for PPC shooting, two seasons and over 50,000 rounds of 38 Special lead wadcutters never affected the accuracy potential of my M19.

For sporting use, I doubt if an individual is likely to wear out a .357 or even a .44 Magnum barrel. Silouette competition is another matter, however. In that game, battering actions loose, out of time, and flame cutting of breech throats is what wears out revolvers.

When the S&W 500 first came out, owners were dismayed to discover that the mfr stated that barrel life was 1200-1500 rounds between replacement! I don't know if the situation has changed, but that sounds pretty extreme.

I have over 20K of 200 grain plated SWC's through one of my 625's. Rifling is sharp and forcing cone is clean. The cylinder bolt stops are showing a little peening from rapid double action. Not sure I could ever wear the barrel with these loads.

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It's around here somewhere!

Handgun barrels take a looooooonnnnng time to wear out through shooting.....you're going to screw up the crown of a revolver through the cleaning process sooner than you'll wear the gun out from shooting.

I had a 1911 in 45acp that I know I put 10,000 plus rounds through prior to giving it away to a family-member. It was just getting nicely broken in. The bore showed no visible signs of wear.

Thank you for the replies. I'd read the 5,000 mark for 45acp before & it got me to wandering what would happen to calibers that had higher pressure rounds. The acp barrels don't have much to start with.

The 5000 round life of .45 ACP barrels is REAL. On the other hand, using cast lead lubricated bullets I know of one .45 ACP (1911 match gun) that has 200,000 rounds through it. My personal .45 ACP 1911 match gun has 100,000 rounds through it and it is still "match" accurate.

I have two .44 Magnum revolvers that likely have 10,000 rounds through them. They have been shot exclusively with full loads of H110 and lubricated cast bullets. They are as good as when new.

Bottom line - jacketed bullets GREATLY shorten the life of pistols and revolvers. Cast lead bullet barrels have almost unlimited life.

LONG LIVE CAST BULLETS!!

Dale53

I have put well over 5000 rounds of full meatl jacket bullets through my 9mm M&P and my M&P in 40 caliber and have seen no difference in accuracy from day one.

My Gold Cup with a Kart barrel has in excess of 25,000 rounds through it and I just shot Ransom Rest test loads of 1.5" last week. All loads were cast lead, not jacketed.

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H Richard
SWCA1967 SWHF244

can someone post a photo of a new barrel vs a barrel with 5000 shots through so we can see?
I just got my mp9 and I after 500 rounds I took the barrel out, looks down and the lands look softer on the top left side, I have not used solvent yet but I will today to see how it looks, it does not look dirty right now though.

Being an old "Gunnersmate"..............and doing a lot of inspection on the 45cal 1911, grease gun, and all kinds of 30 cal units
I can truly state that there will be a "rounding" of the sharp edges of the "Lands" in any barrel with heavy use of Ball ammo.

Some guns shoot better when "broken in" and some are non-shooters, no matter what you do to fix them.

Amounts of powder destroy the throat and high velocities work on the barrel.........just depends how hard your ride that weapon.

There is no way 500 rounds will show wear on a barrel and even if it did you would not be able to see it with your eyes, you would need an electron microscope. What you are probably seeing or not seeing is do to fouling if you have not cleaned the barrel in 500 rounds, I am anal about cleaning, so to me, that is neglect.

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Still Running Against the Wind

It is different for different loads, but most likely more than you and I can afford.

I was just over at the 1911 Forum and in the Colt section, a regular contributor, Brent, from the Colt Custom Shop, said that he had just replaced the 1911 .45 barrel on one of their pro shooter's pistols because it was starting to show some degradation in accuracy. He mentioned that it had an accurate round count of 100,000 practice rounds (not counting ammo actually used in matches). Another posted had almost that many through his 1911 .45 barrel from Bar-Sto.

A lot! I have a Ruger sr1911 I bought last September and I currently have over 5000 rounds through it with no discernible wear or loss of accuracy. I shoot both jacketed and cast.

My figures come from the Advanced Markmanship unit back in the days I was competing in IPSC. They routinely replaced the barrels on their top shooters (who were using hard ball) at the 5000 round level. They stated they were about to drop below accuracy levels they needed to have a chance to win.

If your pistol will not do under 1" at 25 yards, then I don't have any information for you. However, good match 1911's MUST do well under 3" (and less is better) at FIFTY yards to be competitive in NRA Bullseye competition.

Think what you will, but Advanced Markmanship stats speak volumes. My pistol smith for many years was a Marine Gunnery Sgt. who built McMillan's guns (who practically OWNED Camp Perry during those years). He agreed with those stats. Me, I have shot almost nothing BUT cast bullets for many years. The only hardball I shot was when the match mandated it.

FWIW
Dale53

well, I tried to clean it using a boresnake and hoppes 9 and although it now looks pretty clean, the lands on one side create a stronger line shadow than the other. gun shoots well, and do not notice any difference in accuracy so I assume that whatever it is, it is ok.
I am a professional photographer, that is my trade and I am very good with details that is how I noticed this. Now, also, looking down the crown, I can see the lands around the crown have this same characteristics too, some are thicker/taller (not wider) than the rest, weird! I will try to post a macro photo of the crown soon.

The cost of gun replacement vs cost af ammo to wear one out makes it a moot point.

I have done a fair amount of fully automatic fire and barrels themselves hold up well for diameter, its the throat that takes a beating. The more powder you burn in a barrel the more wear you have and it starts in the throat. Light bullets and large powder charges induce more wear than heavy bullets with less powder.

Most barrels will be damaged from improper cleaning than shooting them out. Barrel material ( stainless or carbon steel)
rifling ( conventional, polygonal) and twist rate and the ammo used all come into play to attempt to come up with a valid number.

Having a machine rest and firing ammo until the group size opens up would be one way to test (accuracy) but when that group opens up its still smaller than 98% of the people can mechanically hold it anyway. I doubt the average guy can find or afford enough ammo to wear one out.

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NRA Certified Instructor & RSO

You'll indeed be fortunate to live long enough to wear out a handgun barrel in the calibers you've listed with modern ammo. You may be able to finally scour the forcing cone out of a 44 mag with heavy use, and I suppose the same could be said for the 357 mag. But this would take decades to accomplish unless you don't take care of things. The brand of gun makes a difference too. Ruger stainless barrels are famous for their abrasion resistance, as anyone who's tried to lap one could tell you.

That is a perfect description of copper fouling.
You need a good copper bore solvent, follow the directions.
The "foul out" system is even more thorough.

Boresnakes and #9 are for "quick and dirty" cleaning, not good enough to evaluate the condition of the barrel metal. One major barrel manufacturer says half the "shot out" barrels he replaces are merely heavily metal fouled.

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Science plus Art

Bore snakes for cleaning are next to useless. They are only good for a final pass with some lube.

To properly clean a barrel you need a proper sized NEW bore brush on a rod and a jag or slotted patch holder. Let the solvent sit and work for a while 10-20 minutes, then brush, repeat with patch etc untill it comes out clean. If there is copper fouling then use the product(s) below

The only tested bore cleaner that actually removes copper is KG12 and M Pro 7. I use KG12, it is non toxic and does work. The more you let the bore get fouled the harder it is to clean.

Clean the bore as well as you can with a new bore brush and solvent, any kind and then use the KG12

Scroll down a bit:

Gun Cleaning Product Tests

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Still Running Against the Wind

Perhaps a professional photographer could post pics of a new vs. a 5K shots barrel? Or just a good photo of the barrel interior of his gun?

I don't have a 5K shot barrel, but like I said, I will try to post a macro photo of it, macro photography is not easy to do and might not show anything in this case though, since macro does not means micro, not even close to it.
Regardless, it might help for the more experienced in this matter to judge.
My barrel does not show any particular color, the color is very uniform so, is copper fouling copper colored?
thanks

Most copper fouling is in rifles which of course shoot a lot faster. It's pretty hard to foul a handgun with copper. Now with lead it's real easy. I think you are perhaps worrying about a non issue.

If you buy some kind a of copper cleaner say even Butches. You have to apply it with a nylon brush and a non brass rod as the chemical turns blue when it hits copper so it will react to a bronze or brass brush.

Take a Q tip and put some ammonia on it and swipe an area you think has copper wait a while and see if it turns the q tip a bluish color. Household ammonia is not really strong enough to cut through copper however,

I would just clean like I suggested above and not worry about it. Go shoot it.

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Still Running Against the Wind

SOmeone in American Rifleman way back when did a test on 45acp bls in 1911. SOmewhere around 100,000 rds it started to lose accuracy. I would imagine the slide & frame would take more abuse than the inside of the bbl. More good bbls are ruined by too much or improper cleaning.
High pressure rifle bbls, totally diff. Small caliber, high vel bbls can be pretty beat up in as little as 4,000rds.

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NRA Cert. Inst. IDPA CSO

I know that in rifles hotter loads tend to erode barrels quicker, and I would assume the same is true in pistols.

Practically speaking, you will never, ever shoot enough rounds of handgun ammo to wear out a new barrel, especially if you're shooting cast bullets. You may end up with other problems, but wear out the barrel is not among them.