Bear Creek Arsenal barrels

Toprudder

Be vewy vewy qwiet.
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Anyone have any opinions on their barrels? I saw where they had a 24” heavy barrel in 223 on sale and ordered one. I’ve put a few rounds through it to break it in, and decided to put a bore scope in it to see how much copper was in the barrel. I found a lot of voids and rough spots, especially bad near the muzzle. I’ve got a return label from them, but I have to decide whether I want a refund or replacement. Should I get a replacement from them, or should I get the refund and go with something from another source? I am leaning towards White Oak, but am open to suggestions. I am looking for something to shoot from the bench for precision.
 
Friend of mine bought a complete upper in 6.5 Grendel and shoots it to 700 yards repeatedly and loves it
 
Because of the Moore Machine history and Bear Creek being a division of them I personally stay away from them but that goes back 4 or 5 years ... and just my opinion.

As to other barrels check out X-Caliber ... they are kinda new and making some noise. They offer a lot of choices from profile to length to twist (even a 5R).
 
I have used 5 or 6 of them to build plinkers and have been very satisfied so far. 3 of them where for pistol builds and the rest for rifles all with irons or a red dot so I have not tried to actually measure groups with them but I am not missing either so works for me.
 
I managed to get some photos from my borescope.

This is the rough area about 3/4" inside the muzzle. It goes the full circumference of the bore.

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This shows what appears to be some rough machining marks. I've seen worse in other barrels, though.

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A rough spot just inside the muzzle. This can't be good.
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This is a void on a land. I found several of these along the bore. Something like this does not concern me too much.
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The rough spots near the muzzle are what concern me the most. I have to think that the rough spots are indicative of the quality of the metal which may affect the life of the barrel. Anyway, they said they would either replace it or give a refund, so they are standing behind their product. I just don't get the warm fuzzies about trying another one of their barrels.
 
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Just did some research on them and found pretty much what was stated above with the Moore Machine history and the problems. Girlfriends son is active military and they just did a deal where active duty can get a 16" 5.56 bbl. at n/c. Deal is legit and he ordered one. Guess they are trying to build the name. I will inspect once received.
 
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I got one of the free barrels they were giving away and it should be delivered soon. I’m really not overly concerned with the quality of it as I’m planning to build a budget rifle with it and minute of man is about the best if expect out of it.
 
My free barrel arrived yesterday. It's the 16" Nitride heavy with target crown in 223 Wylde chamber. I'm gathering up the rest of the parts I want for the build. Quality looks good on first inspection. Will post range results once I get some.

Terry
 
My free barrel arrived yesterday. It's the 16" Nitride heavy with target crown in 223 Wylde chamber. I'm gathering up the rest of the parts I want for the build. Quality looks good on first inspection. Will post range results once I get some.

Terry

Mine shipped today. Thought it was supposed to be a m4 profile 16" 556 nato
 
I got one of the free barrels they were giving away and it should be delivered soon. I’m really not overly concerned with the quality of it as I’m planning to build a budget rifle with it and minute of man is about the best if expect out of it.
First,, Thank You for serving
Second, Not my business, BUT concerning the "Quality ?" of the barrel ?
Just because you are doing a "Budget Build" does NOT mean it has to shoot or operate like ,, junk.
Not trying to be out of place, when you get your barrel and if the barrel is not up to snuff , I would hold BCA to it and request a good barrel.

FWIW
Safe Shooting
 
As cheap as Ballistic Advantage and Faxon barrels are right now, I see no reason to dip into unreliable/questionable barrels to save $20-50.
 
As cheap as Ballistic Advantage and Faxon barrels are right now, I see no reason to dip into unreliable/questionable barrels to save $20-50.
True, but this BCA barrel was on sale for $70. I'm not out much, but still....
 
First,, Thank You for serving
Second, Not my business, BUT concerning the "Quality ?" of the barrel ?
Just because you are doing a "Budget Build" does NOT mean it has to shoot or operate like ,, junk.
Not trying to be out of place, when you get your barrel and if the barrel is not up to snuff , I would hold BCA to it and request a good barrel.

FWIW
Safe Shooting

I do want it to function fine, I simply meant that I'm not expecting MOA accuracy out of it and as long as they don't affect function, I wont be concerned with some cosmetic marks or blems on it.
 
I had one of the Moore’s machine ars right around the time sandy hook happened. Never had a single issue with it. Sold it off when I got a ridiculous offer and made a good bit of money on it. One of my exes dad was close with the owner of MMC and had a bunch of their stuff he carried around in his travels as an unpaid salesman after the name change. I checked it out and was more impressed with their stuff than with my current psa that I have. They may not be Daniel defense or colt, but it’s at a fraction of the cost, a local company and they seem to stand behind their products. I don’t think you can ask for much else.
 
I have a 20 inch 6.5 grendel ss barrel from them. Cant get better than 1.5 inch groups out of it. It's being replaced with a ballistic advantage DMR 6.5 barrel. The BCA barrel will be coming a deer rifle.
 
If you are building a rifle for accuracy I would never buy the cheapest barrel and expect high end results from it. It goes along with the old say that good work is not cheap and cheap work is not good. Now if you are building something to kill deer and cans then one of these barrels will fit the bill perfectly. Benchrest or long range precision you will definetly get a more accurate product from White Oak but you will pay way more for it too.
 
If you are building a rifle for accuracy I would never buy the cheapest barrel and expect high end results from it. It goes along with the old say that good work is not cheap and cheap work is not good. Now if you are building something to kill deer and cans then one of these barrels will fit the bill perfectly. Benchrest or long range precision you will definitely get a more accurate product from White Oak but you will pay way more for it too.
And that is the situation in a nutshell. I was expecting to pay $300 or more for a precision barrel (which is my ultimate goal) but since I saw this on sale for $70, I thought "why not". When I took a look with the borescope, my first thought was "now I know why it was so cheap". (I guess they figure there won't be too many people out there with borescopes). I like to experiment with things, and occasionally I will find a diamond in the rough. Right now, what I call my "precision" AR is a PSA upper with a stainless barrel, and I am able to do a little better than 1moa fairly consistently, but it did not shoot that well right off the bat, it took some work (especially my shooting technique). Still, I would like to see just what I can squeak out of the AR platform.

I am shipping it back today. I think I will give them a chance on a replacement, but at the same time I think I am going to dive in a buy a good barrel from either White Oak or X-Caliber.
 
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And that is the situation in a nutshell. I was expecting to pay $300 or more for a precision barrel (which is my ultimate goal) but since I saw this on sale for $70, I thought "why not". When I took a look with the borescope, my first thought was "now I know why it was so cheap". (I guess they figure there won't be too many people out there with borescopes). I like to experiment with things, and occasionally I will find a diamond in the rough. Right now, what I call my "precision" AR is a PSA upper with a stainless barrel, and I am able to do a little better than 1moa fairly consistently, but it did not shoot that well right off the bat, it took some work (especially my shooting technique). Still, I would like to see just what I can squeak out of the AR platform.

I am shipping it back today. I think I will give them a chance on a replacement, but at the same time I think I am going to dive in a buy a good barrel from either White Oak or X-Caliber.

I have a 18" Black Hole Weaponry barrel I have been thinking of selling if you are interested. After purchasing a suppressor I am going back down to a 16".
 
I have a 18" Black Hole Weaponry barrel I have been thinking of selling if you are interested. After purchasing a suppressor I am going back down to a 16".
Thanks for the offer. I was interested in something 20" or longer.
 
Just got a shipping notice, my replacement barrel should be delivered today. Will see what it looks like and report back.
 
I just got a 10.5 barrel from BCA. black Friday deal, 35 bucks. I wont know how it shoots until after Christmas. I am trying to put together an all star pistol packed full of hated parts from low cost companies. just to see if I can make it work.
 
It's a sub 100$ barrel... If it functions, and hold minute of man at 100 then it is worth the coinage.

As mentioned, precision does not come in the form of a barrel that cost about the same as a tank of gas.

I have had 2 of their 223 wylde barrels. They where acceptable for what they where, the rifle went bang, the projectile hit within the area I wanted it to.

Still have a 308 barrel I got for 60$. It was 1.5-2" at hundred yards with cheap ammo.

For a cheap build rifle, they are good. For precision, I would go with an AR15Performance barrel at the bare minimum.

oh and I got one of their barrels for Vets for 10$ for veterans day. It can and is decent quality. It would already be together if I didn't loose my job
 
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Well, I got the barrel in and already have it installed. I took a quick look down the bore with a scope, I did not see anything that concerned me. I still saw some scratches inside the muzzle end, in about the same location where I saw problems before, but they were nothing compared to the first barrel. Makes me think they may have a problem with their process, though.

I definitely won’t be able to shoot it this weekend, seeing as how we have about 6” of snow and still coming down. I’ve got some new toys to play with in the reloading shack, though.
 
I just got my black Friday 10.5 from them yesterday. Its was covered in cutting oil and has metal shavings in the chamber but I cant see any issues with the bore.
 
My buddy just got one of their 6.5 Grendel complete uppers and it’s pretty nice. Don’t have a bore scope to check the inside out and he doesn’t have any sights or scope yet so no accuracy check but he’s pleased with it.
 
I got my replacement barrel from Bear Creek, so I went to Frontline yesterday and shot a few rounds through that to break it in. The factory 55fmj bullets were not very accurate, but my handloads appeared to group fairly well. I only had a 4x scope mounted, and it has a really thick reticle, so I had a hard time with an accurate hold @ 100 yards, but this barrel seems to be doing ok. I need to mount a better scope on it so I can better evaluate it. At this point, for what I paid for it, I will keep it.
 
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