Shooting in the heat

[Joefrazell]

Personally I'm not shooting past about 9am right now because of heat and mirage, unless we get a cool day like we had today. I like to shoot when it's 75 degrees or less out but that's hard to do sometimes. I do use a air pump and tubing down the chamber. It works very well. If you put that thing in after every 3 shots on a magnum it will be back to ambient temp within 5 min usually. If I'm not doing load development and just shooting I'm not as concerned about air temp and mirage but it seems Im always in load development haha

 

[Bob Wright]

There are AA battery powered air pumps that fit in the chamber for about $45. They're small and get the job done. I'd really like to have one that pulls the air thru ice. Where I shoot, ambient air in the morning is 80-90° at sun up. Or, camp out at a higher elevation to get something reasonable. SW desert is pretty hot.

 

[AZShooter]

One of the fastest ways is to run cold water across the barrel with muzzle pointed down. I use to use the refrigerated water cooler at the range. But it had drawbacks. Couldn't do it if others were around as muzzle would have to point in an unsafe direction. Also only did this with a synthetic stock. Blew out any water in barrel channel. When the Canyon Del Oro wash flooded one year the cooler was taken downstream never to be seen again,

A bunch of the members use a wet towel draped across the barrel. Some have a cooler with ice water for the towel. Others use a air mattress pump.

The absolute fastest way which also keeps things dry is a CO2 system. A ball valve is installed with a rubber hose and a tapered tip which will seal against most chamber shoulders. A 20 lb tank is minimum size as smaller ones won't get very cold.

You can get a barrel cool in less than a minute. I only use this system if I am working up a load and want to maintain ambient temperatures. I use it year round for that purpose.

This pic shows the gauges I used before I switched to a ball valve. Drawbacks? The CO2 costs around $23 for a 20 lb tank refill. I own two tanks and go to a local welding supply store to trade the tanks out a couple of times a year. It will cool several rifles for around three or four range sessions.

 

[Lethal_Chica]

There are AA battery powered air pumps that fit in the chamber for about $45. They're small and get the job done. I'd really like to have one that pulls the air thru ice. Where I shoot, ambient air in the morning is 80-90° at sun up. Or, camp out at a higher elevation to get something reasonable. SW desert is pretty hot.

I have one, called the chamber chiller, but the plastic melts in my chamber and leaves red plastic residue. Does yours?

 

[Lethal_Chica]

That is a neat system you have there. Thanks for sharing!!

 

[Buzzsaw]

Use a Barrel KHULE by Magneto, and the yellow Barrel Cool. I use these while rifle stands vertically in a rack while I shoot another rifle.

In Texas, beach shooting (Load Development) you must be VERY Patient, hot is hot, and this way you are "cooling" with warm air to start with.




FOR ME

 

[YZ-80]

Sometimes during the summer I wish I could just fall asleep and wake up in the middle of October. I really have no use for June, July, August or September. If we could just be on a repetitive 3 month cycle of October, November and December, that would be fine with me.

 

[rsbhunter]

Living in S.E. New Mexico, temps are at 98-106 from now to September, so it makes matches an ordeal. I have thought about using one of those cooling/evaporative towels with rubbing alcohol to see if that would work? Wrap around the barrel between relays, wet with alcohol, the evaporation should cool pretty quickly, and the alcohol shouldn't hurt the ss bbl or synthetic stock....one snag now is finding rubbing alcohol with this covid crap going on....rsbhunter

 

[jrock]

I like to set the gun in the vertical position allowing the heat to pull air through the barrel. Works really well even in 90+ deg weather. Down side is moving the gun from the bags between shots. I prefer to leave the gun on the bags and wait 4 min between shots with the bolt open. Keeping the gun and ammo out of the sun is very important. I moved to a pop up tent shade for extended shooting sessions.
I've kept ammo in the cooler and it works well.

 

[Tank308]

I do keep these barrelcool strips on my barrels just in front of the chamber. When the 122 f starts to turn orange I let the barrel cool. I think it's a helpful tool.

 

[Tommytrees]

I use several ways to help cool barrel down.
1-shoot , remove round, leave bolt open, 2- use battery powered Coleman air pump (Red) to send air down barrel, 3- take about 5 min. +- to read target via spotter, update Dope book, keep rounds in small cooler bag with some ice or blue ice, temp around 50-60 and a thermometer.

My FOP range has a fan that moves air at each bench, nature always wins and I pack up around 10:30 AM.

Like a lot of the other ideas on this thread (all seem good) but I try to limit the amount and/or weight of stuff I have to load and unload from my vehicle.

Good shooting and be safe, be well,
T

 

[RWE]

Air mattress pump works great, like that little fan Buzzsaw!

 

[Dosh]

About eight years ago I was getting tired of waiting for barrels to cool here in the Az heat. I made this. Air mattress pump ($10 at Wally World) which runs on batteries and an old bore guide. Epoxied the hose to the pump. Batteries last well over a year. Safely cools a barrel with ambient air.

 

[jrock]

I have one of those and am too lazy to dig it out of the back of the closet. Would be my first choice.