Re: The "ideal" barrel contour
OK, I'll be the kid who's out of step here.
We've come a long way since Carlos Hathcock's day, and honestly, I think we're been off course since shortly after he was forced into retirement.
He bought a .30-'06 hunting rifle and scope in the PX, and plied his trade for a long time before somebody offered him something more specialized. Hell yeah, it shot better, but somehow, folks began to think a Sniper Rifle needed to be some sort of match rifle with sinews of steel.
They went with the heavy barrel approach to accuracy. But sporter weight barrels, well crafted, can be as effective. It's just not so easy to do or so reliable a process.
So tactical folks have been transformed into weight lifters.
I think that's wrong. I think that back then, at the beginning, we all took a wrong turn.
A Sniper is a hunter.
Heavy volumes of fire are not any more suitable for a Sniper than they are for a Hunter. That's why a Spotter needs a backup rifle with more firepower, if sightly less precision.
A soundly crafted hunting rifle is better suited to the task in any scenario where long distances afoot are involved. Rugged reliability is, IMHO, a dodge. If a professional Sniper can't take proper care of his implements, I say, too bad. Fix it, or replace it, but for goodness sake, let's get back to sensibly appointed implements.
I've seen what a sporter weight barrel can do off a bipod. My case is one of those fortunate instances where that less dependable process actually delivered a workable lighter weight barrel. I'm not a tactical shooter. I'm not even a really dedicated hunter. But for what I need to do, and I think, what Carlos had to do, that hunter rifle was is/equal to the task.
Greg
