So I'm thinking about purchasing a new rifle for a duty AR and I'm seeing a lot of these company's (BCM, DD, LWRCI,etc.) offering these new lightweight AR's with light barrels. I've heard that light barrels do not keep their accuracy as much as regular heavy barrels? Can anyone elaborate on this since I'm looking at a Colt 6960 CCU which I believe also uses a light weight barrel. Any thoughts or suggestions?

My belief is that unless you are either (1) going for uber accuracy or (2) shooting full automatic, you will see minimal practical accuracy shift with a lighter-weight barrel out to 100 yards, maybe more.

I took a 1-day 600rd carbine course and from 5-50yds, my 16" ELW BFH BCM had no issues that I could see. Misses were on me and it still stacked them on target when I didn't suck.

I also have a 11.5 ELW-Fluted BCM and it does fine with a suppressor on or off.

And note I'm not saying "none". Some vertical POI shift will likely become apparent to some, depending how / where they shoot. Moderate to rapid fire at longer distances will likely show some degraded accuracy compared to a stiffer barrel shooting similar splits.

To me it just depends how you shoot. Me in the FL Panhandle, it's hard to get a shot greater than 100-150 yards. Realistically for me on my property my max shot is about 75 yards. So a lightweight barrel for pest control / HD works just fine for me.

If I was out west, with a lot more potential reach, I may choose differently, but maybe not.

I love them, very handy. By "not keep accuracy" that means they will heat and open up groups faster than a medium or heavy contour barrel. In practical terms for a duty/defense rifle, not at all relevant.

I had no problem banging steel at 500yds with my 14.5" lightweight barrel Daniel Defense upper.

My 16" mid-length pencil-profile BCM barrel has no accuracy issues that I've noticed after a few hours at the range.

I don't expect that I'll be engaging anything for longer than that duration, and have alternates that I could rotate in if it came to that.

My theory is with barrel mounted sights, the problem isn't as bad. Your barrel heats, bends this way or that way... but it takes the sight with it.

Rail mounted front sight, dots or scopes, the problem is worse. They're still pointing where they were, but the barrel isn't.


I've seen some lighter barreled hunting rifles start to wander a decent amount (at 100 yards) in only a few shots.

InRange YouTube pencil barrel

InRange pencil barrel testing

InRange interview with Faxon Barrel part2

InRange interview Faxon Barrel part 3

Thank you for all the input, I truly appreciate it.

quote:

Originally posted by cas:
My theory is with barrel mounted sights, the problem isn't as bad. Your barrel heats, bends this way or that way... but it takes the sight with it.

Rail mounted front sight, dots or scopes, the problem is worse. They're still pointing where they were, but the barrel isn't.


I've seen some lighter barreled hunting rifles start to wander a decent amount (at 100 yards) in only a few shots.

Never considered that, mine has a front sight gas block, but now also has a Strikefire II as well. I haven't noticed any shift, but dont typically shoot beyond 25yds or so. I've got others for reaching farther.

Faxon gunner profile barrels are Gov't profile to the gas block, and pencil barrel after that. Should be as good or better than typical Gov't profile.

I have a couple of 16" and a 14.5 with a welded brake. The do pretty well.