Keeping Round Counts

[Heartland Patriot]

I haven't kept any round counts on any of my firearms, but they are all "working" guns, not "nice" guns. Not a one of them cost me $1K, and some were quite a bit less. If I owned a very fine bolt action, something that was intended as a target rifle or a fine hunting weapon, then I'm pretty sure I'd keep round count, and annotate types of rounds, group sizes, etc. That way, IF something didn't shoot well, or had some other problem, I'd know fairly quickly and I could take that out of the list of ammo to be used with the rifle. But, they are YOUR firearms, you have to do what YOU think is the right thing to do for you, as long as safety, etc. is taken into account first...and none of that was an issue here.

[snatchel]

Keeping round counts has pushed me towards purchasing reloading equipment... nothing else. LOL

[The Annoyed Man]

I think that the only pistol I have that has less than 200 rounds is my little scandium .357...........for good reason. But my other pistols get shot, and I don't keep track, other than in a general sense.

However, I've noticed that people seem to care more about round count through rifles. The AR10 I recently acquired used came with a shooter's log and 320 rounds on the clock. I've added 70 rounds since and logged them in. But it has a custom barrel from Noveske, and it was a lot of money to purchase and install. I think that rifle cartridges are generally speaking much harder on the bore than almost any pistol cartridge, so round count has some kind of significance. I mean you could use gauges to measure wear and headspacing, but round count can give one quick information about the likely condition of the bore. Even so, I'm guessing that most rifles never get shot enough to wear out a barrel.

[AggieMM]

I will not confirm nor deny the existence of the aforementioned spreadsheet.

Does it have a page the summarizes rounds per gun per year, and breaks out total rounds for competition, practice, hunting, etc.?? Not saying mine does, just asking......

Ryan

[v-rog]

I generally track the number of boolits I cast and my hand-loaded rounds. That gives me a good idea how many rounds I shoot through my weapons.

[Heartland Patriot]

I think that the only pistol I have that has less than 200 rounds is my little scandium .357...........for good reason. But my other pistols get shot, and I don't keep track, other than in a general sense.

However, I've noticed that people seem to care more about round count through rifles. The AR10 I recently acquired used came with a shooter's log and 320 rounds on the clock. I've added 70 rounds since and logged them in. But it has a custom barrel from Noveske, and it was a lot of money to purchase and install. I think that rifle cartridges are generally speaking much harder on the bore than almost any pistol cartridge, so round count has some kind of significance. I mean you could use gauges to measure wear and headspacing, but round count can give one quick information about the likely condition of the bore. Even so, I'm guessing that most rifles never get shot enough to wear out a barrel.

That last statement is true in an absolute sense, very true. And it probably applies to 98 to 99 percent of rifles. But, I would add a caveat that there are LEVELS of worn out...a rifle/barrel intended to win match/competition shooting will be "worn out" at a much lower round count than a long range hunting rifle/barrel which will be "worn out" before a general purpose/plinker/"minute-of-man" rifle/barrel will be...me, since I don't have ANYTHING that fits in the first category and it would be pushing it to put any of mine in the second category, am sitting right about where your statement puts most. Just figured I'd add my .02, thanks.

[74novaman]

But there's nothing wrong with me putting 500-750+ rounds a month downrange is there?

Not if you can afford it.

Thats the main issue. Its not that I wouldn't like to shoot 2,000 rounds a month...

Its just that I'd be homeless if I tried to do it.

[SATX-Scrub]

I will not confirm nor deny the existence of the aforementioned spreadsheet.

Does it have a page the summarizes rounds per gun per year, and breaks out total rounds for competition, practice, hunting, etc.?? Not saying mine does, just asking......

Ryan

hmmm...summary page huh? Food for thought.

[The Annoyed Man]

I think that the only pistol I have that has less than 200 rounds is my little scandium .357...........for good reason. But my other pistols get shot, and I don't keep track, other than in a general sense.

However, I've noticed that people seem to care more about round count through rifles. The AR10 I recently acquired used came with a shooter's log and 320 rounds on the clock. I've added 70 rounds since and logged them in. But it has a custom barrel from Noveske, and it was a lot of money to purchase and install. I think that rifle cartridges are generally speaking much harder on the bore than almost any pistol cartridge, so round count has some kind of significance. I mean you could use gauges to measure wear and headspacing, but round count can give one quick information about the likely condition of the bore. Even so, I'm guessing that most rifles never get shot enough to wear out a barrel.

That last statement is true in an absolute sense, very true. And it probably applies to 98 to 99 percent of rifles. But, I would add a caveat that there are LEVELS of worn out...a rifle/barrel intended to win match/competition shooting will be "worn out" at a much lower round count than a long range hunting rifle/barrel which will be "worn out" before a general purpose/plinker/"minute-of-man" rifle/barrel will be...me, since I don't have ANYTHING that fits in the first category and it would be pushing it to put any of mine in the second category, am sitting right about where your statement puts most. Just figured I'd add my .02, thanks.

Crossfire's husband Marty once told me that he had once made the mistake of cleaning the barrel of a bench-rest rifle he used to use for bench-rest competition—that's right.... apparently many bench rest shooters do not advise cleaning a rifle's barrel at all. He said he had to shoot 350 rounds through it just to get it back to shooting the way it was before he cleaned it. I'm guessing he fired thousands of rounds through that competition barrel without worrying about it at all....until he made the "mistake" of cleaning it.

[Heartland Patriot]

I think that the only pistol I have that has less than 200 rounds is my little scandium .357...........for good reason. But my other pistols get shot, and I don't keep track, other than in a general sense.

However, I've noticed that people seem to care more about round count through rifles. The AR10 I recently acquired used came with a shooter's log and 320 rounds on the clock. I've added 70 rounds since and logged them in. But it has a custom barrel from Noveske, and it was a lot of money to purchase and install. I think that rifle cartridges are generally speaking much harder on the bore than almost any pistol cartridge, so round count has some kind of significance. I mean you could use gauges to measure wear and headspacing, but round count can give one quick information about the likely condition of the bore. Even so, I'm guessing that most rifles never get shot enough to wear out a barrel.

That last statement is true in an absolute sense, very true. And it probably applies to 98 to 99 percent of rifles. But, I would add a caveat that there are LEVELS of worn out...a rifle/barrel intended to win match/competition shooting will be "worn out" at a much lower round count than a long range hunting rifle/barrel which will be "worn out" before a general purpose/plinker/"minute-of-man" rifle/barrel will be...me, since I don't have ANYTHING that fits in the first category and it would be pushing it to put any of mine in the second category, am sitting right about where your statement puts most. Just figured I'd add my .02, thanks.

Crossfire's husband Marty once told me that he had once made the mistake of cleaning the barrel of a bench-rest rifle he used to use for bench-rest competition—that's right.... apparently many bench rest shooters do not advise cleaning a rifle's barrel at all. He said he had to shoot 350 rounds through it just to get it back to shooting the way it was before he cleaned it. I'm guessing he fired thousands of rounds through that competition barrel without worrying about it at all....until he made the "mistake" of cleaning it.

You know what, I've never heard that about not cleaning competition rifles (not saying its not true, just haven't heard it), but I have heard that some folks will buy an old surplus rifle, like an Argentinian Mauser, for instance. They take it to the range after a quick boresnaking or what have you, and fire it and are quite happy with how it shoots for being so old. Then they go home to clean it after firing, see all the copper fouling in the bore (most of it old) and commence to scrubbing away with some strong solvent. Then they later go to the range with the rifle and it doesn't fire worth a darned anymore...and simply cannot figure out what happened. I guess it would work the same for competition rifles. I learn something new every day.

[FishInTx]

I've been round counting on my last gun purchase and that's only because I'm having some minor jamming issues with it, a Taurus .380. What rounds jam, when and where. The more I shoot the better it gets. Only about 168 rounds through it so far.