Carbon fiber rifle barrels can provide many benefits to shooters for certain applications. This guide will help you determine if a carbon fiber barrel is right for your application.
Overview
Carbon fiber rifle barrels are basically a standard steel barrel that has been turned down to a minimum profile and covered in carbon fiber to build the profile back up. Different companies use different methods of achieving this by either wrapping the barrel with resin and carbon fiber sheets or using pre fabricated stock and fitting it to the barrel profile. Wolfpack Armory has developed a process that is accurate, more lightweight, and the most cost effective of all of the manufacturers.
Benefits
1. Weight Reduction
First and foremost, carbon fiber barrels are lighter than steel. This makes them favorable for competition shooters and hunters who strive for the lightest rifle setups that they can achieve.
2. Balance
By removing weight from the front half of the rifle, carbon fiber barreled rifles are better balanced. By moving the pivot point closer to the rear of the rifle, it takes less work to acquire a target and stay on target.
3. Rigidity
Carbon fiber is used by the aerospace industry because of its strength to weight ratio. This also makes it useful for firearm applications. The addition of carbon fiber over the steel barrel core increases rigidity and therefore makes the barrel more accurate and repeatable.
4. Heat Control
When heat is generated in the steel core of the barrel, the carbon fiber absorbs and disperses the heat slower so felt heat coming off the barrel is less intense. While this helps with heat control, it can also cause damage if too much heat is generated too fast.
Disadvantages
1. Over Heating
Carbon fiber will eventually break down and crack if it is overheated. Carbon fiber barrels can take abuse, but will not be a good choice for long periods of continuous fire.
2. Recoil
Due to reduction of weight, felt recoil and muzzle rise will be increased. This can be compensated by adding a muzzle brake.
3. Profile Limitations
Due to the manufacturing process, carbon fiber barrels have limitations on barrel profiles. Generally speaking, carbon fiber AR15 barrels are all HBAR or proprietary profile. Wolfpack Armory carbon fiber AR15 barrels all use a HBAR profile with 0.75" gas port journal and are designed to be used with a low profile gas block.
Carbon fiber bolt action barrels also have heavy profiles. This can limit the stock choices and/or require stock barrel channel modification.
4. Accuracy
Carbon fiber barrels can achieve accuracy of less than 0.5 MOA, but load development may be required to get these results. Due to the barrel harmonics of carbon fiber barrels, some factory ammunition may not give you the desired accuracy that you want. We advise those looking for extreme accuracy to have knowledge of load development.
Applications and Options
Carbon fiber barrel manufacturers have many options for different applications. Generally, custom manufacturers will offer more options but will have wait time involved whereas production manufacturers will have less options but will keep live inventory that is ready to ship. Wolfpack Armory does stock some standard AR15 barrels, but is custom made in general. Remington 700 carbon fiber barrels are made to order using a cut rifled barrel blank and blueprinted to a specific action for maximum precision.
Purchase carbon fiber barrels here - https://www.wolfpackarmoryusa.com/carbon-fiber-barrels