Cryogenic Stillness - Rifles and Pistols

[Edwill]

This was posted over on airrifle

Looks pretty cool what people are doing these days.

The Process

Cryogenic processing, the deep chilling of tool steel so that the molecular structure of the metal is brought to "cryogenic stillness'" in order to improve wear characteristics, is not a new technology. Today's dry process is computer controlled, using a prescribed schedule and maintained at -300F for a particular time before slowly returning the parts to room temperature. The dry process means the material is not exposed to any cryogenic liquids, eliminating the risk of thermal shock. The microprocessor is programmed according to size, weight and configuration of the parts being treated. It controls the flow of the liquid nitrogen into the chamber where the liquid is contained and the boil off vapor is spread throughout the chamber. Prior to the deep cryogenic step, many tool steels require a preconditioning step consisting of a short temper. Once the temperature reaches -300F the cryogenic process enters the "soak phase" which maintains this temperature for a period to allow for transformation on the molecular level. After being subjected to the deep freeze, the materials must be tempered to about +300F. This temperature varies for different materials, and the processing time varies for different material cross sections."

http://www.cryoplus.com

@ these prices it's not that bad. Ok yes still only in "America"

Rifle Barrels	$50 + $18 S&H
50 Caliber Barrels	$75 + $28 S&H
Handguns / Revolvers	$35 + $16 S&H

Anyone have any experience with this?

[krieger]

Since most quality barrels last 5 to 8 thousand rounds why would you pay someone to do some magic treatment to the barrel.

Here in the States Lilja barrels did it for a while but quit. Not economical. Too much process time for a little gain.

[THOMAST]

A friend had a 240Wby mag with a very light profile barrel. First (cold) shot and subsequent shots varied a lot.
He read up about the austenitic/martenitic transformation in the metal, and since he had access to liquid nitrogen at his work, he did the cryogenic treatment on this rifle barrel.
After treatment the barrel was a lot more "stable", no more rising impact points as the barrel was getting hotter.
I think the process would work better on hammer forged barrels, where a lot of stress is induced into the steel during the process.
Not really critical in a hunting rifle where you are not shooting a lot of shots in succession, causing barrel to heat up and stay hot
If memory serves me correctly, Krieger barrels undergo a cryogenic process.

[Edwill]

I just like the fact that we are still moving forward when it comes to gun design. Technology moving forward.

We don't improve something by making one thing 50% better, but rather ten things 5% better!