Gary Reeder
That thought still lingers on.In my gun shop I hear some
Saturday, April 11, 2026, 14:12

of the older guys talk about the short barrels. I try to talk them into cutting the excess barrels off to get it down to a reasonable length. I have a chart that shows the very minimum you lose by cutting the barrel as opposed to how much you gain by choosing a moderate 22" barrel.
Remington has been one of the first to offer a shorter barreled rifle. Especially in cartridges like 7-08, 308, 7x57, and so on. I have shown many of the handgun hunters the velocities gained or lost in our 12 to 14" Encore barrels in those calibers.
A person shooting a 308 in a 16"
barrel will lose around 200 fps, and considering the factory round is 2300 fps that loss is neglible. Back when we had a couple of friends loading our custom calibers,in effect they kept charts showing how much they lost or gained by either cutting the barrels or switching to a longer barrel. The gain or loss was never more than 35 FPS per inch. And when you are considering the size of the animal and the distance of the shot, it just makes sense to cut that barrel down to a manageable length.That way you are avoiding some of the problems associated with the long thin barrels. Problems like the barrel whip and the barrel getting hot after only a couple of rounds. These 2 prblems don't normally effect a 308 barrel in a Remington 700 that is cut back from 20" to 16" and shows a loss of only 250 FPS. That is nothing. If I sight in my encore up here at 8000 feet at maximum and I drive down to the Arizona/Mexico border at zero elevation and at 110 degrees my cartridge is now 5 or 6 degrees over max due to the heat.
The same holds true if I go to Alabama for a hog hunt and I have my pistol sighted in at 50 yards and my load is max for 70 degrees up here at 8000 feet, now due to the heat and thickness of the air around me in southern Alabama plus my barrel is hot to the touch, I am several degrees over max and my load will be bouncing all over the place.
Several years ago I hunted hogs in southern Arizona. I had my 30 GNR sighted in up here in the snow and at zero degrees. The air was clean and clear so no problem with that but a lot of problem with my shots being taken at 110 degrees and heavy, humid air. My first hint was my brass was hard to extract and some primers were pierced. Needless to say I didn't get my Javelina as I wasn't sure where my round was going to hit. If I wounded the animal and he got off in the cactis I would probably never find it. After I got back up here to the snow and clean air and zero temp I checked my load and my 30 GNR was extremely accurate, just like before.
The fellow I was hunting with never got his Javelina either. When we hiked back to his truck I noticed his box of factory 308 ammo was sitting up on his dash in the sun.He mentioned his gun wasn't as accurate as before. I started to tell him leaving that box of ammo in the sun in a closed up truck with the temp probably hitting 135 to 140 degrees surely could't help his accuracy but suprisingly I kept my big mouth shut.

So accuracy has a lot depending on the range and length of the shot and the temp of the air around where you are hunting,and yes, somewhat upon the length of barrel.