Rung barrel!

[Caverun]

Sometime back an individual brought me a Remington M552 Speedmaster which is .22 rimfire and asked me to check it out and clean it!! Absolutely just like a 'pig sty' it was! Tore it all to pieces, cleaned out the barrel...which had rusted up and lo and behold when I cast both my eyeballs down the bore....I was thinking "hey...there's part of a case which separated stuck within the bore"! No so! It's RUNG! Apparently someone had a 'squid round' and fired another behind it. The barrel is not swelled or oversize and upon close inspection I think it's a pure case of a rung barrel!

Many years ago I had a Model 54 Anschutz with a rung barrel. The ring was about four inches from the chamber and if it effected accuracy, I sure could not tell it. I actually shot the rifle for a couple of years without knowing the barrel ring. Back then the word was to clean the chamber if loading became difficult but leave the barrel alone unless accuracy deteriorated.