long throat or chamber?

[Mike357mag]

Contenders and encores, do they have longer throats, does this take away from accuracy?  what exactly is the throat and what length are they compared to say a winchester or remington rifle.  Thanks for any info.  Mike H.

[Catfish]

Mike,
   I have neve measured the throats in the T/C barrels, but would guess that they are pretty close to most of the other manufactures. The throught is the sapce from the end of the case to the rifleings. The longer the throats the more the bullet has to jump befor it hits the rifleing and starts to spin. Longer throats are bad for accuracy, but they do alow you to get alittle more velosity from your gun. Roy Weatherby use very long throats in all of his rifle for that reason when first started makeing his magnums. If you reload you can seat your bullets out farther and usuall get better accuracy form factory guns. There are the odd one that shoot better with a long jump, but they are few and far between.

[Bullseye]

Do the Encores & Contenders have long thoats?  Don't know, I have never measured mine.  Does it hurt accuracy?  Don't know because I load to the OAL in the reloading manuals so I am not up against the rifling anyway.  Do I need to worry about these things?  Don't think so since all my calibers that should shoot MOA do shoot it without worring about it.  Unless you are shooting competition or have a barrel with a problem, don't worry about it, be happy and shoot straight.

[Bob C]

The throats in Contender and Encore barrels vary.  

My Contender barrels tend to have longer throats, and my Encore barrels tend to have more "standard" throats.

With the single shot design it's easy enough to "feel" when the bullet is seated enough to not contact the lands. Different barrels will handle the jump to the rifling differently. You will need to experiment to find out what's best for you.

[DaddyPaul]

I may have a .270 barrel that is one of those oddballs that likes 'em short?  I have tried two different handloads that are seated way out there but off the rifling and they don't shoot as good in my gun as plain old Remington Core Lokts?  At 100 yards the Core Lokts are printing in the 1 MOA neighborhood (some a little better, some a little bigger).  The handloads are Hornady SST's and they will only shoot about 1.5 MOA.  I am no big time loader but it seems to me mine likes 'em a little shorter?