Bent barrel?

Sasquatch

Sasquatch

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I've got a Hawken I picked up at a Durham gun store before black powder season this year. It took a lot of experimenting to get a consistent grouping, and it never was great. Thing is, I had to move the rear sight way over to be able to hit center mass at 50 yards. I was thinking maybe the front sight was off which is why the rear had to be adjusted.

I show it to my buddy who said "your barrel is bent". Sure enough, we took out a straight edge which had a gap on one side and a bump on the other. Nothing huge, but it was visible to him, and explains my need to adjust the sight.

It didn't happen while I owned it, but I'm unsure how it did happen. Are the barrels soft enough to bend if dropped? There's a mark at the bend in the barrel- maybe someone used it as a lever?

In any case, is this something a gunsmith could solve (put it in a vise), or should I trash it and just get a new barrel?
 
Depending on the age, the mfg may or may not still be in business. In the case of Navy Arms, the current iteration ain't Val Forgett's Navy Arms and they won't honor anything on the old company.

Not the first time I've heard of this. You get a guy who's out of shape hoofin it into a tree stand. He gets a couple steps up, slips and falls onto his gun. Presto bent barrel. Often it's hard to see without a straight edge. I saw a Rem 7600 like that. Guy wondered why it keyholed all the time but then fessed up about falling on it.

You CAN fix this yourself. If you know anyone with a HF hydraulic press, it's the ticket. Old timers used to put them into the fork of a tree and pull, look, pull, look, done. Just set up a set of blocks like you see on the machine in the previous post, apply pressure, examine, repeat until satisfied. Just don't use a very small block at the fulcrum points.
 
Numerous times I've watched Hershel House stick a flintlock barrel in the fork of a tree in his front yard & bend the crap out of em.
 
I have straightened a barrel using just a level table, a big C clamp, a 2x4 block and some shims. The shims were just to show me where I started and how much progress I was making. Basically used as a feeler gauge. Make sure the block is long enough to go beyond where the actual bend is. Honestly I had nothing in the barrel and if I had screwed it up was not out anything, but it was a good exercise and it worked. Had to take it slightly beyond to get it to stay straight. So if I can do it and do not claim to be a metallurgist or a smitty, probably a trained monkey could.
 
I tried to take it by Patriot Shooting Sports who came through with my 'other' 50-cal (50 BMG), so they were known to take on unusual jobs.

But was disappointed, they didn't even look at it. I was asked why I was there 'bent barrel on my black powder'. "We don't do black powder". So I say "ok, just consider it a bent barrel", and the answer was "we don't straighten barrels".

So, I'll try the trained monkey approach and will find some suitable blocks- or an HF press- but I like the C-Clamp idea.
 
I saw that "gun show" episode where they were at Savage, watching them bend bbls. That put me off Savage forever. I've had 2 muzzle loaders. One was Remingtons first (modern) effort. The other was I forget the brand but it had a Bergara bbl. Neither would shoot worth a s#it but I managed to kill deer with both before I gave up on ML's. Good luck with bending.
 
Yeah, BP is frustrating- and worse with a bent barrel! But I reload anyway, so I'm used to fighting through several variables to find an accurate load.
 
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