Olympic 9mm barrel - bulged & splitting

[michael_aos]

I recently noticed the barrel on my factory Olympic 9mm upper has a bulge & crack maybe 3" from the muzzle.

I've been toying with moving this upper to an existing SBR lower and getting it cut-down anyway.

Would there be any concern with just lopping it off below the the problem area?

Or should I really just scrap the whole barrel?

[Circuits]

Provided the rest of the barrel is sound, you should be able to cut it back, recrown it, and use it in on your SBR.

If it were me, I'd definitely have the "good" length of barrel you're contemplating using inspected for cracks, though. If the cost of having that inspection performed were around half the cost of a new barrel or more, I'd skip the inspection and just start with a replacement barrel, though.

So what's the story on the bulge and crack? Squib round?

[michael_aos]

No clue what caused it. Purchased new from MidwayUSA back in October 2009. Just noticed it when I was screwing-on the 3-lug adapter. Never been shot suppressed.

http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/P8130001.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/P8130002.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/P8130003.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/P8130004.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/P8130005.jpg

[Irving]

Nice find. Was it easier to identify in real life than the pictures? At a glance it just looks like a streak of dry wall or something.

[michael_aos]

I thought it was just a scratch at first, but it catches on my fingernail. You can feel the bulge too.

Seems like the rifling / chunks of barrel are missing around that spot.

http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/barrel-1.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/barrel-2.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/barrel-3.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/barrel-4.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/michael_aos/.Pictures/Guns/K9GL/barrel-5.jpg

[Circuits]

Guessing by eye, you could cut to between 11.5 and 10.5, and get rid of the damaged section.

That's an unusually large amount of damage for a squib with a pistol caliber round, though - the others I've seen in 9mm (Uzi barrel and a glock barrel) have resulted only in a bulge and a dark mark in the rifling, not long, ragged, multiple cracks like those appear to be, with rifling completely missing at the bulged section.

Definitely get it tested if/before you decide to cut it down and re-use. Seeing that much damage, I'd personally just trash it and get a new barrel to start from, rather than take a risk.

[michael_aos]

I've never knowingly had an issue with a squib.

I did initially have some issues with this upper firing out-of-battery that killed a few pieces of brass. I guess there could have been a piece of a cartridge in the barrel at some point.

I tried contacting Olympic via e-mail, but they apparently don't monitor or at least don't respond to e-mail.

If it's a manufacturing defect it should be covered under their lifetime warranty.

[SA Friday]

That is the result of firing a round with a barrel obstruction, squib or other debris in the barrel. I've seen this in older 22lr barrels from lead build-up.

Personally, I would chuck the barrel.

[BigBear]

That is the result of firing a round with a barrel obstruction, squib or other debris in the barrel. I've seen this in older 22lr barrels from lead build-up.

Personally, I would chuck the barrel.


I am NOT a gunsmith and know jack crap about weaponary. However; you ever seen all those youtube videos of firearms blowin' up in peoples faces? It's because of stuff like what your barrel looks like and people saying, "It's fine."... Well except for that guy who had the ar15 boom on him because he would punch the forward assist for every round! HAHAHAHAAHA.

[michael_aos]

Can I just replace it with "any" 9mm AR barrel? Or does it have to be another Olympic barrel to work with their upper design?
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[michael_aos]

Personally, I would chuck the barrel.

Thanks. That's the kind of feedback I was looking for.

Since the "issue" occurred out toward the muzzle (about 13"), shouldn't I be OK cutting it back to say 8" or so? Or 6", etc? That's quite a few inches from the problem spot.

What is it about the destruction out at 13" that implies to you that the whole barrel is trash? (not that I disagree, just trying to learn)

[SA Friday]

Thanks. That's the kind of feedback I was looking for.

Since the "issue" occurred out toward the muzzle (about 13"), shouldn't I be OK cutting it back to say 8" or so? Or 6", etc? That's quite a few inches from the problem spot.

What is it about the destruction out at 13" that implies to you that the whole barrel is trash? (not that I disagree, just trying to learn)
You developed enough pressure to push a bullet through the barrel with something else in there. It obviously was enough pressure to crack the barrel and stretch the barrel at the point of obstruction. Without someone checking the rest of the barrel, it would be hard to say what occurred to the steel of the rest of the barrel during that moment of overload. A hairline crack could easily be overlooked and come into play later on even after cutting. So hypothetically, you are risking your can, the can adaptor, the gas check, the front hand guard, and maybe even the chamber area, and your hand (or an eye) to save how much money? Besides, by the time you have it cut, recrowned, and a gas port redrilled it might be faster and not that much more money to just buy a new barrel.

Risk vs reward, I just don't see the reward being high enough to try to save what's left of the barrel. I haven't played around with 9mm AR's enough to know the exacts on replacing a barrel in an Olympic upper, but I believe they are the same uppers as used in a std 223 AR. If that's the case, changing the barrel to something other than an Olympic should be the same as changing a 223 barrel on any AR upper. That should be easy enough to determine. Hopefully Circuit or BP or Hoser will chime in on the specifics of changing the barrel.

[Circuits]

My reason for chucking the barrel is that those cracks are long, and longitudinal. For all we know, they go all the way down both ways, and unless you know exactly how far the cracks extend, you can't know you're cutting enough of the flawed material away to prevent the cracks from spreading. Hence my suggestion you take it to a gunsmith or machine shop which performs magnetic particle or dye-penetrant testing to check exactly how far those cracks go, before deciding to cut down and re-use that one.

I could do the dye-pen. full length testing for you for $60, if that option interests you.

The oly system uses a special barrel extension incorporating the pistol-cal feedramps, onto an otherwise-generic AR-style barrel. I don't believe they'll interchange with 9mm barrels from Colt-style 9mm conversions, which don't use a barrel extension at all, and build the feedramps into the magazine block. Colt-style barrels have a basically-bare ended, chambered breech face, and an indexing rim machined into the barrel blank for fitting it into the upper. Any replacement will most likely have to come from Olympic, or be a custom job reworking another mfg's 9mm barrel, or a 9mm rifled blank into something which can accept the Oly pistol caliber barrel extension.

I believe Olympic does sell just replacement barrels, even for their pistol caliber uppers, but you'd have to call them directly to get pricing and order, as they're not regular "catalog" parts. I'm pretty sure that if you faxed or emailed them a copy of your SBR registration, they'd sell you a new, shorter-length replacement barrel assembly for somewhere between $200 and $300, based on their "standard barrel" 5.56 pricing.

Possible warranty issues you'd have to take up directly with their customer service. Oly has a lackluster web presence, so you'll get your most immediate response by calling them.

There is a lifetime warranty on Olympic arms parts and components, but it doesn't cover barrel obstructions if that's what turns out to have caused your crack. They additionally have a 60-day satisfaction guarantee, but only on stuff purchased directly from them, and you're past the 60-day window anyway.

[BPTactical]

Circuits is on the money.
Unless you get it Magna-Fluxed I would trash can it. You have no way of knowing if there is an inclusion in the barrel steel. Too much to risk by trying to save a few bucks.

[yosemite]

I would do a dye penetrant test on it, you can buy a kit at any welding supply for 10-12 bucks, this will let you know how far the crack actually goes