barrel wear
 

How long can I expect a new 4" barrel to last shooting normal modern loads with regular cleaning...or...how many hundreds or 1000's of rounds before the barrel degrades from excellent to good to fair?

It depends a lot on what type ammo that you are shooting. Least were with lead bullets, then jacketed and don't use the old WW2 "sintered steel" armour piercing ammo. I bought some of this stuff years ago in the original WW2 16rd boxes, and found the it was illegal to sell in Calif. ("cop killer bullets"), so I decided to try to shoot some in my P38. You wouldn't believe the amount of sparks coming out of the barrel, as it wore away the rifling. It also purched thru the metal back stop at the range. Dangerous stuff. TH

thanks Tom...I thought I was being boycotted.....G

I've seem more barrels ruined by improper cleaning than I ever have by shooting. It takes a lot of rounds to shoot out a good quality barrel.

Many older bores were ruined not by bullet wear, but from overzealous cleaning or lack of cleaning after shooting corrosive ammo. As the others stated, it takes a lot of rounds to ruin a barrel even with regular jacketed rounds it will take 10s of 1000s and with lead it might be 100K. Heat also plays a role at the rear of the barrel, but more so with with rifles than pistols. This assumes that the barrel is also properly cleaned and oiled between shooting sessions and is not neglected.