Thread: howa mini vs howa 1500 observations 223rem

I bought a new howa mini light weight profile toward the end of last year, immediately hated the factory stock but stuck with it for a while, factory 20" barrel shot very very well with fiocchi 55gn sp chrono'd at 2863fps (S.D of 20fps over about 20 shots) shot well under MOA 3 shot groups, but just couldn't get on with the chunky factory stock and lack of anything that wasn't a chassis or more than than the cost of the original rifle frustrated me.
So I sold the mini and bought a cancelled export order Howa 1500 fitted with a ridiculously long 1:8 twist 26" Hardy match barrel in a Walnut stock. It was cheap and Hardys were actually really great to deal with, I shot the un suppressed 26" barrel at the range just to check accuracy, it didn't disappoint shooting multiple 1/2" 3 shot groups consistently. I never bothered to chrono the ammo with the barrel at 26" as I never intended to use the rifle at that length or unsuppressed, I only shot it to check accuracy before chopping and threading the barrel.

So my observations after docking the match barrel to 20" and suppressing is that the same ammo (same batch, same box even) shoots at 2953 (SD of 20 over 9 shots) similar weather both days and both the mini 1:8 twist lightweight barrel and the Hardy 1:8 twist match barrel docked to the same length using the same suppressor shoots the same ammo 90fps faster, no complaints here, I know all barrels are different and some are faster than others but is this within the expected range ?
Happy accident on my part just curious, and really wishing I had chorno'd the barrel at 26" just for a reference point.
chrono is a magneto speed so lighting is not a variable.