Stock Minimag barrel ,Why?

[Juge]

This thing is old but I was just wonderind that why the minimag stock barrel is like what it is? Why is it just a aluminium pipe? Why is it so good/bad? Why is it so simple? Why there isn't any holes or ceramic surface? Is it better/worse than complex barrel?

All this because I don't have a stock barrel. Should I buy it?

[udtseal]

The stock minimag barrel is very good. Its a straight aluminium pipe that has a pretty loud sound to it, becaue there is no porting. Why fix what is not broken? Its a fantastic barrel and if I ever lost mine I would definetly call AGD up and buy a new one. Maybe tom can explain why he chose that design, but I think its because it just works! I leave it up to you whether or not you want to buy one or not...but I love mine.

[dawump]

I don't know that the issue of asking "why it was made like this" makes sense. I believe that it was made like this because that was state of the art at the time.

In my Automag video it talks about exciting developments coming out in 1992 ;-) One of the things that they show in the video ( along with the "futuristic" 18v VL hopper ;-) is a similar barrel to standard with tear drops at the end to allow the paintball to "ease" its way between the barrel pressure and normal pressure.

Even that barrel was very unsophisticated compared to many today - so the answer is the standard barrel is that way I believe:

1) Because back then it was state of the art, and AGD believed in giving out as good a product as possible
2) In more recent years the first thing most people do is get an aftermarket barrel so it didn't make sense to put money into creating a different standard one.

Is it good? It is very worth having for those days when you only have access to bigger paint, as it is a larger bore than many modern barrels. I imagine that its lack of porting would also make it a good thing to play with in the rain.

Currently I have mine modified to shoot paint with backspin - but that's another story.


Keith

[TheTramp]

The only problem I see with the stock Mini Mag barrel is the it has a fairly large bore while most paint today is small to medium bore.

The lack of porting saves gas but makes it loud.

If you aren't having any trouble with the barrel you have now I don't see any point in getting the stock Mini Mag barrel.

[Army]

From a technical standpoint, 6-8" is the best length for gas use.

All paintball guns use around 1 cubic inch of air at various pressures. That 1" cube will only expand to atmospheric pressure in 6-8" while pushing a ball. any more than that, and there simply isn't the volume to continue to fill the increasing void at the pressure required to propell the ball to 300fps. If you look at two piece barrels, the actual launch length is 6-8" long, the rest is a larger bore and ported to vent the gas out gradually to quiet the blast.

AGD did the research on this, so decided to supply the 8" stock barrel with the MinMag. I love mine as it pumps out Marbs like darts, very accurate.

Plus, I love the "bang", as it makes other players wonder about my gun