The first SP spiral Barrel *PICS*

[M-a-s-sDriver]

Here you go. At an event a helluva long time ago, one of the Gardeners handed this to my teamate Bill Wages, who owned a paintball store at the time. It is the first prototype for what everyone knows as the AA spiral ported barrell. Apparently they made a few and passed them out to certain people to field test.
I know Classicmagger wanted to see it, so here it is.
Brent.

[P8NTBALLER590]

dang that is ugly

[LaW]

"prototype" is everything but pretty for the most part... not sure what you would expect?

I am familiar with the prototype, I knew someone that had one but this was many years ago.

[50 cal]

I have one of the early marketed ones for a Phantom. Yeah, they were ugly but effective.

[vonort]

Used to have one of them for my F1 Illustrator... Not bad barrels for the time. Too bad the company became total JA;s

[Doc Nickel]

Prior to the "two piece" All-American barrels, SP "rifled" barrels were nothing more than factory barrels they bought from the manufacturers, spiral-drilled, and sold as new.

In other words, that barrel shown above was nothing more than a factory WGP Sniper barrel with holes drilled in it. At the time SP was not manufacturing anything, they were just modifying existing barrels.

The "two piece" concept came out basically because it was easier (and considerably cheaper) to make a stack of fronts and press them into slightly different backs for various guns. At the time SP's early machines could not do bores longer than 6" or 7" accurately.

Another interesting tidbit is that the holes were not originally designed to improve accuracy or performance. They were intended to make the barrel "self cleaning". The holes simply gave any paint in the barrel a place to go, when the next ball fired would "squeegee" it through.

Doc.

[M-a-s-sDriver]

Doc... it seems to do that very thing. The little holes will basically funnel the paint out.
Also, this whole sniper setup shoots amazing well and accurate. "Pops' still shoots the old thing as-is.
I'm a barrel junkie at heart, really, this one shoots about as well as anything I ever get, including my current Stiffi stuff I love so much.
I don't think SP "manufactured" much of anything. The early '90's saw a whole slew of these stock type barrels with wierd milling. I had one with a sort of twister slot milled in the front that worked great for slicing paintballs into shreds. Brent.

[ClassicMagger]

Hey:

Took you long enough didn't it... Give me a ring today. Or I can give you a call tonight when my phone gets free.

-ClassicMagger

[Vanced]

Yep,

That barrel caused one of the first of the Smart Parts Law Suites... LOL... When they sued my local Barrel Maker ( BOA - Barrels of America ) over their very similar spirial porting... I think I might still have one of the infinging barrels somewhere at home before they were discontinued...

Oh well... I guess some things stay the same and some will never be the same again...

Nice little piece of history though...