Hammerhead barrels, and their lies!

[Arson51]

A good test for this would be to take a hammerhead barrel and coat the inside with baby powder. Shoot one ball out of it and then look down the barrel. any place the ball touches the side of the barrel would leave marks in the baby powder.

This can also be used to show how a ball makes contact at only two points in a barrel.

The baby powder would get blown out, you would need that deodorant Tom Kaye used to test this theory!

[billmi]

Yes, but that means the ball is traveling in some random direction after the last bounce when leaving the barrel. Does it not?

Yep, and that would be the problem with it. I was answering the following question "Does it magically stabilize and lose all that random movement juct before leaving the barrel?"

The stabilization would not be magical, it would be because there were no longer barrel walls for it to keep bouncing off of. It would no longer bounce around randomly, but would continue on the path that was created by the last random bounce it took.

[Muzikman]

The baby powder would get blown out, you would need that deodorant Tom Kaye used to test this theory!

Actually, no it doesn't. I have done it many times before. Give it a shot.

[billmi]

Speaking from someone who knows a thing or two about black powder muskets, that is one of the reasons why muskets are so inaccurate.

Been there, done that, and agree with you.

It disappeared with the introduction of rifled guns though. But they took MUCH longer to load since you are actually forcing the groves in the ball AS you load it (with the combination of cloth patch around the ball).

To be historically nit-picky, it stayed around well after the introduction of rifled guns. Some America Revolutionary militia forces were using rifles in the 1770s, those who supplied their own rifles, usually hunting rifles they owned. In the 1850s Minie invented the minie bullet, which loaded underbore but expanded its base into the rifling when fired, combinging the fast loading benefits of underbore ammo with the accuracy of rifling, and the penetrating power of a conical bullet.

Same here.

I agree it doesn't apply as an example of bounce, but that's not how I was using it. It applies in that once the water is out side of the hose, the hose no longer affects its path. Similarly once a ball that theoretically is bouncing randomly between the walls of a barrel exits the muzzle, it will no longer bounce randomly, it will continue on it its (relatively - considering gravity, air, etc.) straight path, a path that was created by the last bounce it made in the barrel. Just the same as the water that squirts in the direction the nozzle of the hose was pointing.

[Army]

I believe Bill meant that the water will not continue to spray in the coiled/curly-cue shape the hose was in. Each drop of water will go straight away from the last position it was in as it exited.

As a certified ballistician, I will assure you that the Hammerhead barrels BY DESIGN will not, and CAN NOT, induce any appreciable, nor possibly even noticable, spin upon a paintball.

That some players have great success with them is no tribute to their engineering, as most players will have a barrel that works wonders for them, regardless of the hype and out-right lies.

My JJ Ceramics have always performed admirably, does that make them the best, or does it make them the best FOR ME?

[shartley]

To be historically nit-picky, it stayed around well after the introduction of rifled guns. Some America Revolutionary militia forces were using rifles in the 1770s, those who supplied their own rifles, usually hunting rifles they owned. In the 1850s Minie invented the minie bullet, which loaded underbore but expanded its base into the rifling when fired, combinging the fast loading benefits of underbore ammo with the accuracy of rifling, and the penetrating power of a conical bullet.

[WARPED1]

I call upon the power or Bill Mr WARPIG Mills to do a bench test. Say, a Hammerhead, an All American, and a non rifled barrel of some sort.

[Aliens-8-MyDad]

mmm war of the barrels...

-same gun
-matched bore size
-same paint
-same fps

then try alot of diffrent barrels... show everyone that one barrel doesnt shoot further and rifling is a myth. maybe also do a personal short review on each, (weight, sound/loudness, accuaracy)

I think its a good idea. but I guess he would need people do donate barrels

[tsc]

From the Archives here on AO..

Spinning Paintballs Tech Tip #3

It was asked in another post what effect do riffled barrels have on spinning a paintball, not drilled holes, actual rifling like in real guns. This is a good question and one that was explored by our research team.

In theory spinning a projectile on the axis of flight adds gyroscopic stability as well as averages out any imperfections in the surface air flow. Paintballs leave a bad turbulence wake behind them that "walks around" the back of the ball as it flies through the air. This is the main cause of a paintballs inaccuracy as the turbulence tail drags the ball around sideways in flight. Spinning the ball should create a tornado like vortex in the back of the ball thereby evening out all the turbulence so the ball is not pulled any particular way.

So great you say lets do it and get more accuracy!! Well if it was possible it would already have been done. The problem is the liquid fill, when you rotate the shell, the liquid tends to stay where it is. The best example of this is a glass of water with ice floating in it, when you rotate the glass the ice stays in the same place (you have all seen it). So if you can grab the ball hard enough to go from 0 to about 10,000 RPM's in 5 thousands of a second (remember TechTip #1?) Yes the shell is spinning but the fill is not. When the ball leaves the barrel the viscosity of the fill slows the shell down but the fill's rotation is speeding up from the shell too, so you get an almost instant reduction of the RPM's out of the barrel. The balls rotation does not come to a complete stop because the shell does impart some spin to the fill.

In order to test this properly we actually developed a gun that spun the barrel, with the ball in it, up to 30,000 RPM's and then shot the ball out. In this way we knew the ball and the fill were completely up to speed when it left the barrel. We had visions of a spinning barrel paintgun that would make that high speed turbo wine! Unfortunately this didn't improve the accuracy because the ball is still too light.

As a final test we developed a barrel that had three razor edged knife blades running down the length of the bore. Using our plastic paintballs they wedged in the blades perfectly and we spun up the barrel and fired more test rounds. Because the knives would cut the ball we could examine them after the fact to see if they were rotating in the barrel etc. Again unfortunately we saw no improvement in accuracy and gave up.

Based on this data we believe round paintballs are too light and have lousy aerodynamics to expect any more accuracy than what we are currently getting. When the military came to us and wanted a more accurate non lethal system we made a bullet shaped, spin stabilized paintball that far outperformed any equal weight round projectile. Accuracy by volume has been, and will remain, the best way to score eliminations.

Just the facts from,

AGD

http://www.automags.org/forums/archive/index.php/t-8954.html

As you can probably tell, you can also find this in the "Tech Tips" section uptop here on the site. It's a great resource.

http://www.automags.org/resource/tech/tomstech/03_spinning.shtml

here's ANOTHER article debunking (but not in lenght), rifled barrels.

http://www.madpaintballer.com/accuracy.php

And another...

http://www.dyehard.co.za/tech.htm

And the one...ONE article I could find saying rifling worked...

Is from APG. http://apg.cfw2.com/article.asp?content_id=7362 Draw your own conclusions.

We've known you can't spin paintballs effectively for a long time, why does this always come up again? They are not a ballistic projectile, it's a squishy blob you're hurtling through so many variables that anything can change it on the way.

[Target Practice]

I call upon the power or Bill Mr WARPIG Mills to do a bench test. Say, a Hammerhead, an All American, and a non rifled barrel of some sort.

Tom has already done it. I'm pretty sure Mr. Mills has also done a rifling test.

"Rifled" barrels in paintball do not, acutally or theoretically, impart any spin on the ball, nor do they play a part in paintball accuracy with regards to imparting axial spin on the projectile."

One of the pro-rifling people tell me, in plain, bolded English, why I (and the rest of the 10th AAHCR, Armored Anti-Hype Cavalry Regiment) am wrong.

That being said...

Any impact on accuracy by a "rifled" barrel, real or imagined, is purely psychological.

It's just your brain telling you that you really didn't waste your money buying that Hammerhead.

[SlartyBartFast]

My JJ Ceramics have always performed admirably, does that make them the best, or does it make them the best FOR ME?

Any impact on accuracy by a "rifled" barrel, real or imagined, is purely psychological.
It's just your brain telling you that you really didn't waste your money buying that Hammerhead.

[Hotshot33610]

Reminds me of a quote...

"What we have here, Bob, is an ugly barrel (HammerHead) that costs twice too much and shoots only almost as good as this Trracer barrel that hasn't been squeegied since 1996."
~Doc

[Target Practice]

I dunno if this is an actual question or not, but I don't think so. As you can see, the rounds themselves are "rifled".

[Mike Smith]

This is the post I was talking about. Miscue had stated because we went from a little properly sized hole, to a big hole, it made pretty good sense that the rifling on that big hole was not doing anything. Mike Smith argues that it must be, because that ball is not levitating down the barrel. Now I'm wondering how a ball that does not fit tight, and is not flying down the center, is catching rifling consistantly enough as it bounces back and forth from in that barrel to impart a consistent spin. You know, I see "I have been chronoed because of my range" implies without saying my marker shoots farther. BS... base physics says no. Might you like the hammerhead better for other reasons not to do with the rifling? Sure, very possible. But if you buy that this makes your marker so much more accurate or give you longer range then anything else.. then yes you are so gullible. Of course that got a response about playing ability which confused me to no end because I don't recall saying anything about playing ability or lack thereof... we were discussing hammerhead hype.

To respond:
Miscue totally botched his explanation. He clearly stated that the ball, travelling through the "big hole" didn't touch the sides of the barrel. That is absurd. The ball hits the side of all barrels before it exits. The amount of hits can add spin to the ball and that will affect the ball's travel. If it never happened, then the balls would never curve right, left, up or down, after they left the end of the barrel. Do you want random spin or less than random spin?

As far as my crono experiences, there are numerous witnesses to my statement. It is a simple statement. No need to read more into it than is posted.

As far as the accuracy of the barrel, it is a definite improvement over my 12" Lapco. Does it have a better sight line? Maybe. Can I get on-target quicker? Maybe. Does the rifling impart micro-cuts on the ball, thus making the paint easier to break. Maybe. Can I "break balls' further downrange than players without Hammerhead barrels? Yes. Does it improve my game? Yes.

And, per my statement, I got no game, you can safely ignore me.......
No need to "over-think" that statement. Just accept it.

[hitech]

The amount of hits can add spin to the ball and that will affect the ball's travel.

No.