The inner diameter of barrels...

[athomas]

Yes you are right, but I'm not testing paint against paint. What I am going to do is test small bore paint in the small bore barrel and the large bore barrel. This should give and indication of which barrel is more accurate with the small paint, the proper small bore barrel or the oversized barrel. Then I'll use the large bore paint and check which barrel is more accurate with that paint, the proper size barrel or the tight barrel. Its not perfect but it should show some effects of barrel sizes on a given paint.

The Lapco barrels are vented barrels and are not well suited to simply testing the effects of barrel sizes. Adding venting or porting to a barrel corrects some of the effects of the barrel, which is not what we want to do if its the effect that we're testing for.

[echoes]

Originally posted by athomas
Yes you are right, but I'm not testing paint against paint. What I am going to do is test small bore paint in the small bore barrel and the large bore barrel. This should give and indication of which barrel is more accurate with the small paint, the proper small bore barrel or the oversized barrel. Then I'll use the large bore paint and check which barrel is more accurate with that paint, the proper size barrel or the tight barrel. Its not perfect but it should show some effects of barrel sizes on a given paint.

The Lapco barrels are vented barrels and are not well suited to simply testing the effects of barrel sizes. Adding venting or porting to a barrel corrects some of the effects of the barrel, which is not what we want to do if its the effect that we're testing for.

To clarify what I was saying- you'll be hard pressed to find two different types of paint that are exactly the same, except for their size. Plus, when you add in inconsistency of the paint it could really skew the results. You could easily put tape over the muzzle brake on a Lapco barrel, but I think you should also test it with the muzzle brake.

[athomas]

Originally posted by Arno


To clarify what I was saying- you'll be hard pressed to find two different types of paint that are exactly the same, except for their size. Plus, when you add in inconsistency of the paint it could really skew the results.

We don't care about different types of paint. The same paint is used in two barrels to see the effects of the two barrel sizes on that paint.

We're just using the two sized different paints to check two different effects.

One paint used to check good fit vs loose.
One paint used to check good fit vs tight.

If I had three barrels(one tight, one good fit, one loose) then that would be the best way to do it, but I don't so I have to do it this way. I have a ported barrel with three different inside diameters but it corrects the balls too well, even if you cover the porting. The ported area is stepped so it opens up to a larger bore which would cause the measurements to not accurately reflect the real effects of barrel size on the accuracy.

[echoes]

Originally posted by athomas
If I had three barrels(one tight, one good fit, one loose) then that would be the best way to do it, but I don't so I have to do it this way. I have a ported barrel with three different inside diameters but it corrects the balls too well, even if you cover the porting. The ported area is stepped so it opens up to a larger bore which would cause the measurements to not accurately reflect the real effects of barrel size on the accuracy.

The fact that porting can negate the bad effects kind of makes this moot- it's not that often that you see a completely unported barrel.

Are you sure that the ported area's of barrels are all step bored? It seems to me like most of them in fact are the same bore size the entire length of the barrel.

[FreshmanBob]

little something about dirty dans thinking on ball compression

if a ball compresses that much when it's fired (enough to push against the side of a barrel) then galactic Z's Z body for the mag shouldnt work at all.

If the ball expands so much to fit the barrel despite it's small size the ball shouldn't spin.

[athomas]

Originally posted by Arno


Are you sure that the ported area's of barrels are all step bored? It seems to me like most of them in fact are the same bore size the entire length of the barrel.

Yes a few of the barrels have porting and are not step drilled. Almost all two piece barrels have different diameters on the tips than the main barrel section.

I have a Taso barrel with porting along its tip and it is not step drilled.

A well ported barrel with a medium bore size and a step drilled extension would probably shoot most paint fairly well. The variances in paint would make it very hard to test various sizes without a proper lab and a masters in mathematics. Plus, I suspect you would have to shoot thousands of paintballs to get a proper amount of test data.

Well, why would we consern ourselves with various barrel sizes if a good step drilled barrel with good porting will work fine? The step drilling and porting will affect the accuracy by minimizing the effects of the walls of the barrel. The more the ball is affected in the breach section of the barrel the less likely the ported section will be able to totally correct the problem. Therefore the closer we get to the proper size breach at the start, the better the overall accuracy at the end, even with a ported barrel.

A fresh, good quality paintball that is as round as it can be will also develop less effects from an improper size barrel.