Barrel Guide - Look here before Posting Questions!

[Joner]

Hi guys I am relatively new here and I have been looking through the forum and looking at some common problems encountered by people when they want to upgrade their barrel.

Any other comments are welcome and I will add them to the main body.

BARRELS

A barrel is a personal choice. Therefore there is no 'best barrel' as such. However, you can take things into account like ACCURACY, BORE, 1 - PIECE, 2 - PIECE, LENGTH, DURABILITY and PORTING.

Accuracy has to be the most important factor in the decision on what barrel to get. A good barrel is the difference between putting a ball on someone and missing. Some are more accurate then others but the BORE of the barrel must be taken into account. The bore is the size of the paintball exactly. The main size is .68 caliber but there are sub sizes ranging from around .679 to .697. This small change in the size of the barrel is crucial to making sure you get the most from not only your barrel but from your gun as a whole. The standard bore is from about .687 to .689. Most paint comes in this bore also. If the bore is too large for the barrel then you loose air efficiency and you will increase your chance of ball breakage. If the bore is too small then the ball will move around and your accuracy will be impaired.

Smart Parts decided to counter this by creating the freak barrel. The first 3-piece barrel, one front one back and an insert. The inserts allow you to match the bore of the paint perfectly. This sounds great on paper but the inserts can get damaged and cost a lot. If there is slight damage to the insert then this can have the same effect as too large a bore. It is also not a accurate and some air efficiency is lost because of the porting on the side of the barrel. However, if you cant choose the paint that you shoot (rec-ballers in my country) then the Freak is the way to go.

If you can choose the bore you shoot than a CP pro barrel, Dye Ultralite, Eclipse Shaft, Pepperstick, the Empire Kit, the Evil Pipe Kit may be a wiser choice. These barrels are two-piece (but you can get single piece barrels from the same manufacturer.) These barrels are the cream of the crop. I have probably forgot some so please help me out! These barrels don’t have the insert kits but I find that they are sometimes more accurate. They are the perfect choice for regular tournament players.

Before buying a gun make sure you check the finish on the inside of the barrel. Run your finger down the centre and feel the finish. If it is smooth it will reduce the amount of friction between the ball and the barrel increasing accuracy. If it is rough then put the barrel back where you found it! Most barrels are finished well but some can be really bad so just watch out.

Two-piece barrels allow you to change the front of your barrel for a different style of length and different backs have different bores. However, 2 piece barrels reduce the effective barrel length. The length of barrel that the gun has control over the ball. So therefore a two piece barrel has an effective barrel length of the back of the barrel (8” or so.) a one piece has a much longer effective barrel length. This gives you far more control over the ball, but you have to weigh up whether you regularly change the length or bore. If you stick to one length and one bore rigidly then a one piece is a much better choice.

Recently there is now a third form of barrel that is in its infancy (thanks ydna for the help here ) They are called self adjustable barrels. This means that you can twist the barrel to change the bore inside. This is done using an adjuster sleeve to expand or contract a small rubber o-ring on the inside of the barrel. Quite rare but sounds like a good idea. And again it is up to you to check it out. Examples are the Katana from Ronin Gear.

Above you can see the different bores that the barrel can be changed to.

Another area that really rubs me the wrong way is length….

A LONGER BARREL WILL NOT GIVE YOU MORE DISTANCE OR ACCURACY!

I see this a lot from new paintballers, ‘got to get an 18” barrel so that I can get more distance and increase my accuracy’ This is COMPLETELY wrong. Set to about 275 – 280 fps a 12” barrel will fire just as far as an 18”. Don’t believe the hype. Infact, anything over 14” will become unbalanced and you will be spending so much air just to get the ball to the end of the barrel than is worth it.

Durability is also a good point to bring up in this barrel guide. I am a tournament player and I play mid/front so there is a lot of diving involved as I guess some of you know. I have actually bent a Dye Ultralight Barrel in the past. I know that is hard to believe but I crumpled the front. The barrel is accurate, light and reliable but because Dye have tried to reduce weight they have made the barrel out of a relatively soft material. To counter this they released the t itanium, which is an absurd amount of money and very difficult to get hold of. So just take that into account and see if you can look and feel the barrel before buying it.

Another bit of hype that drives me mad is porting. Again I hear people going on about how it is better to have as much porting as possible as it makes it more accurate. NOTHING could be further from the truth. All that porting does is to stop all the gas (white stuff – you know what I mean!) coming out of the end of the gun. This can affect the ball but it will only effect it in such a small amount it isn’t worth thinking about. Porting creates more problems than it solves. It reduces air efficiency because so much air (or CO2 for some guys) is being wasted out of the porting. The amount of shots from a full fill will drop significantly. Therefore, dont go for too much porting. One of my favourite barrels the 2 piece CP Pro has none!

So I hope that has helped and these are some ideas to take into account when choosing a barrel. As I said it is personal preference and I will not say that a certain barrel is best. It is totally up to you to make a wise choice. And if you do a new barrel is a brilliant addition to your ‘super-gat!’

Joner

Any comments please PM me!
Oh and congrats to the mods and admins; running a great forum here guys!

Barrel List:

J&J Edge - TWO PIECE
SP Freak - INSERT BASED
AA - TWO PIECE
Progressive - ONE PIECE
Teardrop - ONE PIECE
Eclipse Shaft - TWO PIECE
Eclipse Shaft solo - ONE PIECE
Dye Boomstick, Ultralight and Ti tanium - ALL TWO PIECE
Warped Sportz Dark series barrel. - TWO PIECE
WGP Kaner - TWO PIECE (comes in a set for the c ocker)
Powerlyte Scepter - INSERT BASED
ACI Phat barrel system - INSERT BASED
M3 Barrel System - INSERT BASED
Aradeus - SELF ADJUSTABLE BARREL
Katana - SELF ADJUSTABLE BARREL
Slayer SA. - SELF ADJUSTABLE BARREL
Pepperstick - TWO PIECE
Evil Pipe Kit - TWO PIECE (comes with loads of backs and fronts though!)
Empire Kit. - TWO PIECE

COMING SOON – AIR AND CO2 GUIDE

 

[ADJ]

Do you understand why they have porting on barrels ?

 

[H]

Barrels are just tubes to be honest and make a ridiculously neglible difference to accuracy. Ask anyone who is involved to a technical level and they'll tell you the same. Paint is the most important factor along with regulator consistency (shoot down, spikes etc). Barrel fit also means jack. In the case of cockers and other closed bolt markers then the ball should be a nice fit, holds in place but move through freely after a gentle blow. With open bolt markers the ball should just roll through but make sure your detents are kosher. Pretty much all the pros out there use larger bore size barrels (.693), as they'd much rather have a neglible reduction in acuracy than run the risk of barrel breaks.

As long as your tube isnt so short you cant use it to push back obstacles or too long that you end up spearing the other players, you'll be fine.

Barrel choice, in all honestly mainly comes down to how cool they look and whatever your sponsors say you should use.

 

[ADJ]

Barrel's do play a big part in the performance of your marker. In many ways.

 

[H]

Originally posted by ADJ
Barrel's do play a big part in the performance of your marker. In many ways.

Over the top porting may neccesitate a minutely higher dwell or pressure to maintain velocity but thats about it to be honest....

As long as the inside of your barrel is smooth and they all are these days, then the effect the pretty porting and the like makes on the flight of the ball is very little. Most of those much vaunted accuracy claims are just BS.

Find me some decent evidence to justify your statement, please.

 

[ADJ]

This is not suposed to be a debate dude.... just advice to new players. Barrels will be important to people with small budgets, as most of the people reading this forum will not pick a barrel because there sponsors told them to! For example, would you put a stainless barrel on a marker in the winter using C02? if you broke a ball in the game you would have to defrost it before you used it again!! This is the advice I am trying to give to NEW players and not people already sponsored by a tube company. Also porting is important to a barrel as it gives a better delivery in to the natrual air from the marker. If you want to know more as to my knowledge of this then my number will be in your pm shortly so we dont stray away from giving new guys to the sport sound and simple advise.

regards


Alex.

 

[stark]

Originally posted by ADJ
porting is important to a barrel as it gives a better delivery in to the natrual air from the marker.

The Broz is right. Porting has nothing to do with barrel performance. Its the to make your marker look cool and sound quieter.

In fact only the first 6 inches of a barrel are used to guide the paintball anything after that is just for show.

 

[H]

I'm not sponsored by any barrel company.....

This is a forum, things posted are up for debate and if someone is giving missleading advice then I think somone should stand up for it. I'm no intrestested in having a phone convosation over the matter so don't send me your mobile number by PM.

There are so many myths regarding PB equipment around, a great deal amount of them created by manufacturers to get newbies who don't know better to buy the next shiny toy. A lot of the advice i passed on has pretty much come straight from a person i know who knows his ****, you might have heard of him..... Jack Wood he's called. And im sure an number of people in simular roles to him would agree.

If anything i'm trying to help newbies in not spending money on mad barrel kits that won't increase their marker's performance to the level they may expec if they pay so much.
EDIT: The money spent on OTT barrel sets should be better saved and spent to top up the paint budget so u get better quality.... That is what makes the real difference.

PS: In all seriousness, who still uses entirely stainless barrels? Even at the bottom end of markers they come with simple aluminium pipes that do almost as good job as ones costing a hell of a lot more

 

[ADJ]

A matter of opion this seems to be then. Whilst working at WDP for nearly two years I spent many long hours discussing this with the man that designed the very gun you shoot now, John Rice (WDP's Technical Director). He as I'm sure you are aware is also an expert in his field and the information I have posted on these boards is knowledge from discusions we had. I know Jack Wood also and agree that he is a very skilled air smith and " knows his **** ", but so does JR mate.

 

[Glorykid]

Accuracy is mostly down to your barrel and paint match. And ADJ is right, porting makes a huge difference otherwise wouldn’t you see Lang, Lasoya and other big names using a drain pipe for a barrel? If Jack really thought that porting wasn’t an issue, why did he design the shaft with porting? Oh I know! Because it makes a difference! Companies spend allot of time and development in making barrels better and more accurate, are you saying that they are wasting there time? If so why don’t you email Dye or Empire and say that. I’m sure they will tell you to kiss there ass just like we are.

Out