Does a choked barrel really improve accuracy ????

[moorepower]

All I am hearing is opinion and not hard faq.

Sloppy barrel design with choke improves but a well designed "built" barrel delivers.

I am starting think gimmick again and it P's me off. This is one of those situations that someone (bigger and "YOU LOOK UP TO" ) throws something out in the market and everyone thinks it's greatest thing from sliced bread.

Come on now... Where is the data that supports a choked barrel as being the best.

You mean facts like choked barrels almost always win the matches?? Just because YOU don't care to listen/believe does not make it a fact it is not true. It's not hard to fathom that if the bore is looser at the muzzle the pellet/ bullet will not perform well. Do you understand that barrel makers always mark the muzzle end of a barrel because it is tighter???

[elh0102]

All I am hearing is opinion and not hard faq.

Sloppy barrel design with choke improves but a well designed "built" barrel delivers.

I am starting think gimmick again and it P's me off. This is one of those situations that someone (bigger and "YOU LOOK UP TO" ) throws something out in the market and everyone thinks it's greatest thing from sliced bread.

Come on now... Where is the data that supports a choked barrel as being the best.

Seems to me, you offered some hard facts in your opening post. Those facts are: a good barrel can be made more than one way, and, no manufacturing process insures great performance. A precision made barrel that is essentially perfect from breech to muzzle will shoot well, regardless of choke or not, assuming the pellet is a proper fit. And therein lies the rub. As mentioned above, since the choke is a smaller diameter, it tends to make a barrel less fussy about pellet choice. It is, in effect, sizing your pellets. The success of some premium makers using choked barrels proves it works. The success of others using non-choked barrels proves it isn't the only way. Maybe one reason I have had better luck with choked barrels, I'm too lazy to size pellets. You may be offered your "hard facts" by both groups, and both will be right. The fundamental remains unchanged, good barrel and good pellet fit, however you can get it.

[shorty]

There is a huge difference between a precision tapered barrel vs choking one .5" from the muzzle to make it better. I am not an idiot fudge nuts and don't treat me like that. Yes you moorepower and travis )
I don;'t like being implied as an idiot or dumb as$.
But to say,
I have a choke is better just ain't true and point me in the direction of those barrels that are winning matches. Please. I am sure there is more to it than a choke  " .5 inches from the muzzle".
This is a discussion... Not knocking a choke as I have had to put one on my .22 synrod to make it shoot better.

Show me and i will listen.

Knifemaker makes a great point and it has to do with precision barrel manufacturing. A taper is completely different than (just the ) muzzle being choked.

Like I said,
This is just a discussion about chokes in general. Not a bar fight as I am getting too old to keep defending myself on this site.

[oldpro]

Never had, nor have I seen a choked bbl in 22lr, or any other modern pb. There are bbl.s that are lapped by hand or fire lapped that are gradually tapered from breach to muzzle. But this is a totally different process than chokes. And quite extensive to manufacture or have done by hand lapping. Unless you know how to do it your self. It is hard arduous work. Trust me on that one. 


One poster wrote that fire lapping will give you a choke. Not true. If done to the extreme, you can end up with a tapered bore, or completely ruined.


Pellets, thru the years have had all sized in one cal. Different manufactures have used all kinds of specs. Still do to some extent. Especially in the .177 thru the years, and even more so in Europe. The only answer to have any kind of accuracy on average, with different brands, much less different lots is choking. Not much of a way around it.  Have a barrel that is not all that pellet fussy, especially in .177, bet dime to donuts it's choked.


Knife

 I agree with everything you said Knife. Just no way around mass production and pellet variations with out a choke to compensate for it. Now custom guns can certainly be made to shoot without a choke 

[oldpro]

There is a huge difference between a precision tapered barrel vs choking one .5" from the muzzle to make it better. I am not an idiot fudge nuts and don't treat me like that. Yes you moorepower and travis )
I don;'t like being implied as an idiot or dumb as$.
But to say,
I have a choke is better just ain't true and point me in the direction of those barrels that are winning matches. Please. I am sure there is more to it than a choke  " .5 inches from the muzzle".
This is a discussion... Not knocking a choke as I have had to put one on my .22 synrod to make it shoot better.

Show me and i will listen.

Knifemaker makes a great point and it has to do with precision barrel manufacturing. A taper is completely different than (just the ) muzzle being choked.

Like I said,
This is just a discussion about chokes in general. Not a bar fight as I am getting too old to keep defending myself on this site.

 Not sure why you think Im treating you like and Idiot or how you came to that conclusion so Ill bow out good luck Tim.

[KnifeMaker]

Trust me, I did a LOT of mixing of pellets and bullets BEFORE I removed the Choke. I wanted to made "dang" sure there were very good,and concentric land and groove markings in both bullets and the bullets I wanted to shoot.


It sht JSB's far too well to monkey with it on the hopes it would perform with the bullets without checking first.


The base of the skint was very deformed when pushed thru the choke. With all the lands causing extrusions al the way around.


With the pellets pushed thru all the way to be just short of the choke as measured, the markings were sublime. NO deformation at all, but with clear, and well defined rifling marks all the way around, and very even. This made the decision for me.


Still gave me pause, but I pinned my ears back and went for it any way. LOL!    (If it failed I guess I could alway save my money for a while and order a replacement bbl.). Grrrrr!


Knife

[TF89]

One poster wrote that fire lapping will give you a choke. Not true. If done to the extreme, you can end up with a tapered bore, or completely ruined.

I guess that would be me   Absolutely true what you said.  I guess I've always assumed if the bore at the muzzle is smaller than the rest of the bore it is choked.  I see the difference between a taper, just getting lucky and having the tight spot be at the muzzle vs the breech and of course a manufacturer rolling a constriction on the end.

None of the guns I have purchased have been high end, so it is less scary to work a barrel over.  Whoops made a mistake, darn just lost $30. 

[KnifeMaker]

LOL!

[Ribbonstone]

Would be hard to get real definaitive results...and would need to be repeated with several barrels.

Would need ONE barrel that could be progressivly choked, tested, and the retested with the next degree of choke.  Not changing the crown or shortening; would want only the choke to be the variable.
 Likely have to retest all the pellets, as the favorite pellet of one degree of choke might not be the favorite of the next degree of choke.

Just working on one barrel wouln'tprove anything universal about chokes...esp. if other variables were manipulated along the way (barrel length/crown/attached weights/etc).

Also likely,would be mixed results...but likely by chewing up the 10th barrel, would get an  indication (maybe a 70% confidence level?).

Doubt if anyone really knows or can put independent (not connected to any airgun maker/barrel maker) experiemntal data out there.

This much I do know...if the pellet barrel is going to have a slight tight spot, the only place it WON'T hurt is if it is at the muzzle end.

And under that flag, offer antecdotal tales (which certainly isn't proof of anything...just what happened in one or two instances).

Pretty picky about accuracy, even with cheap barrels.  Have had a couple of early QB barrels that were terrible.  All the usual cures didn't help.

One I did find a slight tight spot about 17" down the barrel.  Cut the barrel , made the tight spot the end of the barrel, and I still shoot that barrel today. Was it the slight choke?  Was it somehow a better crown? Was it the length/stiffness of the shorter barrel?

Don't know...don't really care.  Goal was to try and make that one barrel accurate enough to keep. May not be the "ultimate" that that barrel COULD be, but I'm not likely to tell the differences.

As for the other problem child barrel....it's doing duty as a tent stake.

[Mod90]

So, Tim, you're querying if choked barrels improve accuracy, or if they are just a gimmick. it's a gimmick, it's the longest running most widely practiced gimmick on the planet
The short answer, yes they do to, depending on two things in my experience. If the barrel likes its choke (some can be extremely aggressive, while others are barely there at all), & the factory consistency of the size of the ammo you chose to shoot. Because 4.51 mm ammo isn't always 4.51 mm, not even in the so called match grade ammo used for international competition. There will be a some at 4.52 & some at 4.53, some at 4.50 & some 4.49 might even get a few 4.48

Want the ultimate accuracy? Questioning the choke likely won't get you there unless it's a really aggressive choke. My advice would be that you could start checking the size of the choke on your articular barrel against the bore size, I consider anything more than .04 smaller than bore aggressive. If that's not your cup of Earl Grey then move on to with sizing your pellets, or do what most match competitors do, which is find that magic pellet the gun absolutely loves & get the batch number, & buy all the pellets that were made in that batch that you can.


Good luck.

[nced]

Does a choked barrel really improve accuracy ?

I don't know.......

All grouping at 25 yards on paper.
First gun was the 22 synrod with terrible barrel. Re-choked it and it shoots better than me with 14.66's and 21.14's ONLY. Laser straight.
Second was a FD PCP .177 cal (no Choke and did nothing besides put a target crown on it) and shoots every .177 cal pellet the same ( GREAT ).
Third was the 25 cal synrod with GM barrel ( did not do anything to it ). Shoots pretty darn good but not as great as the 22 and the FDPCP.
Forth gun Gauntlet 22 cal. Out of the box, great. Chopped 5" over barrel and re-crown, better than great with every 22 cal pellet in house.

So, when I say great I mean cover with a dime or nickle. When I say Ok, i's more like a quarter (min-10 shots). I really like the one holers but I can't hold it that steady or have a great scope on each of the guns.

What have you all experienced? Is a choke really worth it? From what I am seeing, I can shoot a larger variety of pellets without a choke more accurately than a chocked barrel.

Interesting thread so I actually did a "bore map" of my spare .177 HW95 barrel by pushing through a new 7.9 grain CPL from my pellet pouch that had been head sized to 4.50mm using my home made pellet sizer. Here is the "map"............

Setting the pellet in the leade with pellet skirt flush with the face of the barrel pivot block I started pushing a new pellet through the bore noticing the tight and loose spots.
1. The initial push to engrave the pellet required a "hard push" on the pellet.
2. The push was still "tight" but looser than the "initial push" till the pellet got past the area where the barrel was pressed into the barrel pivot block.
3. Then the push was an "easy sliding push" which became a TAD "lighter".
4.  Then the pushed pellet encountered another slight constriction in the bore till the pellet entered the choke.
5. This particular .177 HW95 barrel had a very tight choke requiring about the same force as it took to push the pellet into the rifling at the leade.

Here are the results after pushing a couple CPLs through the bore, one CPL only head sized and one CPL full sized.
1. Pellets pushed past the"tight patch" at the barrel pivot block. Notice that the rifling lightly marked both the pellet head and skirt of the head sized CPL but the skirt of the full sized CPL was VERY lightly marked...........


2. Two new pellets pushed through the bore and out of the choke, one head sized only and one full sized. Notice that both pellets had the rifling heavily engraved into both the heads and skirts after exiting the choke..........


Anywhoo.....both of my .177 HW95 barrels had similar constrictions along the length. My other .177 HW95 barrel had a bit looser choke, however the barrel that I used for these "pellet pushes" was a bot more consistent as it pertains to the degree of tightness/looseness. As far as accuracy is concerned, when I shot groups with the barrel "other less consistent" barrel on my HW95 in the pic "from bucket and sticks" I have to say that they were excellent............
(LOLonly 4 shots the last group)
 

[shorty]

Nced,
That's some interesting stuff there you did. I am glad it got your interest (like me) to do some testing.

Been reading  alot about this lately for a couple days. Just like Knifemaker did with the lapping, It seems like a beautiful taper from the breech to the muzzle is the most idea condition and choking a barrel like I did (wedding band method) and Motorhead showed is just a "fix/hack-improvement" from a barrel that is not performing. Although, doing this does not work or improve all the time due to barrel quality and other things are needed to fix it.

I can clearly see where a clean taper from the breech to the muzzle is the key.

Next questions I keep asking myself is, how do you do this in a precision repeatable automated way and be able to show ACTUAL evidence of a conforming taper to a specification.

I would love to be able to do this but, I just can't afford or get permission from the wife to go into a journey of this magnitude.

So I will share my thoughts on how someone may do this if they ever get into precision lapping barrels to a taper.

Linear slide  - 170 bucks
4 axis cnc controller accepting G-code - 260 bucks
Stepper driver and power supply -  25 bucks
Silly wiring -
This really cool ID air gauge for tight tolerance ID measurements so that the barrel can be provided with an actual dimensional report of the bore.


https://www.westerngage.com/air-probes-for-precise-measurement-of-internal-diameters/

I am also curious to know if any barrel manufactures provide an internal dimensional report for their barrels as I have not seen or found one yet.

[Mod90]

I can clearly see where a clean taper from the breech to the muzzle is the key.

& this would basically make the entire length of the barrel into  a choke, a long low degree choke.

I am also curious to know if any barrel manufactures provide an internal dimensional report for their barrels as I have not seen or found one yet.

iirc a few older barrel manufacturers used to, but I can't recall which ones. Most check to make sure their bores are within certain tolerances along the length but dont publish that info. It's more for their own internal use to let them know when there are issues with materials, tooling wear etc

[nervoustrigger]

LW is the only manufacturer that publishes that information to my knowledge
https://www.lothar-walther.de/163.php

[lennyk]

how clean was the barrel before you pushed the pellets through ?
I have an mrod with a very temperamental barrel
it gets leaded up fairly easy and the leading causes a lot of friction
kinda like rubbing a crayon on a glass surface is much stickier than rubbing on paper

one can easily think that the barrel has a physical tighter bore in areas but it could very well be lead deposits

Interesting thread so I actually did a "bore map" of my spare .177 HW95 barrel by pushing through a new 7.9 grain CPL from my pellet pouch that had been head sized to 4.50mm using my home made pellet sizer.

[moorepower]

There is a huge difference between a precision tapered barrel vs choking one .5" from the muzzle to make it better. I am not an idiot fudge nuts and don't treat me like that. Yes you moorepower and travis )
I don;'t like being implied as an idiot or dumb as$.
But to say,
I have a choke is better just ain't true and point me in the direction of those barrels that are winning matches. Please. I am sure there is more to it than a choke  " .5 inches from the muzzle".
This is a discussion... Not knocking a choke as I have had to put one on my .22 synrod to make it shoot better.

Show me and i will listen.

Knifemaker makes a great point and it has to do with precision barrel manufacturing. A taper is completely different than (just the ) muzzle being choked.

Like I said,
This is just a discussion about chokes in general. Not a bar fight as I am getting too old to keep defending myself on this site.
[/quot

You ask for opinions, I gave you widely known information and you tell me it's just opinion and you want some facts. There is a reason you get the responses you do, and being an idiot is not words I would use as to why that is.   I am done with your..... question

[nced]

I can clearly see where a clean taper from the breech to the muzzle is the key.

& this would basically make the entire length of the barrel into  a choke, a long low degree choke.

I am also curious to know if any barrel manufactures provide an internal dimensional report for their barrels as I have not seen or found one yet.

iirc a few older barrel manufacturers used to, but I can't recall which ones. Most check to make sure their bores are within certain tolerances along the length but dont publish that info. It's more for their own internal use to let them know when there are issues with materials, tooling wear etc

The BSA SuperSport barrels are hammer forged with a taper from breech to muzzle................

https://www.pyramydair.com/product/bsa-supersport-tactical-air-rifle?m=3209

http://www.airgunmagazine.co.uk/tests/gun-test-bsa-supersport-se/
From the above.........
 "it does boast BSA’s world-famous cold-hammer-forged barrel – a carefully crafted spout that’s renowned for its accuracy."

[triggertreat]

I could be wrong, but I believe those tapered barrels are referred to as a "full choke" barrel.

[strever]

Steyr had hammer forged barrels and were always on the top of list for accuracy
mine is an LG100 and the hammer forged barrel is a treat to shoot
don't know if they still do hammer forged or not

[KnifeMaker]

I could be wrong, but I believe those tapered barrels are referred to as a "full choke" barrel.

No Sir, full choke is a shotgun term. These taper bore barrels have been used in competition for decades and are called Taper bore. Quite common in high end bench guns. They were also used in old black powder barrels such as some Sharps used in long range competition. It isnt' a new concept.


Speaking of this, another variation of a hammer forged bbl, is the FX system. However, rather than using a mechanical driven set of anvals, (hammers in rotation), it instead used hydraulics to press the outer dia into the bore. Which is a smooth bbl until the last part of the barrel which is now somewhat rifled. But very shallow marks. Imparting much less disturbance to the projectile.


the new X Barrels are an extension of this process. What was old, is new again. 


Knife


While a Taper bore can be obtained by skilled hand lapping, it is more commonly done usually done as a result of using a tapered mandrel in the hammer forging process.


Knife.


Knife