Lothar Walther vs. Smooth Twist

[Ian Johnstone]

they are MORE expensive to produce than standard barrels, the special 'blanks' (in fact specialist tubing) costs nearly as much as a LW rifled blank (ie. the unworked FX balnks cost nearly as much as the worked LW blanks).

One aspect of the SmoothTwist barrels is their seeming immunity to fouling & they dont cut the pellet resulting in a more uniform projectile.

The guy who made the video is in the States and shoots at FAC levels, he's had an Edgun for a while - they are often messed with to get max power, that could well be his problem here. Most American air gun users select pellets on a weight basis (for some reason ) I've tried to educate them about head sizes etc. but they tell me the makers dont provide the information, well that could also be an issue with his LW barrelled Edgun.

FX will not be making SmoothTwist barrels available to the public.

[Parabuteo]

they are MORE expensive to produce than standard barrels, the special 'blanks' (in fact specialist tubing) costs nearly as much as a LW rifled blank (ie. the unworked FX balnks cost nearly as much as the worked LW blanks).

One aspect of the SmoothTwist barrels is their seeming immunity to fouling & they dont cut the pellet resulting in a more uniform projectile.

The guy who made the video is in the States and shoots at FAC levels, he's had an Edgun for a while - they are often messed with to get max power, that could well be his problem here. Most American air gun users select pellets on a weight basis (for some reason ) I've tried to educate them about head sizes etc. but they tell me the makers dont provide the information, well that could also be an issue with his LW barrelled Edgun.

FX will not be making SmoothTwist barrels available to the public.

Fair Ian

But would the point not also be that the machinery and processes are considerably faster, and rejection rate lower (just supposition on my part there having been briefed on smooth twist) so this would offset the fact that the blank is more expensive (at the moment).

The system is still in development to an extent, so best wait and see

Moreover, the barrel is as stated, less prone to fouling, less pellet fussy, and may (or may not be) a match for match barrels....with much less variables.

It is also slightly more efficient in PCP form, which has to also be a usefull spin off.

Technological advances these days are seldom major leaps, but more often not a bit here and there.

Smoothtwist may tick all the boxes yet, particularly for mass production

[derekm]

To put cost of blanks into perspective, the Americans can have a Lothar Walther barrel machined and fitted to their gun for around $120, that's £75, for a one-off custom job. Now if the smooth twist barrel blank is twice as much as the Lothar, it should hardly make a huge difference to the total cost of a gun.

There's maybe a good grain of truth in Hares Ear's earlier post.

If it's more expensive, it must be better, even if there's no commercial need for it to be more expensive.

Flavour of the month works in most hobbies

[A685]

Was after one cos I thought have to change a caliber,but as much I ask the answer was not available yet.So we just dreaming.....

[Murphy]

If FX own the rights to this barrel what is the point in banging on about being able to own one.

Unless you buy an FX rifle you wont.

And IMO FX rifles are very overpriced and not that good.

And as for improving accuracy nearly all airguns have one hole accuracy now,

at the ranges most people use them anyway.

So my question is how can you get MORE accuracy than what's already available?!

[Parabuteo]

If FX own the rights to this barrel what is the point in banging on about being able to own one.

Unless you buy an FX rifle you wont.

And IMO FX rifles are very overpriced and not that good.

And as for improving accuracy nearly all airguns have one hole accuracy now,

at the ranges most people use them anyway.

So my question is how can you get MORE accuracy than what's already available?!

I cannot see one company getting the rights to this Murph.

If it works out it could well be quite a widespread thing...on the other hand...But who knows.

The point is that a barrel can be made, more quickly, with less likelyhood of rejection (I base that on less to go wrong as long as the blank is made correctly) that is much more tolerant of different pellet types.

Even if accuracy is comparable, the other factors may weigh in it's favour.

This may men that we have to worry less about batch numbers, pellets going out of production, etc etc.

Ben is also doing experiments with varying degress of twist and numbers of...err...dents, (corresponding with grooves on a conventional barrel). These have turned up some interesting results by all accounts.

Apparently the smooth twist made quite an impression on a well known semi auto rimmie too.

I have one of the rounds fired by it, uncanilly smooth.

I think it may be a whole can of worms that sound as though it was worth opening.

I think half the problem is that Ben is (quite rightly) very secretive and exploring all of the possible applications before licenses get sold etc. As a result, we think things are either not progressing, or react to heresay or conjecture.

I am only working on what he has told me, and what I have heard from others who have tested the barrel and the Airgun press.

[Murphy]

I cannot see one company getting the rights to this Murph.

Not totally 100% sure of this but I remember Ben posting on here that he has sold all rights to FX?!

Apologies to Ben if this is not the case.

He may have just said FX are starting to produce them.