So I was in denial about FSRs for awhile but I built a single shot and man is it cool. I'm working on making a precision rifle and am considering rifling the brass barrel by making a rifling button. Since I've never really taken a close look at a dedicated first strike gun and have no plans on buying one I was curious if the rifling makes much difference since the fins on the projectile don't actually engage with the grooves of the rifling like with an actual bullet.
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Gas, Grass or Brass, no one rides for free... -
People go nuts over the idea of rifled barrels with first strike... I've tried a bunch with mixed results and just stayed with bore matching-
Agreed.
Anecdotally I felt like when I was using a rifled barrel the shots had slightly less "waver" at a distance, but I'm pretty sure it was mental snake oil. Now I just do the same and bore match and it shoots just about the same. -
honestly I will say with good and consistent round ball even, I noticed a much more consistent placement, especially when you have a barrel break. I won a hammer head barrel back in probably 2005 or so, never would have considered buying one but free was free. Once I used it that thing got put on my pump and hasn't been off since. I know people argue rifling cant work on paintballs but I know side by side I have seen the paint fly differently compared to smooth bore. With any bad balls or after a break all of the shots went down and to the right instead of all over the place.
I really don't think its snake oil as I have zero investment in my barrel so no reason to want it to work better, but the long distance shots I could pull off with that were better than any other just bore matched smooth bore (granted this was the days of chronic and good marbs).
Honestly I will probably pick up a 686 rifled PWR insert at some point just for S's & G's to try with round ball just to see (I know you're "not supposed to" but this is MCB, we don't care what something was designed to do we care what it can do).
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Single shot FSR is soooo fun. AnarchicArctic and JeeperCreeper turned me onto it, and it's such a blast.💀 PK x Ragnastock 💀Comment
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I haven't ever felt like First Strikes aren't accurate enough. Some claim the rifled barrels help, but I haven't bought one. I just shoot them from my PGP with a p68 Speed Demon bolt in it, or hand loaded into my Ion rifle, and they go where I point.Comment
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I actually made a rifling machine a couple weeks ago. Its a little janky. Could be made better with less slack in the system, but it works. You might wanna try building one so you can experiment yourselfAttached FilesComment
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That’s so cool! Can you riffle some .680 brass for me? -
Chuck E Ducky sorry im not doing any rifling in the near future. Setup is still very prototypish and has a lot of kinks. -
All good just thought some rifled brass would make for a fun build project.
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Some swear by the Hammerhead barrel, I know that one's "specifically designed for FSR."Comment
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While their barrels work well. It's silly to say that they designed them for First Strikes. They developed their rifling pattern and, tooling at least five years before First Strikes were conceived. The only 'barrels' I would say that were specifically designed for FS are the Carmatech Nemesis and, the PWR Lapco Rifled inserts. -
It's their marketing, and just what I've heard from people that have used them. I figured the quotation marks would have summed that up.
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I did a ton of comparison between the Hammerhead, Lapco and Carmatech barrels with a hammer 7 build, a 468 build, Mg100, etc. In most cases they did perform better than a non-rifled barrel. But not by a ton, and the differences between each were again minimal. I liked Lapco and Carmatech the best, as we had trouble with rollouts on the Hammerhead sometimes. I like that Lapco has different sizes too, in the cases where you get extra small FSR.
But I say go for it!Comment
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It blows my mind that folks would use smoothbore barrels for First Strike rounds, given how expensive they are. I consider it as a means of getting the most of what I paid for. That being said, I have the OPs thoughts in mind, with a single shot system, you really want to get the most out of the projectile.
Rifled Barrels Work! Assuming the correct twist direction- Armson is the odd barrel out here.- I had high speed video shot to confirm that the rounds exit the barrel spinning.
- I have multiple, well-documented 20rd strings that showed that even the poorest rifled barrel performed better than the best smoothbore in the test.
- I only have a few questions that would take a pretty big chunk of money (several hundred $) to test:
- What is the optimal twist rate for a fin-stabilized, spinning projectile, does it follow the standard external ballistics theory?
- Does the pre-spinning contribute to an an increased ballistic coefficient? If so, how much? And does it change over the duration of the flight?
To Add: I consider controlled testing (ideally, indoors for these lightweight projectiles) to be way more valuable than 'how they feel' on the field. Paintball has a rather silly history of folks shooting projectiles in field conditions and jumping to all sorts of wrong conclusions:- Closed bolt paintball guns are more accurate than open bolt
- Paintball shots, over a long enough string will form a donut pattern
- Rifled barrels will improve the ballistics of regular paint
- Bore-matching has any influence on accuracy
- Low breach pressure guns are more accurate than high breach pressure guns.
- Elliptical Honing is more accurate than single or stepped bore diameters.
- I don't think I need to go on.
Originally posted by Tom Kaye, in response to FS price critics:
Unfortunately all of you have played the one "speedball" game of paintball for so long you can't conceive of other ways to do this and hence any new ideas seem stupid.
External Ballistics | Rifled VS Smoothbore FS Barrels | My FeedbackComment
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what did your bench set up look like? marker was mounted in a vice? -
latches109 It wasn't my bench setup (@cockerpunk may remember more) so, forgive me for not remembering the specifics (Vice/Clamp/etc) but, the marker was fixed to the bench.
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They do work when you start shooting into the longer ranges. I've got a nemesis and older style hammerhead, and if you can get your FPS consistency really good the FSR shots become very predictable (accurate??).
The Nemesis works better on my Phenom x-7 setup, and the hammerhead works better on my EMR Spyder.
The hammerhead however uses the fins for bore matching so I can run normal paintball too, and it's less likely to have issues.
If you find you're shooting a lot under 100 yards then I've found a tighter bore and any barrel you want works great. They shoot pretty flat at normal bunker to bunker ranges.
I'd argue that single shot are the best setups because of consistency, then you have the MG100. My Phenom and Spyder are just not as consistent as paintball markers but that really only shows when you are trying to lob an FSR through a keyhole. If I can see your lens I can hit you.Comment
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I feel like if the fins on the fsr extended out past the OD of the nose and they then locked into the grooves of the rifling you could really spin stabilize the round well before it even leaves the barrel. I can't see rifling that doesn't engage with the round doing too much..Gas, Grass or Brass, no one rides for free...Comment
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I remember seeing videos of the Carmatech Nemesis barrel when it first came out that showed FSR did actually slightly engage the rifling and that was a big deal. Then I remember later hearing something about First Strike decreasing the bore size/QC going downhill on the rounds and the barrels no longer engaged. -
The fins of an FSR do not extend out beyond the OD. If you look closely at an FS rounds, the wall of the tail (where the fins attach) acually tapers towards the rear, and the fins get taller as they go rearward (while keeping the same OD).
The carmatech spline system 100% firmly engages the equator of the FS rounds.
The rifling (land and groove) pattern used by LAPCO, Hammerhead and, PE all engage the hemisphere. How much is dependent upon the bore match. That being said,Even when FS rounds came out, they weren't tight in the hammerheads, and they still worked (as shown by controlled accuracy testing).
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First off. Y’all are chasing the 🐉 dragon.
An object traveling 290fps is traveling 290fps from an open bolt, closed bolt, DIY garage rifling, NASA space engineering riffling, PVC Pipe, Magically spellbound with flames on the side and a spiked bracelet or a tube made out of brass. There’s no debate here.
FS has more mass. You all remember newton and his laws right?
FS is frowned upon in rec ball. It’s a cheat, creating a longer distance to the target therefore creating an unfair advantage. This advantage is not a benefit of the FS player, as they are regularly picked out first and sought after because their unfair advantage is looked upon as cheating by spending astronomical amounts of money on costumes, gear and $1-2 a piece FS darts. I’m calling them what they really are, badminton birds or darts.
FS darts are not paintBALLS. Funny part is everyone playing with FS darts calls them “Rounds”. I’ll let you fill in the blanks.
At large scenario games or when a FS darts player comes to rec ball, he’s getting ramp balled once I find them hiding in the bushes somewhere shooting through a crack that they dug with the shovel in their belt😭.
How is it considered sportsmanship or fair to compete against markers that range 50-75yards with a FS dart that goes 100-150yards. I just don’t see how that’s not cheating. Not to mention the welts that FS darts cause due to their (increased mass-incorrect, it’s sustained velocity), the contusions are way worse which leads me to believe a FS dart close up to a soft spot could be a serious safety issue. Paintball hits your neck, it sucks. A FS dart hits your neck and it could be an ambulance ride.
I had to get that out. All being said, I do think FS has a place and is in its own right pretty awesome. If it’s FS darts only, that’s awesome.
Last edited by Daltech; 07-15-2024, 03:16 PM.Comment
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I distinctly disagree with most of your points.
More mass has already been addressed but, even at the time measured 3.11 vs 3.0 gram measurements, 0.11g wouldn't improve the ballistic performance of a paintball even 0.1%
They are not a cheat or an instant win button. They have their own disadvantages: No bulk feed, no practical speedloading of mags. Mags take up more space and weight compared to pods. Limited on gun feed capacity (compared to guns with hoppers), MagFed reliability is almost universally worse than the average hopper system on the average gun. Oh, and the cost.
You don't like that they are called FS Rounds? Where's your outrage at Nerf 'Rockets'? They look more like a dart than a rocket, they're used in the game of paintBALL, and, they aren't even included in the ASTM standard for paintball like FS rounds are.
Finally, on fairness. Paintball as an industry and community was totally fine with putting renters with M98s and a shake and bake hopper on the same field and in the same games as any electro, double-finger electro with a force feed loader for more than a decade, if not two.
I strongly disagree with the idea that everyone should be shooting the same projectile. How many computer FPS games feature this? I think a game featuring .50, round ball, .50 First Strike, .68 Roundball, .68FS would be great. Each system has it's own set of benefits an limitations, and success comes to those who exploit their system best.
To add: If everyone was shooting First Strikes, It would be played identical to roundball magfed, just at a longer range.
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fsr actually have less mass than a standard paintball. They have half the fill. They hurt more because they dont slow down nearly as fast after leaving the barrel when compared to a round ball and the poly shell takes much more force to break than the thin gelatin shell of a paintball.Originally posted by Daltech View Post
I agree it's doesn't always have its place in a game but you sound a lot like me before trying them for yourself! 😛
Gas, Grass or Brass, no one rides for free...Comment
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Paintballs: .683, 3g DXS Silver Ball Paintball fired at 300 FPS Maximum Range: 94 Yards Angle for Max Range: 26 Degrees Terminal Energy: .453FtLb
First Strike Rounds: .683, 3.11g Tiberius Arms First Strike Round fired at 300 FPS Maximum Range: 178 Yards Angle for Max Range: 32 Degrees Terminal Energy: 1.388FtLb
Taken from: https://www.pbnation.com/showthread....topics/4087614
Makes sense that the FS dart carries velocity longer as it is more aerodynamic. Simply stated; the FS Dart is traveling a full 280~fps whilst the lowly paintball has already dropped down to 200~fps at 50 yards.
I appreciate your understanding and civility in this discussion. Science 🧪.
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Its fair because the amount you can carry on you is extremely limited and cost prohibitive.. and they've been used extensively for a long time now.. if there was serious safety issue, you would know it. And as someone who has played with and against first strikes for almost 10 years, I complain more about cheap paint hurting. Tell me how it's considered good sportmanship or fair with ramping electronic markers. We can spin in circles all day long... tbh I've used my Apex2 over First Strikes because it isn't as advantageous as one would like to believe.Originally posted by Daltech View Post
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"Rec ball". Short for recreational ball.
The point, have fun. If the rules allow for the gear FSRs aren't " cheating'. We are having a pretend gunfight. In a real gunfight it is quite likely that different participants will field different platforms. Well planned load outs and tactics create different situational advantages.
My old scenario team had a player that adopted FSRs early. That gave us the ability to discover the advantages and disadvantages of that style of play. I enjoyed that process. I enjoy playing with FSR guys, because I'm a better team mate for them. I enjoy playing against them because I'm potent opposition.
First Strikes aren't the game changer many players make them out to be. I had a dedicated kit for FSRs, I prefer playing round ball.Comment
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I'd be pretty annoyed if you ramped me just because I was shooting FSR.
FSR out of a barrel cronoed at 280fps is 280fps.
A paintball out of a barrel cronoed at 280fps is 280fps.
As you called out the difference is that FSR carry that velocity further, and there is some stabilization that let's you land them more consistently.
I could shoot 1 or 2 FSR or I could use a APEX tip to launch a hopper of balls the same distance. You still need to play paintball, which usually means not standing out in the open.
It's really not a big deal, just another way to play.Comment
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