At Home Rifling

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dark1961

Member
Nov 17, 2017
436
2
Virginia
I attempted to to rifle my Gamo Express Sooth Bore Shotgun at home by hammering a tungsten 22 Caliber rifling button through the barrel with smaller steel rods supplied the vendor.

The first attempts with rifling, the button was too tight, but after diamond filing the button down a small amount, I could get it through the barrel without damaging the gun. I am very happy with the results. What used to be a 5 inch spread at 25 yards with pellets ( remember this is a smooth bore shotgun ) is now down to 1 inch at 25 yards, freehand. Now I can shoot relatively small groups ( for what was a shotgun, if you call it that) with pellets (no tumbling) and still use the very limited shotgun function....snakes!
 
For some reason, I have trouble uploading pics, here's the website.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Rifling-Buttons-Spiral-Reamer-Tungsten-Alloy-Novice-Use-Prevent-Break-Style-A/282827051714?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&var=582185897573&_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649



Here's the website on Ebay, it's seller is named "riflingbutton"



I started from the muzzle end because I thought hammering with the the rifle half-cocked would put too much strain on the linkages. Measure your bore VERY CAREFULLY!

I ordered a 5.5 mm button and had to diamond file it down to 5.47-5.48 to get through the barrel, the custom buttons are not returnable!


 
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1542139850_11058810855beb2fcad0e511.95642004_20181113_145640.jpg


Here's the evidence, 20 yards with the home-rifled gamo viper express "shotgun"
 
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From what I can find on the internet the cheap (but nice looking) 5.5 buttons produce a 5.7mm/.224" groove dia. Haven't received it yet. I should have done a bit more homework before ordering it. Technically too big for airguns, but I strongly suspect the Viper Express has a thin-walled barrel with injection molded plastic around it. If that's the case the groove dia may spring back some as soon as the button passes by?... Have a feeling this may go badly lol... since I have a twenty-ton press. A .216" gage pin will fit in the bore, so if the pilot/nose of the button fits I might go for broke, unless I can find a true air rifle spec'd button. They're out there, but they cost ten times what the button I ordered was ($79 vs $7.90)...












 
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Further research indicates buttons are made to allow for roughly ,05mm smaller than button diameter end results. So in theory a 5.7mm button might produce a .2225"-ish groove diameter once the dust settled. Finding all this data in the process of ordering a custom button, to lessen the odds of demolishing my Viper's barrel trying to force too large a button through it.
 
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To further complicate matters... appears as though the 5.5 button is actually larger bore than the 5.6... the latter being the numeric value they assign to a rimfire button. The former produces a 5.7-5.75mm groove diameter. The later produces a 5.6mm groove diameter...



EDIT;

It's hit or miss, arriving at any consensus between the plethora of Asian vendors. Few of them agree on the end result of what a 5.6mm button achieves. One thing I can say for certain, anytime I see a "22LR" button, it is also referred to as a "5.6". However... some charts show spec's on the 5.6 button indicating a 5.85mm end resulting groove depth (.230"), which greatly exceeds the groove diameter of a typical rimfire barrel, which, is around .221, in the same ballpark an airgun uses if I'm not mistaken.
 
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