FX Royale 400 .22 with BSA hammer forged barrel accuracy and variety of pellets

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mubhaur

mubhaur

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Nov 8, 2015
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Karachi, Pakistan



I was keen to find a BSA barrel. Finally I got a full length new production BSA barrel blank. I got it machined for my FX Royale 400. My 400 had Smooth Twist barrel previously.

After installing BSA I noticed a few things;

1. Its extremely accurate barrel
2. It shoots JSB 18 grain, 16 Grain and CP 14.3 grain almost equally accurately at small and medium distances i.e. 25 yards to 40 yards.
3. You can see in the pic that 10 shots of JSB 18 grain have made the hole only as small as it can be. It is almost 5.7mm hole.
4. At 75 yards it is also very accurate. It means 1/2" groups at 75 yards in good conditions.
5. This barrel also accepts high FPS. If I shoot JSB 18 grain at 970 fps it remains as accurate up to 40 yards but at 75 yards the best accuracy is at 880 fps.
6. CP 14.4 grain is also very accurate even at 1000 fps at 25 yards.
7. To me its all in one barrel in which I can shoot a large variety of pellets at various fps very accurately.

I remember Harry now when he praised BSA barrels. My barrel is from new batch still its amazing.

You can see that its 10 group in the pic is even better than 10 shot group of my Royale 500 .25 with Smooth Twist Barrel.

I am not going against any barrel making technology. I like Smooth Twist barrel as well but that barrel is good only with one kind of pellets and at certain FPS only.

Its just sharing of my experience. 
 
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"mubhaur"True. These are better than LW and some others as well.
Click to expand...
Really? Next group was shot with my Boss .25, 5 shots at 50m/55yrd, king heavy running 270m/s



Although the BSA barrels do shoot pretty well, they certainly are not perfect.
My experience is that they tend to suffer from excessive fouling.
When you push a pellet down the bore, it feels like cycling over an unpaved road with a racing bike.....
Lots of loose spots, and far from being smooth. The total opposite of a decent LW barrel.
(B.t.w. I'm talking about the blued BSA barrel blanks from Knibbs without lettering.)

I've rebarreled many, many airguns with BSA barrels in the past, but in my experience, LW poly barrels are better finished than the BSA's. Unchoked LW polys almost don't foul at all, and if you decide to clean, the 3rd rag will come out clean. Each to his own, but I'd pick a LW over a BSA any day.

Cheers, Gijs

 
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LW poly may be much better. I only tried LW traditional button drawn barrels.

You are right that when a pellet is pushed all the way through the barrel LW seems better finished than BSA but in the real life results, the variety of pellets that BSA barrel allows to shoot accurately even at very high fps is different to achieve from LW button drawn barrel.

This is just my first hand experience and I 2nd you that apparently the internal finish of LW is better than BSA.

But perhaps the different type of grooved and may be different twist rate or may be a different way of making choke make these BSA barrels positively unique.

I have LW button drawn barrels installed on some pcp guns but I will pick BSA barrel any day over LW button drawn barrel.

One other barrel that surprised me is that Diana uses on its pcp P10 00 .22. It's amazingly accurate barrel.

Regards,

Umair Bhaur
 
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You're absolutely right that they shoot well, but unfortunately the barrels I have tried were fouling very quickly. A quick clean and you are good to go again, but during a match this is not really convenient.

The LW poly's perform very good, and without choke they seem to even not foul at all. (I prefer barrels without choke, a good barrel does not need a choke I.M.stubborn.O :) )
Because the BSA's are cold hammer forged, they seem harder and stiffer, hence why I find them harder to straighten and more difficult to machine. The LW's are buttery soft, and when they get a hit, they can bend very easy. 
About the Diana barrels, AFAIK they are made in house, and indeed, they are very good.

Below a couple of photo's of a group shot with my LG110hp shot at 100m/109yrd with a BSA .25 barrel, they sure do shoot great :) (JSB King 25.4's running 275m/s) Sorry for the Hijack Umair :)




 
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Dear Wetherby,

I love the way you share your knowledge. Yes I feel that BSA barrels normally need a Polish with JB bore paste or some thing of that kind.

You would be aware of Leupy in UK . He is a big fan of BSA barrels. Also John Bowket is also fan.

Each barrel is different and I prefer BSA barrels.

I shall share some material from Leupy Web site.

Thanks and regards,

Umair Bhaur
 
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