So my gunsmith made me a replacement .177 barrel for my Crown in the week, the work cost about $200 including the barrel and took about 2 hours.
He used the brass transfer port from the FX barrel and simply cut the second threaded piece direct into the blank after matching the profile and the original O rings, the brass piece needed a lot of heat to loosen the loctite.
Upon inspection I was surprised to see the FX liner is actually under compression, albiet how much is hard to measure.
With a tin of pellets the gunsmith began rodding the FX liner and was not impressed, now I have not seen this done before so I am only repeating this not trying to bash FX, but when he told me to do it myself even I could feel a huge difference between the FX & Walther barrels.
The FX liner felt like an unlubed round object being pushed up a tight hole (only way I could think to describe it) however the hole would get loose then tight again very juddery, leading me to believe the hole diameter is not very even along the length.
The Walther felt totally different, very smooth indeed and no loose or tight spots even though at this point it was 8-9" longer than the FX liner as it had not been cut down.
I tried to get good pic's of some pellets but my IPhone wasn't upto it, he may do that himself with a macro lens at some point, suffice to say excepting the bite marks the pellet through the Walther barrel looked much less miss-shapen to me.
Finished barrel fitted perfectly, the end threaded to match the 1/2" X 20 on the original and threads directly into the Air Fective shroud.
Now the downsides, the weight is considerably more, 1/2 pound more (1.5 VS 1 inc shroud), the blank could have been reduced in diameter to match the weight of the original but there is plenty of support at the breech end so it's not a big deal for bench shooting.
Well the barrel shot faster, the groups with the 8.4's were not good, too much speed for the little pill I think, I will try again with lower FPS, but the 10.34's were much better. Not the pellet I wanted to shoot but there you go!
He used the brass transfer port from the FX barrel and simply cut the second threaded piece direct into the blank after matching the profile and the original O rings, the brass piece needed a lot of heat to loosen the loctite.
Upon inspection I was surprised to see the FX liner is actually under compression, albiet how much is hard to measure.
With a tin of pellets the gunsmith began rodding the FX liner and was not impressed, now I have not seen this done before so I am only repeating this not trying to bash FX, but when he told me to do it myself even I could feel a huge difference between the FX & Walther barrels.
The FX liner felt like an unlubed round object being pushed up a tight hole (only way I could think to describe it) however the hole would get loose then tight again very juddery, leading me to believe the hole diameter is not very even along the length.
The Walther felt totally different, very smooth indeed and no loose or tight spots even though at this point it was 8-9" longer than the FX liner as it had not been cut down.
I tried to get good pic's of some pellets but my IPhone wasn't upto it, he may do that himself with a macro lens at some point, suffice to say excepting the bite marks the pellet through the Walther barrel looked much less miss-shapen to me.
Finished barrel fitted perfectly, the end threaded to match the 1/2" X 20 on the original and threads directly into the Air Fective shroud.
Now the downsides, the weight is considerably more, 1/2 pound more (1.5 VS 1 inc shroud), the blank could have been reduced in diameter to match the weight of the original but there is plenty of support at the breech end so it's not a big deal for bench shooting.
Well the barrel shot faster, the groups with the 8.4's were not good, too much speed for the little pill I think, I will try again with lower FPS, but the 10.34's were much better. Not the pellet I wanted to shoot but there you go!
Let us know how it works. What pellet are you tuning for?
