Recently discovered

[Rich4]

Don’t laugh, but due to a recent extended period trapped in various tractors I’ve just discovered podcasts, which apparently are not a new thing, anyway Frank Galli has one called “everyday sniper” prs based really, however he has a great interview with Frank Green of Bartlein, worth listening too episode 245
Really enjoyed it

[williada]

This a bit long winded. Rich, Frank is an easy man to listen to. I fully endorse what he said in the podcast “…only as good as equipment”. An individual certainly needs to learn to read wind in the early stages of their development, but training with accurate gear teaches them the real value of wind and mirage and significantly cuts their apprenticeship which allows them to learn when their rifle sours because of attention to detail.

The reality check for the future. Some have taken it a step further and earned the heads up.

If people get involved in the trade, they know what to look for e.g. Geoff Ayling was a magnificent fullbore shot, and had an edge he has expressed with his custom-made barrels which was a story of initiative and triumph for the times. Percy Pavy back in the day was a master armourer and perhaps the worlds greatest shot until challenged by James Corbett in recent history IMO. James owns a firearm importing business. I used to drive Percy to and from the range at Williamstown in his later years as did Frank Dodd when I lived in Melbourne. Percy gave me one of his Queens winning rifles in .303, and told me he had different setups for different ranges. That was the beginning of my life-long interest in accuracy. He was a very private man and would never shoot on a Sunday for religious reasons but understood barrels and their setup a bit like the barrel swappers of today and imparted a fair bit in my formative years. When commencing the school’s program in Melbourne Percy generously gave me a sugar bag of barrels to put together gear for the activities and winked that the previous owners thought they were done. Not so. That is another story. Andy Powell was another top shot but was also an importer of Shultz and Larson barrels. All of these guys shot against hundreds of competitors at a time and they had access to the best gear and knew what to look for because they were passionate about what they did.

FClass is in its infancy and the ranks are thin by comparison today. What the old and new have in common is the need for aspiring shooters to seek specialist knowledge from people who understand the finer points of engineering behind the manufacture of different projectiles and barrels, not gun plumbers with limited insight who may also provide an end product. Frank Green so freely passes on his professional knowledge is someone to listen to. It was Alinwa, on Benchrest Central who reminded people about the good workman who will always have a trade but a person who knows why it works will always be his boss. It looked kind of tough at the time, but Al is not a diplomat and has a bucket load of knowledge.

This also translates to team shooting. New coaches soon learn to deal with frustration in team shooting if a weak link loses shots at the margins or where super centres are sacrificed in order to manage a large group. I don’t think any responsible Captain in a team’s match should allow a top shot to shoot if their gear soured or let cronyism get in the way of objectivity and the teams best interest. I’ve seen coaches tipped out between matches. That is the reality, not some fairy story if an aspirant gets picked in squads. People have to deal with this disappointment. Be prepared. Reputations can be sullied by idle gossip. Accurate gear wins elite matches if there is team harmony. Just have to look at Captains reports and the disappointment that eventually leaks out down the track as to what decisions cost matches but it also demonstrates what the value of character really means. It maybe the story of the “Could have beens”, sadly to say. Its part of the journey of never giving up in order to win. The old adage is, “a good team will always beat a team of individuals”. Shooters representing the country or states or districts represent us. Let them be worthy representatives who do their best.

[Rich4]

Al’s quote was by Ralph W Emerson, one of my favourites, I’ve actually listened to that interview 3 times now as there’s always something happening that takes my focus for a second, I had a good chat with Nev Madden but got brain freeze and remembered what I wanted to ask after I left, mostly being cognisant of his need to get back to work, it seems to take me a while to get to the meat and potatoes as I’m often as interested in the person as I am their knowledge, I had an distant uncle encouraged me early on, a old fullbore shooter fastest paddock shot I’ve ever seen and some of the rifles he tuned were appalling yet he could drag the best out of them, I’m probably nearly more focused on building/tuning rifles as I am shooting them, to the point I could be the person who spends their life training for something that never happens, but I’d like to see a Queens and meet some of the amazing people who give so unselfishly of themselves to better the sport and help young ones up

[Gyro]

Al’s quote was by Ralph W Emerson, one of my favourites, I’ve actually listened to that interview 3 times now as there’s always something happening that takes my focus for a second, I had a good chat with Nev Madden but got brain freeze and remembered what I wanted to ask after I left, mostly being cognisant of his need to get back to work, it seems to take me a while to get to the meat and potatoes as I’m often as interested in the person as I am their knowledge, I had an distant uncle encouraged me early on, a old fullbore shooter fastest paddock shot I’ve ever seen and some of the rifles he tuned were appalling yet he could drag the best out of them, I’m probably nearly more focused on building/tuning rifles as I am shooting them, to the point I could be the person who spends their life training for something that never happens, but I’d like to see a Queens and meet some of the amazing people who give so unselfishly of themselves to better the sport and help young ones up

…….”to the point I could be the person who spends their life training for something that never happens” ………… are you that guy building a boat in his back yard who actually never wants to finish it ?

I know a guy ( not me ) in a small town near here who has always lived on his own. He works when he has to but would really prefer not to. His background is in machining and he has a huge amount of experience. Some of the stuff he makes blows me away.

Anyway he’s gotten really interested in shooting relatively recently. I have a stack of books about ‘technical’ shooting stuff so I’ve loaned him some to read because I know it will help him out. The last thing I want to do is lecture him because he’s as happy as a dog with two tails just working it all out for himself. He machines the chamber without a reamer and has made some tricky tooling to get it done how he wanted. He’s made this tricky pressure measuring vessel as he’s needs to know what’s happening with the chamber pressures. Hours, days, weeks of work.

I wonder how many guys there are in the world like that ?

[bainp]

Just listened to the podcast. It seemed to me that the interviewer had a preconceived idea that gain twist barrels are the bees knees. Although I have never tried a gain twist barrel (never felt the need), I have friend that did. His scores did not suddenly increase nor did he suddenly start winning all the matches around.
My thoughts on gain twist are that the rifling distorts the bullet more than a constant twist barrel, so why would you want to use a barrel that did that?
I have won my fair share of matches using constant twist barrels, not driving the bullet so fast that the jacket and core separate, moderate loads, but the right bullet selection for the job and a positive frame of mind.
Philip

[pjifl]

Being very hard of hearing, I had trouble with the podcast. A huge amount of it was devoted to Gain Twist. While I have a lot of respect for Frank Green, I thought he was partially reacting to one of the latest fads. I know nobody using Gain Twist and like Philip, worry about it actually damaging jacket bullets. I believe it could alter the felt recoil of the rifle - especially the torque - and especially when faster and faster twist rates now seem to be in vogue. Perhaps we could hear from any users in Aust.

Gain twist is an old idea probably of more use with lead bullets.

It was resurrected for some use in artillery especially when delicate electronic components were fist used in projectiles' proximity fuses. The initial torque shock was very hard on small vacuum tubes and their filaments
Electronic components have since become far more robust.

BTW, CRYO treatment of steels is also over 100 years old. To my knowledge it was first used on Gauge Blocks and does help reduce internal stresses. But sometimes one gets the impression it was recently invented by the firearm industry and barrel makers probably gain by pushing it.

Peter Smith.

[Gyro]

Rich, anybody , help. I must have got the wrong podcast because it was soooooooo bad. You were lucky Peter. I could hear it.

Please post a direct link ?

[Gyro]

Please ignore the previous one lads. My impatience for substance got the better of me. Again !

[Old Trev-39]

I had a gain twist in a .22R/F bench gun. Could not get it to shoot. Ditched it after around 1500 rounds and went back to conventional. It now seems as if ratchet barrels are the new fad in R/F. bench rest. Not for me, my conventional Maddco is shooting better than me.
Keep safe.
Cheers, Trevor.

[williada]

Rich, I endorse the good gear Frank speaks about. I also have been using one of his left twisters but not a gain twist for the last couple of years with great success in a couple of prize meets up to 1000 yards in Vic State Team company which later cleaned up in WA. Same barrel never dropped a point in last years Champ of Champs in Gippsland to win by a sound margin. I have not entered other meets or the State Champs for health reasons much to my frustration over the last few years.

However, during the 1980's I had a play with gain twist by accident and was not a fan with issued 308W. I even reduced the rifling to .001.5" in an effort to caress the jacket and kept the groove size as close as possible to diameter, .3074 from memory. Yet I won a prize meeting with another experimental barrel from the same billet but in regular 1-13 with the same bore groove dimensions as the gain twist. Perhaps it was slippage in the system as Frank suggests. I do realize that one swallow does not make a summer.

Some time back I posted a picture of a record 10 shot, 200 yard approximated group from Ray Smith's book, "The Story of Pope's Barrels" which I was a one hole from a gain twist barrel. That group was shot from .33-47 muzzle loading rifle and used lead based projectiles made by Pope. No jacket. The rifle weighed weighed 13 pound 10 ounces. Interesting that the barrel was 31 inches long, no taper and was rough turned to 1.125 inches. The current owner says it is spotless and has worn less than .001". It has fired an unbelievable 125,000 rounds. That's 2 tons of lead and half a ton of powder!

I note the pod cast referred to Pope and Frank also made comment about jackets. Popes parabolic formula for twists can be worked out from his data which is a great legacy.

In more recent times I also posted a modern commercial gain twist and associated groups. I could not recommend such a barrel from what I saw, but that is not to say a little more science has gone into it to get it right. Again sample size is where the proof lies. I suspect my issues were with the jackets produced at the time, where the rifling grooves in the jacket changed angle and spread displacement on the jacket. I really don't know. Probably getting the transition right for the final gain and the metallurgy is the key. Some barrels gain twist gain all the way to the muzzle, others to the last 6 inches. All sorts of implications for tune and refurbishment of the crown.

I used to correspond with Cliff LaBounty who unfortunately lost his wife a few years ago. Used to use his jigs. He has left a great legacy with material regarding rifling machines and methods. I always have an open mind. We will have to see whether the gain twist is a mere puff with modern projectiles. I will wait for the verdict on this one. I know what works now.

[pjifl]

Maybe I should say that I have 3 Bartlein conventional 5R barrels. 2 in 7 mm which are winners and I could not imagine anything better. But also some conventional ones by Madco which are also excellent. But no experience with Gain Twist.

Peter Smith.

[Rich4]

I wasn’t actually advocating gain twist to anybody, I believe that I can learn something from anyone but mostly I enjoyed the technical discussion with someone I respect greatly who adds to this very forum freely, I do feel that if you look deeper though it may be geographical, Lh vs Rh Northern hemisphere shooting past 1600 yards, I do get the rifle torque implications though, really is a case of nothing new under the sun, a Lee Enfield accurizing book I have notes the asymmetry of the bottom of a lee with fultons trying to add material on the left side, I’ve often wondered if the left twist was related to that, as far as gain twist goes it may well be a fad, however if Frank is selling them to most of the short br boys in the states there could be something to it, he sees trends we never will due to volume

[Gyro]

Yes Frank has written some really good stuff here. I don't think a podcast is a very good way to present technical material though. Hey Rich have u got Harold Vaughns book too, as he played around with lots of interesting apparatus. And no I do not fully understand all of his work.

[John T]

Gain twist is nonsense, though there has been some interest in 6" cannons.

[Rich4]

Yes I have Vaughn’s book, I can understand the concepts but cannot do the math to prove it, I’m very visual if I draw it out I can get it, I can’t see it from equations like more educated types can, podcasts may not be ideal, however you learn to filter the noise from the data, they are good for me as it allows me to listen while I’m in a tractor or driving between blocks, I wish presenters would use better grammar more than anything else, however in front of a microphone I may be no better