Shooting straight...

[dubsta]

Are there barrels that actually shoot dead on straight? I found that my stock barrel is better than my 16" JJ Ceramic...but they both curve all to hell. I dont get it...

I was shooting from about....80 feet away and found it hard to hit the target, which was a 3x4 piece of foam. The balls were dropping and going everywhere...

Thoughts?

[cwest1977]

Clean your barrel and squeegee it a couple times, making sure it is dry. And maybe some different paint. Your 16" JJ should not have a problem with something that size at that distance. To me the most accurate barrels are the kits. Since, you can adjust your barrel to your paint.

[aerophyte]

Palmers Brass
Opsgear (any with matched paint)

Barrel Insert Kits:

Deadly Wind Carbon
Hammerhead

To answer your question:

It depends on what paint you were using and how old it is. You should be able to to a blow test: insert 10 balls, one at a time into your barrel. They should stick, but you should be able to gently blow them through the barrel.

Barrel kits with various sizes of inserts should correct this problem. Palmers brass barrels just work really well.

With this selection my teamates and I were within a 2-3 foot shot pattern minimum from 100 feet (we measured it as part of a shooting course). Most of the time our shots were within a 2 foot pattern.

The first two things that effect shot consistency are:

1. Using HPA instead of co2.
a. outside temperature will effect co2...you may need an expansion chamber
2. paint to barrel match.

There are a ton of threads on it- hit up the search feature for more info.

<edit>

Yes, for sure squeegee out the barrel, your paint may be oily. Even good paint gets oily at times, make sure you bring the squeegee out on the field with you.

[dubsta]

I did clean the barrel, using water and the squeegee. I made sure it was dry as well.

Would you know what a good paint match for that barrel would be?

[z3th]

My friend had this same issue last weekend. We took apart his a5 and it was oil everywhere, so the paintball ends up getting coated with oil and it puts a weird spin on it.

Maybe take apart yours and give it a good cleaning, it doesn't hurt to try.

[acuk]

The j&j is a nice barrel and should be better than the stock one, are you useing good quality paint? is it old? what fps are you at? if you are shooting too high it can cause all sorts of funny shots, you will find that most crappy shooting is due to paint quality/bore match!

[HeDsHoTz]

I'd also suggest you pull your gun apart, clean it thoroughly, give all the o-rings and moving parts a VERY light wipe over with an oiled cloth, and re-assemble. Then take your gun out and test fire it again.

Also check your paint to make sure you're not shooting old odd shaped paint.

[Simbrian]

It doesn't look as though anyone has mentioned climatic conditions yet, so I will

Ball size can change based on current weather and humidity conditions. It's a mostly accepted fact that the primary factor in accuracy is paint-to-bore matching. If it's a proper fit, then you'll see some good accuracy, while if it's bouncing around or being compressed in the barrel, you will see a marked decrease in accuracy.

One thing you can do is get a general all-around barrel, that performs fairly well with all sizes and conditions. The most common (that I know of) would be the Bigshot, Ceramic, or the Palmer's brass barrel. If you have the cash, a barrel kit would be ideal. Most barrel kits are good, but the JnJ Edge kit is the best performance for your money. Hammerhead barrels are also very good, but expensive.

Personally I own the Tippmann Straightline (Hammerhead) barrel, as well as a Bigshot and an Apex (hardly use it anymore), so i'm pretty much set. If I do buy another barrel in the future, it will be a Palmer's brass because I have read that it performs very well with all paints, and would thus make a good backup if my Straightline is having problems.

[SilentDeath12886]

Paintball manufacturers make paintballs in various sizes. Paintballs are not .68 caliber, but a larger range of .679 to .695 in size. That is why you see barrel kits, such as the freak, with multiple bore sizes to provide the best fitment. Even in a box of paint, paintballs may various in size ever so slightly

Paintballs won't fire as well as firearms. So dont keep your expections high with 1" groups at 100 feet. A man size target at 100" is usually starting to push it.

Like Aero mentioned, using HPA over co2 will increase the precision. The use of a good regulator will add additional performance. This creates consistency in the delivery of air to the ball. In this game its all about consistency, from air to barrel, to paintballs that create the best precision markers.

[aerophyte]

ah yeah climate conditions as to how it effects paint, good one.

Don't use the expansion chamber with HPA, it will effect your recharge rate. The regulator on your tank will effect the charge rate also if you're using HPA already. Crossfire and Guerilla air have great regs on their tanks.

In spite of a higher cost, try to focus on using Professional or Tournament grade paint. Usually, in a perfect world, you don't have to worry about the effect of climate as much (aside from the fact they may not break).