Improving accuracy?
 

I'm wondering if any company makes a tight bore barrel for TM AK47's?

I have an AK and find the accuracy ok, but could be better. Maybe I'm too picky, but if I fire indoors at a 2 1/2 inch round target (like the little targets you get when you buy a new gun from TM) at 20 feet away, I get maybe 3 shots just inside the circle (but far from center) out of 13 shots. The shots seem to pull to the right, ever so slightly. Adjusting hop-up and my sites does very little, if anything.

Anybody else shoot an AK, and find the same problem, or any gun for that matter? ... will a tight bore barrel (if they are made for AK's) help?

:salute:

Actually thats not horriable. However I am able to do the TM 8-9 rings from 25ft standing.

many companies make toghtbore barrels for the AK.
If its your 1st gun, yah, reality sets in fast. Airsoft guns are the last thing from accurate.
but 20ft is a short distance to measure it really. really wanna try it a 50 to 100ft.
In general, you want to be able to hit a man sized target at over 100ft.

hopup wont do much at 20ft. its ment to flatten your trajectory and usually isnt noticed at short distances.
but if its not having an effect at 100ft, then lube it with silicone lube spray.

I'm going to have to toss a comment in here.

I find tightbores 100% worth it.
and...
Definately get a Systema. It's not worth spending twice as much to get a Prometheus barrel. I've owned both and noticed little difference.

Forget 6.03 & 6.04. Take the big step and get a 6.01mm tightbore!! :wink:

Aernt those like $100 each and can jam if there is even the slightest deformation in the BB?

There's always the mystical Tanio Twist barrels... :D

6.04 is the largest bore, right?

Only designed for guns shooting under 350 fps, though. If you play outdoors with heavy underbrush, you need more than 350 to punch through the foliage at ranges beyond 40 yards.

I've seen as open as 6.09 on some cheap HK knockoffs and springers.....stock TM barrels are 6.08-ish by comparison.

No.

However, if you're talking about for a TM Kalashnikova, then I don't know.

Thanks for the info... I'm definitly getting a tight bore barrel now, but just not sure what size. I'm guessing from what I've read here, a Systema 6.03 is what I want. If anyone thinks this is wrong, please tell me now.
I thought at first my in-accuracy problem could be becuase of the upgrade I had done (new gears / 170 spring - 390 fps) but then I thought, if anything, that would make it MORE accurate.

Make sure you clean your barrel every thousand shots or so. I've seen shitty accuracy in guns shoot great after a good barrel cleaning. Includes GBBs BTW. Example, my sniper rifles, I clean the inner barrel every 30-40 shots to keep the accuracy & consistancy at it's max. My M700's C&A goes to crap after about 40 rds.

I beleive I saw them for sale on here on ASC for around $80 or so CAD.

Kokanee IIRC, was selling them, there is the PDI barrels & then these custom ones made by an airsoft retailer just across the border in Washington. I do recall the barrels being black.

I had the link bookmarked but during a hard drive failure in the last few days I lost the link.

Muwahahaha!! I found them!
http://www.deescustoms.com/prod_custom-barrels.html

Definetaly a barrrel I will put in my next gun.

Well, what's wrong is that Systema 6.03s don't exist. You must mean either a Systema 6.04 or a Prometheus 6.03. They're both good, the Systema is cheaper.

Ok, I guess I'm going for the Systema 6.04.... has anyone here installed a barrel? Is it hard to do?, or should I leave it to a airsmith / gunsmith?

It's a quick job that takes no time at all. Definately something you can and should do.

I've done it for a few of my guns and it only takes about 5-10 minutes to accomplish. It's hassle free, too.

DO not for for the love of god get a promothesus 6.03, they have a nasty habit in jamming in my opinion. 6.04 are ok, but like stalker said, make sure you clean well and often.

I use KSC and I've never had a jam. What kind of BBs are you using? Guarder? They ARE 6.03.

Sounds like you have been listening to Apoc. He & I have gotten into heated discussions that all the problems you guys are having with your guns is because you installed a tightbore barrel, even if it weas something in the mechbox that fragged itself. If you do a search on the entire ASC site about tightbores jamming, you will find less than a dozen posts that have those words in it, and all of them speak of the reputation, not of fact (ok, maybe one in what, 5-6 years that ASC has been around?).

I even asked Vondnik about it, he said as long as good ammo is used and the barrel is cleaned once in a while, no jamming occurs. Yet he uses 6.04mm for his AEGs and 6.03mm for his single shot dedicated guns.

BTW, Greg, the thing that makes my info important is because I use a 6.03mm barrel in my M24, and a 6.05mm barrel in my M700. I'm also shooting 1/2" groups at 30ft, and can get BBs through doorways 200+ft away most of the time. An AEG is different, 3" groups satify most at short range, etc. COnsidering that evern with good ammo (roughly 5.93-5.95mm per BB vs. 6.03mm tightbore.........) leaves a 0.10-0.08mm gap between the BB and the inner barrel wall, it's not likely jams will occur unless using REALLY bad ammo. For my M24, no matter what I shoot through it, it comes out the nasty end very nicely. All of the problems I've diagnosed with you guys that have tightbores in your AEGs, I can't confirm a single one to be the result of the 6.03mm tightbore you had me install.

Draw your own conclusions.

***For the thread poster, I'll say this: My MP5 has a stock TM barrel in it, shoots around 360fps, has a clear Guarder hop up sleeve & bucking (50%) installed, and I can get consistant high round (like a full lo-cap) groups in a 2" circle at 30ft unsupported with a couple flyers. Your accuracy isn't that great compared to some guns, but I can say that it's better than I've seen out of a "stock" (430fps) G&P SPR shot on the same range, that gun would be lucky to get CD sized groups at that distance! Of course, 20-30ft distance does mean much in the way of field guns. Gives you a rough idea though. Using 0.25g BBs will increase your accuracy by a lot, more so at longer ranges than 0.20g BBs will.

Thanks for the info... I am using 0.25g BBs, the good ones (made by Airsoft Elite). If it is not that difficult to install (otherwise I have to drive 7 hours or ship it to get installed), I'm putting in my order for a 6.04. I really want good accuracy. It's funny because I played paintball for years, and I had a barrel kit- the barrel had two parts- front and back, and you matched whatever brand paint you were using, to the various front barrel sections you had, and it gave you super good accuracy. I thought an Airsoft gun would shoot as accurate as a real gun out of the box. I spent $300 for that barrel kit, and now I'm doing the same thing in Airsoft... but at least it's only around $100!. Anyway as it is right now, if I were to shoot at an actual cd from 20 ft away, I'd hit the edges of it at best, missing a few times... unless I watched the shots like a tracer, then I could adjust and get them on target, however I don't want to do that, I want to nail it dead center first shot!
:salute:

Keep in mind the best you'll get for consistant accuracy at 20ft is within an inch or so. Don't expect to be able to dump 20 shots into a single 6mm hole, even at 20 or 10ft, you won't get it. Another thing to keep in mind is that even if you are using expensive match grade ammo in your AEG, the BBs will STILL go where they want to. AEGs are like that, you can get superb accuracy all the time like real steel. Under the same conditions every time with my M700 (dry swab the barrel, fill mag with propane, fire 4 dry fire shots to even the presssure out, load with 0.29g Super Grand Master BBs........... about $25 for 500.........) I can get all 10 shots onto paper at 30ft, and make a hole the size of a dime.

A tightbore isn't going to solve all your problems though. It'll help tighten your groups up a bit, good hop up unit and rubber will help as well. I find it really odd that your gun is so in accurate though. I mean, not being able to get all shots onto a CD at 20ft? Something is really wrong there. My Glock 19 gets tighter groups than that at 30ft. And it shouldn't be more accurate than an AEG.

Hop up: Should be easy enough for you to do yoruself, just have to pay attention. Not sure how different AKs are from other guns as far as hop up unit goes. There's a half circle clip on the front part that holds the barrel in the hop up. Pop that off, gently twist the barrel and hope the rubber sleeve comes out nicely. Keep in mind there that little 'packing' (little rubber cylinder, about 1/8" long) inside the hop up unit. Tap the unit on a table with full hop up set, it should fall out. Take the new packing, hold the unit upside down, roll the packing in there, and with a small screwdriver poking in form the opposite side, position the packing sideways and into the square hole. Once in there, move the hop up adjust up & down, make sure that packing move up and down also. Put the sleeve over your barrel, inside nub into the barrel's square hole, put a thin layer of silocon oil on the outside of the sleeve, and holding the hop up unit upside down (hop up full off), slide the barrel and sleeve into the hop up unit. Once it's in there, look down the barrel and point the other end at a white wall, move the hop up to full and back again and see if you are getting the rubber into the barrel nicely. Once done, put that semi circular clip back on, then reinstall into your gun.

I would add that a physically solid gun will help.

Shaving 0.2mm off your inner barrel diameter won't help you much if the goddamned piece itself has 0.5-1.0mm of play in how it seats.

Seconded, first thing I did when I got my CA36 was to check for inner barrel wobble. I was inspired to do that after reading about how even TM designs like the G3SG1 had a rather loosely seated inner barrel.

Generally AEG barrels are only held solid at the hop up unit. Good point to bring up guys! Am sure O-Rings would help improve things rather nicely. Hey, if out of a 100% increase in accuracy of a KSC Glock comes from adding a larger and thicker O-ring to the inner barrel, and 25% comes from installing a tightbore...........................

You got me curious.

Would the concept of a free floating barrel (applies to firearms) work with airsoft? Has it been tried?

This may belong best in a thread of it's own to be explored further (and in the Upgrades/Mods section entirely).

Yeah I don't know what is going on with this damn thing. I just took 30 shots at a Tokyo Marui target (the ones you get with a new AEG- hint- photo copy these) and I shot at exactly 20 ft again, indoors, and got about 15 shots within the right side outer 3 rings. The group is fairly tight, but they always pull to the right, I'm aiming for the center, and every time, they hit 1 to 1 1/2 inches to the right.
When I got this gun and had it upgraded, the little cap that covers the screw on the fire select switch would not go back on. I pounded on that thing with a hammer (covered by a towel), for quite a long time. It would not go back on, so I just left it off. Could all that pounding on the side of the gun (but it's not like I was pounding THAT hard) actually throw off the accuracy of it, as hitting it on that side WOULD cause the barrel to shift to the right? I'm probably wrong but it's the only thing I can think of at this point. If so, a tight bore barrel might tighten groups, however it would still pull to the right... right?

:???:

adjust your sights

I did, I raise / lower both the front and rear site. Doesn't make a difference. I can shoot from the hip at 4 feet away, and still my shots will be off. Unless there is some way of adjusting my sights that I don't know about...? Anyway I'm certain the problem is internal.

Shooting from the hip doesn't give you any idea of how accurate your gun is. It's all in your mind.... I tried it.

Clean the barrel and check the hop-up, it sounds normal, but maintence like that is always good.

Ok I'll do that, even though the gun is brand new. Also... how exactly do I check the hop-up? what do I look for? sorry to sound like a dumbass. :salute:

Check the little nub to make sure it is smooth and even, maybe run it up and down a few times to make sure it works, give a little silicone, etc.

As long as it looks good, no reason to take that apart. If it is looking a bit weird, you can always take it apart -- carefully, and put a bit of oil in, make sure everything is fitting right.

If you put too much oil on the barrel/hopup, it will take a few hundred shots to work itself off again though.

------------------------------

You'll need to partially dissemble the gun to do this.
Can't help you on that part though, I haven't owned an AK--yet.

Your manual should show you how to strip it down enough to get to the barrel and hop-up.

My hop-up adjustment knob looks normal, it has a smooth movement both ways. I don't want to start stripping that apart and be in over my head. I may take it back to where I got it ( a VERY good shop, with a guy that REALLY knows what he is doing) and I'll leave it to him to fix this little problem and put that tight bore on, even though it's a 7 hour drive. I'll find an excuse to go. :razz: Well I cleaned my barrel, that improved the accuracy a SMALL bit. I tiny metal shaving came out on the cloth. This is a brand new gun, but who knows how long it's been sitting on the wall display in the shop, and what happened during the upgrade (even though I watched it happen). The accuracy is still allot off though. Maybe this is just normal for AEG's, maybe I'm too picky, and maybe I should just get that tight bore and hope for the best. One thing I did notice though, cleaning my barrel seems to have sped up the fps's... it shoots at 390 fps, but now when I put my paper target in front of the piece of cardboard I use, it RIPS though it!. Before it would kind of just punch holes though the cardboard. Anyway I'm still not impressed with the accuracy, but what can you do. Hey it's more like a real AK anyway right? I heard they have bad accuracy. :smack: Thanks for the help guys.

Ok I know what the problem is now. :banghead: The front site is crooked, the barrel is straight, but the front site leans to the left a bit.
Does anyone know how I can straighten that out? I tried just cranking it to the left, but doesn't really work.... should I take out the dummy cleany rod, and then somehow adjust it?.... or? ...please help..... :-?

(I meant crank it to the right)

Ok I guess I'm posting to myself now but that's ok, if anyone else has this problem they can learn from this I guess.
I know for fact now that my front site is crooked. So when I aim now, I aim between the center post and right side post on the front site > looks something like this >
( | )
-so I aim right here (but a bit closer to the center post)>
( |*)
-still using the rear site as normal. This puts 30 shots within 1 inch at 25 ft!!!!! can you say STOKED? yeah I'm pretty happy. I just shot all 30 within the center 3 on a TM target. AK's rock, just figure out how to shoot it if your front site is crooked. What's funny is I could hand this to someone to shoot at a target, they wouldn't be able to hit shit. Then I would take it, and I'd know the trick to it, and kill it!

I don't know how much better it will be with a tightbore.... damn I get chills thinking about it...!

Unless the inner barrel is securely mounted, free floating will only cause problems. Look at my Glock 19, I used to get all my shots on a peice of paper at 30ft, and I mean ALL over the paper. Then I discovered that when the slide was closed, there was about 1mm of movement in any direction with my inner barrel, stick a pen in there and it moves everywhere super easy. I installed a thicker and slightly larger O-ring on the barrel, no more play, got me nice ~5" groups after that, then I installed a tightbore and that knocked me down to ~4" groups at 30ft. For a GBB that's pretty decent.

Free floating DID in fact make my KJW M700 shoot much tighter groups though, simply because the outer barrel wanted to lean to the left, but part of the design was a mount that holds the inner barrel in line with the stock, puts a slight bend in the outer barrel, makes the same slight bend in the inner barrel. I was lucky to get CD sized groups at 30ft with it, after free floating the barrel I get 1" groups easy, sometimes dime sized.

Raising or Lowering (Elevation) won't affect your grouping if it is going to the Left or Right (Windage). To correct the grouping to the right you will need to adjust your rear sights windage to the left.

Also shooting from the hip does not let you use the sights.... Try holding the gun properly or sit down at a table and do the shots so that you have a stable shooting platform. Shoot 5 bbs see where they land, adjust your sights a bit, repeat until they are hitting where you are aiming.


The bent forward sight that you mentioned is a slight larger problem and may not be able to be accounted for in the range of windage adjustment available on the rear sight. I suggest you contact a gun doctor or some one else that owns an AK for suggestions on correcting that issue.

Yeah that's what I meant, adjusting up and down on front and rear sights doesn't do anything for adjusting left to right. It's to bad you can't adjust the sights left to right.
I shot from the hip to see if it was my barrel or sights that were off. I soon found it was my sights, they look obviously bent to the left when you sight on the right side of them and shoot.. I don't know why this is, it is a brand new gun. My shots went to the right all the time, and so when I aim through the right "hole" between the middle and right side, it's right on target. Makes sense. So it will be a while until I can get this fixed (I don't want to ship my gun), I'm thinking to black out the left side of the sight, maybe with some tape or something. I don't really need too, but may make it easier during "rapid target aquasition"... anyway thanks for the help. :cheers: