Dan, GG and Victor, thanks for your replies. Maybe part of the problem with me not being able to grasp some of this is because I don't have anything that fires a gb. I've been reading a lot on the net about golfball aerodynamics and the Magnus effect and it's helped in understanding some of what you've said. I reload for both high power rifles and my pistols, so I know how important consistency is in both the making of the rounds and in firing the guns. When George mentions accuracy being dependent on making the components of flight as similar as possible, I get it. I also get the nature of the beast; the beast being muzzleloading smoothbore barrels that have to have windage to function, and their nature being that they are to a certain degree, inherently inaccurate, coupled with the fact that using golfballs as projectiles compounds that inaccuracy.
On another thread about sabots increasing the accuracy of shot, someone said it was the ball bouncing back and forth against the walls inside the barrel when being forced out of the barrel that caused the inacccuracy of the ball in flight. Centuries ago some artillery experts were aware that decreasing windage would increase the accuracy of the gun, and when the manufacture of more uniform and smooth iron shot became the norm that's what the cannon makers did.
Cannon makers of centries ago also discovered that the size and shape (gomer, hemisphere etc.) of the chambers on guns, and the smaller diam. powder chambers of howitzers, and mortars could increase their accuracy. Now these two major improvements I can understand, but the discussion of an angled chamber I dont get at all (this could only be used on a smaller than bore diam. powder chamber). Wouldn't this design just make the problem that much worse by causing the gb to be slammed off the wall of the bore and bang off its last hit before it left the barrel to slice one way or draw the other?
By offset, I take it that what is meant is that the chamber itself is no longer centered in the bore, but is lower than center to exert the energy of the charge on the lower portion of the seated golfball, supposedly causing backspin. Well, in reality wouldn't this basically and to a lesser extant just cause the same problem as an "angled" chamber? Wouldn't the force exerted on the bottom of the ball cause it to lift upward and bounce off the upper wall of the bore, causing the same erratic flight of the ball when it left the barrel?
Victor, I liked your continuing the bb pitcher analogy, and I follow what you mean. Your concept of two protuberances or projections coming down from the top of the bore at 10 & 2 o'clock to grab the top of the ball as it exits the bore thus causing the desired backspin, and I guess also centering the ball so that it flies in a straight path, seems plausible in theory; but would it actually work in practical application?
Because of the windage, how could there be any possibility of consistency in the ball being snagged by the projections on the same two spots on the top of the ball shot after shot? How could the ball be centered between the projections and not be off to either side, and wouldn't the ball on some firings be too low and only grazed by the projections, and on others be too high and hit the projections too hard?
George said in his post to me " The goal here is to get the same spin for every shot", and I just don't see how you can attain that goal with this concept, that is what I meant when I said, I just don't get it.
Victor, the bottom line is I'm no designing engineer, and you've got experience in this arena, so for all I know your idea would make a gb cannon much more accurate, and cut down drastically on the slice or draw of the ball in flight, it's just that I'm thinking in terms of what I know, and that's the smaller caliber cannons that I've been firing with a patched lead ball.
