Best rimfire tuner??
- Thread starter Ansterds
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Be aware that a tuner will not help ammo that doesn't shoot well to begin with. In other words, it must be consistently consistent.
Entry level ammos such as SK varieties will be likely to be unaffected by whatever tuner is used. The name on the box doesn't guarantee that the ammo will be "good enough".
Keep in mind also that not every rifle will benefit from a tuner. A mass produced rifle with a mass produced factory barrel will be an unlikely candidate to benefit from a tuner.
A tuner is not a magic device that will make any rifle with any ammo shoot better.
Bryan Litz recently did a report on attempting to tune a CZ 457 using SK LR ammo. He reported that a tuner made no difference.
I have experimented with quite a few over many years. First recommendation is not to buy any tuner that projects beyond the crown of your rifle. As mentioned by Glenn, they’re not a quick fix that turns a poorly built barrel and mediocre ammo into a consistently accurate gun. However, if you have a great quality built gun and great lot of ammo, then the tuner can help TUNE that load or lot to that barrel. You’ll burn through a fair amount of ammo to find the proper node and then eventually you’ll shoot all that ammo and have to start again minus the tuner to find a great lot number and the process starts all over. Frustrating to say the least but when the stars align it is awesome until the flyer ruins the party haha. I have had great results with one from Insite arms paired with their Heathen 22 brake. This is what I use on my Competition rifles for X22, ORPS and CRPS.
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First question should be why do you want one? Just curious to try one? Is this a rifle you're shooting in competition you want to do better in? Which competition(s)? While CZ makes great rifles for the money, the second part should be emphasized. They're not exactly custom $5,000+ benchrest guns. And they're not going to shoot like them, even with a tuner. That's not to say you couldn't improve your shooting results with a tuner, but expectations should be reigned in with respect to the equipment involved. A tuner is typically the last piece of the puzzle even with those custom $5,000+ benchrest guns, but that's a long way from a CZ.
Something with tuners that hardly anybody seems to understand is every barrel is different in length and contour, and those things affect how much weight you need to add in order to get into a good barrel movement speed region, that is, a good tune. Any random tuner isn't necessarily going to give good results with any random barrel. It is a very sensitive thing to set up, and requires that the amount of weight involved by carefully matched to the barrel in question. I feel Litz was the victim of combining random barrel and random tuner, not to mention it was a CZ and SK ammo involved. He's incredibly knowledgable, but I feel he missed the mark on that test on several counts just due to not knowing any better. The tuner needs to slow barrel movements down into just the right region for the distance you're shooting at in order to give you the best results. Random tuner and random barrel will likely just result in random results. That's likely what he saw in that case.
I accidentally left a bubble level on my barrel one day, which weighs an enormous 31 grains, and it threw my tune out and my point of impact off by a very surprising amount. I was very puzzled until I stood up to look at everything to make sure I hadn't screwed something up and saw that little sucker still sitting there where it should no longer have been, haha. Took it off and the gun behaved again. 31 measily little grains.
Something with tuners that hardly anybody seems to understand is every barrel is different in length and contour, and those things affect how much weight you need to add in order to get into a good barrel movement speed region, that is, a good tune. Any random tuner isn't necessarily going to give good results with any random barrel. It is a very sensitive thing to set up, and requires that the amount of weight involved by carefully matched to the barrel in question. I feel Litz was the victim of combining random barrel and random tuner, not to mention it was a CZ and SK ammo involved. He's incredibly knowledgable, but I feel he missed the mark on that test on several counts just due to not knowing any better. The tuner needs to slow barrel movements down into just the right region for the distance you're shooting at in order to give you the best results. Random tuner and random barrel will likely just result in random results. That's likely what he saw in that case.
I accidentally left a bubble level on my barrel one day, which weighs an enormous 31 grains, and it threw my tune out and my point of impact off by a very surprising amount. I was very puzzled until I stood up to look at everything to make sure I hadn't screwed something up and saw that little sucker still sitting there where it should no longer have been, haha. Took it off and the gun behaved again. 31 measily little grains.
Can a tuner have negative results on accuracy?
I’m hoping a tuner will add more forward weight and provide a better rifle balance.
I don’t want to go through the whole tuning process so I am hoping that setting #1 or whatever it comes set at either does not impact accuracy at all or improves it.
I will be doing a quick test with groups at 50 and 100 yards to see.
I’m hoping a tuner will add more forward weight and provide a better rifle balance.
I don’t want to go through the whole tuning process so I am hoping that setting #1 or whatever it comes set at either does not impact accuracy at all or improves it.
I will be doing a quick test with groups at 50 and 100 yards to see.
100%, I took a tuner off my last gun because I could easily make it shoot worse on 3/4 of the tuner settings... and I couldn't tell how much better if any when I thought it was tuned. (probably didn't have enough rounds tested, but I do shoot 10 or 20 round groups a lot of the time) The tune also seemed to changed over temperature variances and distances.
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Yes, it can make things worse. A barrel moves/bends a lot during firing. Those moves/bends change the launch angle, and what happens at the paper depends on when the bullet leaves relative to those movements. A tuner set up for ideal results gives a barrel that has a period of time where it is moving/bending such that the angle of departure is constantly increasing so that all shots leave during that upswing, and the upswing is such that it perfectly compensates for how much more launch angle the slower bullets need to hit the same spot on the paper. Slapping any random tuner on is not a guarantee that you will be given an upswinging barrel, nor within the advantageous region. A barrel on its own without a tuner is capable of having bullets leave at less than ideal times. They can leave during an upswing, a downswing, or some shots leaving while moving up and some shots leaving while moving down. The trick is to figure out how much weight you need to add in order to get as many shots as you can to leave during an upswing that's just the right speed. An upswing at just the right speed removes as much vertical as possible at the target.
If the tuner is horrible for that particular barrel you might have all shots leaving during a downswing. This is the opposite of what you want, because a downswing introduces more vertical at the target. A 1085 fps shot needs less launch angle than a 1050 fps shot. But if the barrel is swinging downwards then that 1050 fps shot, being in the barrel for a longer period of time, will have a lower launch angle. So not only will it drop more due to its lower speed, but it will also be aimed lower, compounding how much lower on the target it will hit.
If shots are leaving near the time when the barrel changes directions then you have random shots leaving at random launch angles, and naturally that won't be helpful. The only way to tell what is going to happen is to try shooting it. When it helps it will reduce vertical. When it hurts it will produce more vertical.
My guess would be the tuner simply wasn't a good match for your barrel, and you'd need to figure out the weight of one that would be helpful. Temperature will affect tune, but only slightly. This is simply due to temperature affecting how quickly the metal vibrates. As temperatures go up you might need to move the tuner in towards the shooter, or as it gets colder you might need to move it out away from the shooter. How much temperature change you're talking about will govern that.
As for distances, well, you can only tune for one distance. Or should I say, the results you get from tuning are focused on one distance only. Tuning to get the best results possible at 50 yards by definition means you will not be getting the best results at 100 yards, or any other distance. Tuning is attempting to get all shots with differing velocities to converge at one distance despite those differences in velocities. If you want a 1050 fps shot and a 1085 fps shot to both hit the same spot at 50 yards, that is, to have zero vertical at 50 yards, those same shots are going to have something like 0.4" of vertical out at 100 yards. The launch angles needed for 1050 fps and 1085 fps shots to hit the same spot at 50 yards dictate that amount of vertical if you also look at where they hit at 100 yards with the same launch angles.
Exactly, you nailed it! And I shoot all the way from 25m-300+ in varying conditions from snowing to 30C, it would be simply impossible for me to be able to test all the variables. If you are benchrest shooting only 1x distance it might be a helpful tool.
Fixed-distance benchrest matches are definitely the intended target, pardon the phrasing. They could still be helpful when shooting at different distances, but they're only reducing as much vertical as possible at one distance. That distance is something you can select, though. Someone might tune for 100 yards in order to reduce as much vertical when shooting near 100 yards, and not mind any changes in vertical at other distances. All depends what you're doing and what you are willing to accept. But they are best when dealing with just one distance because you can only tune for one distance. Having to find and keep track of multiple tunes for multiple distances would be horrendous. It's bad enough trying to find one for one distance, haha.
Leuchtkafer
Member
Too much weight extended too far beyond the muzzle can absolutely make the rifle perform worse than no tuner at all. It's better to have a tuner that is too light, though that means modifying and shaving weight off of pretty much every commercially available tuner to achieve this. When the tuner is too light, the likely effect is overall some improvement over the bare barrel, perhaps a little less fussy about what lot shoots well in it, but the results won't be the best they could be if the tuner weight was properly matched to the barrel.
