What makes a BB?
 

Ok so I completly understand how weight and diameter affect your BB's performance, but how does it's composition come into play? Someone had told me Bioval** BB's go farther because they're organic or something of that sort, was he blowin smoke at me? Does it just come down to what it's made of or is it how the bb itself was manufactured? A combination of the 2 doesn't sound to far off from the truth but I don't quite understand how it works if in the end the BB's are the same size or weight

And in a final thought, is it possible for low grade BB's to actually damage your gun?

While I cannot offer any information in regards to BB composition, I can atleast confirm your suspicion that some lower grade BBs can damage your barrel or hopup. Due to the way some BBs are created seems or injection molding marks can be left on the surface of the BB. These seems can scratch up the inside of your inner barrel overtime, and in some cases even get stuck in your barrel.

not to sure but i think the more they are polished they fly better thats what i heard then again im not to sure and what tokyoseven said low grade bb can damage your gun ive been told to use bb bastered bb's and i have havent had a problem with them yet

the more they're polished the less irregular their surfaces are on a microscopic level (ie. the same reason why you wax your car, so that light refects more evenly), which makes a difference in areodynamics on such a small and light projectile(but doesn't make much of a difference on... your car =p).
Bioval BBBmax looks like glass, and despite me never being able to get any, I would suspect that they are extremely well polished and smooth.

i just had an idea. Since dimples on golf balls make them fly through the air better, would the same thing apply to bb's?? is there any such thing as bb's with golf ball like dimples? has the idea ever been explored before? just a thought.

yup, that idea is being experiemented atm, and apprently the results are "good".

http://www.arniesairsoft.co.uk/forum...owtopic=151663

not sure when we will see it in mass production but I'm crossing my fingers!

Wait, wouldn't dimples on BBs have the chance to slightly damage your barrel?

Dimples are dents not bumps lol. Also, some bb's can also break apart in your gun if they aren't hard enough.

Since pretty much every BB has an "air bubble" in them you also want to make sure that it's in the "centre" or close to the centre. It would make sense that a BB with an air bubble that's off to the side or something when it passes through the hop up and down the barrel will have a weird flight path since the weight isn't totally distributed evenly. Simple high school physics.

Not sure if the above made sense but in a nutshell you want your BB to have as small of an "air bubble" in it as possible and preferably have it in the dead centre.

OR Buy BBBmax, you can see all the way through em, and see for your self that there are no bubbles :P

Or not given the rumor that their made of a glass-like substance. Theres an entire debate about them in the accessories section of the forum started by Scarecrow, has anyone heard anything in regards to that since the thread got locked?

If you want a quality BB, just do a little research to find what most of the players use and their reasons why. There are discussions about this all over this board as well as others. I personally use BB Bastard exclusively as they are one of the most trusted high quality BBs or a great price.

No, no, i totally agree with you, i was just throwing my two cents out there about air bubbles in BBs.

I actually orded a bag of BBBmax about a year ago from a store in britan, came to almost 60 bucks with shipping, but i wanted to see what the fuss was about. I was very impressed with them, but for my money? i still use BB Bastard

I thought that a while before as well, but after cracking various brands open, that doesn't seem to be the case with a lot of them. I would guess that it's more density of materials than a lack of it.

I did some test a while ago.

Basically it all depends on the situation.

Some cheap BBs have an off-center air bubble. That causes them to "bounce" in the air and thus result in a random/erratic flight pattern.

Some others are made of some sort of "foam-like" material (The BBBastards are that way). Instead of controling the amount of material, they control the density of the material. Denser = heavier for the same size.

I also tried some super poilished BBs and some "Super hop", barely polished BBs.

The later where not irregular, but the surface what some kind of dull finish. I was not really good at long ranges since the air grabbed on it a lot more. However, at high velocity, the flight pattern was flatter for a longer portion of the flight than with the polished BB. Basically, it flew shorter, but strait for a larger percentage of the flight. I tested with a 575 fps BA rifle. The range was reduced significantly, but the BB flew VERY flat until it did a little "bump" and dropped right to the ground. Air speed was also reduced quite a lot (horizontal speed).

The polished BBs had a better range, but the trajectory was less regular. The pattern was more predictable and less affected by wind however. It required a LOT more hop-up adjustment to get the same effect. I actually changed the rubber to a harder one to get a setting that was in the "mid-range" of the mechanism.

The increase in range and wind resistance where sufficient to use polished BBs over dull ones.

I don't think that the golf ball BB will work. It is basically the same as the dull finished BBs... Well, it would probably be good for UK, since fps restrictions keep the rifles at a low velocity. In our case where most games are at 400 fps, a polished BB is performing better.

Ok so I read that last post and it got me thinking, why wouldn't a golfball style bb work better? So I started thinking about the golfball itself but as I did I remembered a place I used to hang out a lunch in high school, a stream we sensibly called the "dildo's". Big ol' 2, 3 foot wide concrete pillars used to slow water flow. I used to watch the water hitting them and see all the force smacking into it, and all the drag coming from the water not moving directly behind it (you might have no idea what I'm trying to explain). So then in turn, that got me thinking too, what if those pillars had a couple dents in em. Some place the water can go to create it's own independant turbulence and act as some kind of a buffer zone. Because, I mean the less force being directly applied to an object must conclude in more stable results right? It's like heat coming off your body in winter, throw a coat on and you've got an extra layer saving that energy from being stolen. 2 completly different situations but you can see the connection I'm trying to make.

Anyway after thinking that I desided to ACTUALLY find out for myself what makes a golfball fly better with dents.

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/question37.htm

This confirmed my suspicion and then some. It explained "Laminar flow" which I also found pretty interesting, which explains the round ball flight path. It really makes a lot of sense but it' a lot different when someone explains it to you in layman's terms

I really wouldn't know if all this applies on a BB size scale, but I would strongly like to believe so :P.

Hope this was able to shed some light on the subject