[ILLusion]

After years of hearing and reading endless debates about Tanio Koba Twist inner barrels, and after years of hunting for them, I've finally acquired a couple of them in various lengths for various guns from AEGs to GBBs.

Here are my initial findings:

These inner barrels shoot STRAIGHT. They have an extremely predictable, flat and straight flight trajectory. Where standard hop up will cause the BB to gently curve up before dropping, TWIST (or cyclone) inner barrels will cause the BB to go extremely straight for an even further effective range before dropping.

To set a clear and definitive answer for all the debates that have floated on the internet for years:

Q1. "How is it physically possible to have a rifled barrel impart a spin on the BB and combine it with the Magnus effect of the hop-up? It is two totally different axes of rotation!"
A1. Actually, the barrel ISN'T "rifled" in the standard sense of a real gun. Yes, the inner barrel has spiral rifling grooves in it, but the BB does NOT touch the groove. The purpose of the TWIST inner barrel is not to put a rifling spin on the BB. It is to put a "cyclone" of air around the BB, to help float it through the inner barrel and PREVENT the BB from touching the side walls of the inner barrel at all. The result of this is higher accuracy, more predictable trajectory and greater effective range.

Q2. "I've heard about power requirements for these inner barrels. Details?"
A2. What you've heard is true. The twist inside these inner barrels are optimized for guns that shoot NO MORE than 1 Joule or 330fps with 0.20g BBs. Some internet debates claim that if you have a higher powered gun, all you need to do is use heavier BBs to slow down the velocity of the shot. NOT TRUE. The air moving around the BB will still be beyond 1 Joule and it will affect the shot trajectory.

Q3. "What happens beyond 1 Joule or 330fps with 0.20g BBs?"
A3. Up to 330fps, the results of the shot and even the shots dropoff are very predictable, accurate and flat. Groupings remain tight with very little spread. However, once the velocity of the shot begins to exceed that limit, the shot starts to become unpredictable with increased spread. The higher the velocity, the greater the perceived spread.

Q4. "So how accurate are these inner barrels compared to other brands such as Prometheus, KM TN or Systema?"
A4. At this time, I have not done any quantitative comparitive range testing to get accuracy results. When used within its optimized power range, I can outright say that these inner barrels have a MUCH straighter trajectory, greater effective range and a generally much more predictive flight path than any other barrel I've used before.

There is a project underway for an indoor range test to compare various lengths of these barrels against other barrels at different power ratings (stock, 1Joule and 400+fps).

How do I like these inner barrels? I love them. I wish they worked well at 400fps. At 360fps, they are still very acceptable and I will take that in to consideration when using them in some of my guns.
But for now, I am FOR SURE putting these inner barrels into all my pistols and low powered AEGs.

Further questions? Comments? Post away!