nodes...

Lynn said:
Beau

On his saying he did it all wrong earlier with the earlier tuners he has posted that several times but again that isn't a quote just me paraphrasing.I think it went more along the lines of before I found the parallel node I did it like everybody else and this is wrong or not the right way to do it.Again not a quote.
Waterboy
Click to expand...

I think you're right to an extent there. Bill used to turn the tuner and now he does not. As he says, we tune the barrel and not the ammo. You are right that he has said he did that and it was wrong but I don't believe he ever said it was a complete waste of time. If I'm wrong, I'll let you know.

I said years ago, without any real basis other than common sense, that what people were doing could not work. What they were doing was twisting a tuner or giving it a few clicks in a gale force wind and sitting back down and saying "there it is". The tuner in that case did nothing tangible. If they clicked it a lot, it probably hurt more than it helped. What it did do was make the shooter BELIEVE it worked and therefore it did. Anyway, I, at that time agreed with Pacecil, that the tuner was nothing more than a weight. Now, I had no basis for what I believed other common sense. About 4 or so years later, Calfee agrees that you can't twist the tuner and win and that's what he believes now. So, there's been a meeting of the minds as far as some people are concerned. But, if you don't believe a tuner does anything or can't really be adjusted, you ought to watch Bill adjust one. It doesn't take long and he knows where it should be. I'm sure other people can do the same thing, but I'm just saying.
 
Beau
I also think Bill has a handle when it comes to the tuners.I can make my tuners do things I would have never thought possible a few short years ago.

Love him or hate him he sure has a way of writing things that makes you want to go out and give it a try.I haven't shot a barrel without a tuner since I first added one and now my hunting rifles will all get one as well.
Waterboy
 
Tuners do work--I think most us of agree on that, no doubt in my mind. Figuring out the "how" is the tough part, and agreeing on it is a whole "nuther" ball game. I like 'em!
 
Last edited:
I finally figured out you have to come to your own answer. They're a simple device, so I don't see them being improved upon a lot. No use to request a physics grant to study them. The only thing I know for sure is that engineers and physicists sure can take a lot of fun out of shooting.
 
Beau said, I think you could read everything Bill Calfee ever wrote and never find that he said the term "parallel" node was a math, or scientific term. However, it is now a term in real life or maybe shooting rimfire is just a fairy tale (not that Bill Calfee has declared it a term). Point is, the term has been accepted by some people and therefore now exists.
Going back to reading what Bill Calfee has wrote, I think you will find that he explains that it is his term for what he is seeing and there could be a better more descriptive and scientific term.
So Calfee (or maybe you) thought it wasn't a "scientific" word and thus he could give it any meaning he wanted! You are probably right. So, what do you think he meant when he said "parallel" ?
Science doesn't deal with real life..... Hmmmm.
As I read Calfee I think he saw two lines he thought were parallel. But wait, he wasn't thinking "scientific" parallel, he was thinking real life parallel...... Hmmm. I'll have to give this some thought - let's see , what is a better word for parallel? And I guess it's got to be unscientific, or real life, something engineers or doctors wouldn't use. Lets see, he could have said "tracking" - you know as in car tracks or railroad tracks. Yep that's it, that barrel and the line thru the center are not parallel, they're tracking!
 
Not trying to beat a dead horse or be derogitory but a tuner is just a weight....that has very fine adjustments. Is that simple or what? The dead spot stuff.....I think is a bunch of horse$h!t. I remember about two years ago, Darrel Barnes shot a 2500 and a friend of his posted that he rang the barrel at the match and the dead spot was around 2 to 3 inches behind the muzzle. I can tell you this year a 2500 was shot with the tuner only and no added weight. I witnessed it.

Carp
 
Beau. What it did do was make the shooter BELIEVE it worked and therefore it did.

Lynn, I can make my tuners do things I would have never thought possible

The power of the mind!
 
Pacecil
I think you were doing just fine for a short while but now your stretching things just a bit.
A tuner will allow a 216 grain bulletwith 73 grains of powder behind it to shoot through the same hole as the same bullet with 81.5 grains of the same powder through it.I would have never thought that possible and neither would 99.44/100 of the posters here yourself included.Sure now that it has been down we can all say it was well known for many years but it hasn't been and to now say it was would be lying.
As alot of us now know you get water in the bore do you remember that conversation as well and what everybody said back then?

As to the "parallel Node" as Bill describes it I see two sections of barrel that are parallel in relation to the barrel at rest.One being the area right in front of the chamber while at rest and the other being the muzzle if a long bloop tube was added and the Anti-node was sitting there.
If you now go back a few posts to your reply you will see that you yourself described a short section of barrel near the anti-node to appear Straight and Parrallel when a weight was added to the muzzle.
To my way of thinking this would fit the description.
Not trying to beat a dead horse either but your answers to my earlier posts leave me with a little skepticism.
Waterboy
 
Last edited:
pacecil said:
So Calfee (or maybe you) thought it wasn't a "scientific" word and thus he could give it any meaning he wanted! You are probably right. So, what do you think he meant when he said "parallel" ?
Science doesn't deal with real life..... Hmmmm.
As I read Calfee I think he saw two lines he thought were parallel. But wait, he wasn't thinking "scientific" parallel, he was thinking real life parallel...... Hmmm. I'll have to give this some thought - let's see , what is a better word for parallel? And I guess it's got to be unscientific, or real life, something engineers or doctors wouldn't use. Lets see, he could have said "tracking" - you know as in car tracks or railroad tracks. Yep that's it, that barrel and the line thru the center are not parallel, they're tracking!
Click to expand...

Pacecil,

You or Vibe brought up "real life" out of context. Go back and read what you wrote or quoted and maybe you'll understand it. I sure don't. Your sarcasm in this case is aimed at you.

I have no idea what he saw when first coined the term, although he has said he will demonstrate it to me at some point. I assume it was something along the line of two lines equidistant that never converge. Although they may seem to if viewed at a distance, like railroad tracks.

Sometimes you seem fairly intelligent. This is not one of those times. Go back and read what you quoted from Vibe about real life terms. Examine your sarcasm, and then read what I wrote. Take some time with it.
 
pacecil said:
Beau. What it did do was make the shooter BELIEVE it worked and therefore it did.

The power of the mind!
Click to expand...

I won't address whatever Lynn said because I don't know what he meant. I've been saying that same thing on this forum for years. Confidence, the power of the mind, put them in pin stripes and they act different. Whatever you want to call it. Why do some sports teams come out and destroy teams with twice their talent? Same thing.
 
Beau
If your a fisherman take out a long thin pole and holding the handle shake it several times so you see a steady pattern.The shape is known as a standing wave because it appears as a constant to the eye.
If you notice the tip is always whipping up and down and never appears to be stationary.Nothing you can do changes this unless you add weight out in front of the last guide.
You can tape a pencil or a section of dowel to the tip of the pole and as you increase its length the original tip of the pole will appear to stop.You have shifted the node to the tip of the pole but not the tip of the pencil or dowel.

If you can keep the poles vibration pattern very steady the standing wave remains constant.

You can change the amplitude or the height of the standing wave by adding weight to the end of the pencil or dowel.In our example you can tape some washers to the tip of the pencil or dowel and the standing wave will look like it is now flatter.
Bill had everyone do this with welding rod or by looking at your trucks antenna while traveling down a bumpy road.The tip will never appear to stop moving unless you place an extension out in front of it.
Waterboy
 
If I recall I had the intellectual patent on the fishing rod theory some years back, except I used a fly rod since i used to do a lot of trout fishing. Interesting concept.
 
Lynn, I never cared for fishing but I did used to fool with shortwave radios for a time, so I know about a standing wave. I've even had several courses of Calculus (not the same one each time), general college physics, fluid dynamics and several other engineering type courses as I thought I was expected to follow my brother down his chosen path. I've done my best to forget all that stuff over the years but some of it is still there.

Now, let me ask you a question about your antenna. When you put the weight on the end of it, does it whip back and forth more or less? Is the whipping action more violent or less so? Just asking.
 
Beau
In a nutshell the weight will dampen its amplitude.If you have a barrel laying around hit it and while it is ringing pinch the muzzle with your thumb and forefinger.The partial wave that is a couple inches past the node is moving pretty fast and when pinched the barrel will stop ringing because you damped it out.
Waterboy
 
If you're just talking rimfire I don't know, but over here in Australia, iron sight belly shooters have relocated their clamp on foresights modest amounts to achieve better accuracy out of their factory loads. We use similar weights 2-6 ounces behind the muzzle to achieve the same result with out F class & 1200 yard rigs, where we might start out by loading for maximum usable velocity (based on ES & SD) then tame them by tweaking the tuner.

But were you actually asking for the expression tune to be defined?
 
Beau
Bill always says the proper amount of weight the correct distance in front of the muzzle is what tunes the barrel.
By putting the weight out front of the muzzle he is shifting the node.For some reason I can't paste the pictures to my earlier posts?
Waterboy
 
Lynn,

I've listened to Bill enough to know exactly what he's saying. I've never seen his experiments, but he has said he will show them to me and let me write whatever I want about them and post it here if anybody is interested. When I get a chance, I'll do that. All I can say for sure about tuners, rimfire only, is if you shoot with Bill and he sets the tuner, there is no doubt you're getting more than just a weight effect. Now, most of us who shoot know how to set a tuner. But Bill can set one fast. I mean in seconds. You can go back and run the various tuner setting techniques including the Hopewelll method and you'll end up very close to the same spot he already used. Now, I think Pacecil thinks I believe in magic, but there's science behind that somewhere. I can't explain it. I guess it's fun if math and dynamic systems are your hobby, but I'd rather read Gun Times magazine and I hate gun rags. By the way, I don't consider Precision Shooting to be a gun rag.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top