Airlab has the HSA Lapping kits in stock

what exactly is lapping a barrel etc? what does it mean? Never come across it beforehand...

 
If a barrel is actually straight then the second most important aspect in its performance is the internal finish. Its not uncommon looking into a barrel to find that its got obvious rings and other artefacts from its manufacturer. Cutting apart a barrel and looking at the insides show they aren't anywhere near as smooth as you might think by looking down them. These rough points, inconsistencies in the barrels internal texture generally cause the BBs to head off in different directions depending on which little edge they hit. So to improve accuracy you can lap the inside of the barrel to improve the consistency and make the barrels internal quality much higher. Its just a way of polishing away the imperfections inherient in the creation of the barrel itself and it can be used to improve stock barrels or less than perfect aftermarket ones.

 
oh ok. So is it just a piece of metal, or does it provide a coating which then smooths out and becomes the inside diameter? And how do they hold up, if you have ever used one? thanks, it's quite an interesting topic, one I never knew about.

 
team flex said:
oh ok. So is it just a piece of metal, or does it provide a coating which then smooths out and becomes the inside diameter? And how do they hold up, if you have ever used one? thanks, it's quite an interesting topic, one I never knew about.
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Its a series of different grits (like sandpaper) and things to insert these uniformly into the barrel. Takes a lot of repetitions through the barrel with different grit sizes to gradually smooth it out until its perfect.

 
The kit comes with an alignment block which makes it easy to keep the same orientation throughout the lapping process. Although the laps themselves are designed to lap evenly all the way around the bore. It's difficult to screw up your barrel because the material removal rate is very slow - as long as you used the lapping compounds supplied, or of equivalent grit sizes. The amount of metal removed is miniscule, just enough to take the high spots off the surface.

 
Am not really sure I could be assed to lap my barrel unless I was doing a super DMR build. But that AR Latch clip looks handy.

(Edit) I would use the latch on a build using a powerfull spring that you need to use all your strength to get the spring in. and if the AR latch poped out from you moving the gearbox shell while installing the spring, but you got the gearbox closed that is the point were I would just give up on life.

 
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The ARL clip is super helpful!

Lapping is always an improvement to a barrel. Yes it can be time consuming, but it doesn't have to be - you can do as little as you like. It's also really easy and quite therapeutic. You can watch a film or something while you work as it doesn't take much concentration.

 
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