Round ball knurling

[Siringo]

Gentlemen,

Somewhere in this forum was a fellow that made a tool, operated on a drill press, for roughing up round balls. I am looking for contact information. THANKS.

 

[Sidney Smith]

Just run a ball across a wood rasp. Performs the same function.

 

[renegadehunter]

Without trying to hijack the thread, what does knurling a RB offer? Holds the patch better with the theory that it won't slip the rifling? Or for shooting a bore sized RB with no patch? Just curious.

 

[Grenadier1758]

I've always seen the knurling (gnawing or rasping) of the ball as a practice used by smooth bore shooters to slightly enlarge the ball at the knurling for a better fit of the ball to the bore. The knurling is allegedly supposed to give better aerodynamics to the ball. I think that the practice of dimpling the ball between two rasps ot whatever gives the shooter a bit of mental confidence and the accuracy improves,

 

[smo]

I’ve knurled and dimppled them. Two rasp for knurling and a plastic coffee can for dimpling..

It only takes a minute or two of shaking and your done.
This was done for shooting a bare ball out of my smooth bore.

Rock tumblers work well I’m told too.

 

[Sidney Smith]

Supposedly improves accuracy out of a smoothie, similar to why a golf ball is dimpled and not just smooth.

 

[Ray Settanta]

Google Vortex Ball Roller tool

 

[Maven]

Knurling is also done to give bullet lube a place to accumulate when you're shooting an unpatched, knurled RB in a smoothbore. I've knurled bore diameter RB's between 2 coarse files for my smoothbore, dip lubed them, but I didn't find them to be more accurate than a smaller patched RB in my gun.

 

[Carbon 6]

I tried it, went back to smooth, I used a hoof rasp, makes quick easy work out of a .69 caliber ball.

 

[flinter1977]

Duelist 1954 has a YouTube video on chewed balls. Very informative.

 

[Eterry]

Gentlemen,

Somewhere in this forum was a fellow that made a tool, operated on a drill press, for roughing up round balls. I am looking for contact information. THANKS.

On the N-SSA Site, maybe in classifieds there's a guy has them listed for sale.
Good luck