matador r3 .25 long barrel length

Thanks for the info, Mike. My good friend, Nik, met with John B a few months ago. Nik was going to try to smuggle a few GOOD BSA barrels out of England. I was on his list for as many GOOD 22 and 25 barrels as he could get me!

John B hasn’t had any GOOD BSA barrels for over a year now. John would buy the BSA barrels in lots of 500 and he had to return his last shipment as they were not up to his standards.

Last year, I got the same story from Leupy.

Both guys have said that the BSA barrel quality went to shit around August 2010.

The only way to get a GOOD barrel now is to buy a well-cared for used BSA air gun and salvage the barrel off of it. I got lucky with the NOS 25 cal LoneStar that AOA had had on the shelf since before 10-2010.

I have spent thousands of dollars trying to get my 25 cal long versions up to the next step in accuracy.

I am firmly convinced that I/we are wasting our time trying to get really good accuracy using pellets! They were not designed to go as fast as we shoot them.

I have 2 Hart rifle barrels, a FX Smooth Twist, a couple of custom LW barrels, 2 JT’S enterprises hammer forged barrels and a couple of BSA barrels.

I have got way too much money tied up in a Richard Corbin’s swaging press and dies for the 22 and 257 Hart and JT’S barrels. So far, the results have not been good. I am still waiting for a die set for the .257 Hart barrel that I sent a barrel slug to Richard so he could fit a die for it.

I told him that I wanted him to make me a die that would give me the most accuracy at 100-200 yards using a 950 fps muzzle velocity, shooting 45-60 grain slugs.

That die set has cost me $650 and I hope that it works out. I am cautiously optimistic that it will be killer!

As of right now: IF you can find a GOOD BSA barrel; JUMP on it! I fitted a BSA barrel on my R2.5 and my R3, 25 cal longs and they both were killer!

Gamo has owned BSA for a several years has upped the production demands for barrels and hasn’t allowed BSA to do the necessary maintenance on the hammer forges to keep the quality up to BSA’s standards. The quality started going south around Aug, 2010. I took a chance on a close out BSA LoneStar that AOA had for a couple of years. I just wanted the barrel off of it. I got lucky and the barrel was a good one.

If you know where you can get a GOOD BSA 25 cal barrel and you decide that you don’t want it, PLEASE let me know and I will gladly buy it!

My R3 25 cal long version’s original barrel measures 23.220” using my Starret caliper.

I order replacement barrels at 24” length and then cut them to length. You will also need to thread the barrel 12 mm X 1.25 mm pitch on each end for at least .600”.

If the barrel ends up a little long, the excess length will just screw deeper into the baffle nut and not hurt anything.

Be careful what you order, a BSA barrel is .619” OD and will need to be turned down to .479” for the first 11.5” so it will fit into the scope rail housing.

I didn’t have any luck with a FX smooth twist or a replacement LW barrel. The stock Edgun barrel shot better.

The BSA barrel was a slight improvement but, takes some work to fit.