Krieger Barrels is the only barrel maker that I know of who presently offers the Pope Rifling --there are probably others.
                                                               leadball

Forgive a relative newbie... but I've seen references to "Pope rifling", but never an explanation of what it is..

So, uh, what it is? Uh, is it?

Paul F.

Boats

I just finished reading the book Pope's Barrels and the targets in the book are extraordinary.  The book was written a few years back so I do not know if anyone has bettered those targets, but the C.W. Rowland target that is so well known was shot with a Pope barreled rifle, so I am still surprised noone has tried to duplicate his efforts.

Paul F.

In the early 1900's Harry Pope made barrels and modified winchesters, ballards etc and fit them with his barrel which included inovative rifling  and a false muzzle, while muzzleloading the bullet.  He also went to work with Stevens Co. for a short period of time, but left do to problems with his exacting standards.  Most top target shooters of the day shot his barrels.

Thickside

But - to reply to the question, what was the rifling form of the Pope barrel??  Unless I am mistaken, it was some kind of Henry rifling, I believe....  Or not?

Pope rifling involved a couple of complimentary components.  The grooves were relatively wide and shallow while the lands were relatively narrow, resulting in minimal distortion of the closely fitted lead bullet.  The bottom center of the groove was almost the same height as the lands.

In addition, the grooves were in what is referred to as "gain twist" configuration so that the bullet would spin faster as it went through the bore rather than going to full spin from standing start.

Also the Pope barrels had a twist that was backwards from the norm as he felt this worked better for some reason I have never completely had explained to me.

This was all off the top of my head and real Pope afficianados may wish to jump in with additions or corrections, but at least it begins to answer MartiniBelgian's question.

HTH, Froggie

Left handed rifling torques the cheek rest away from the shooter.  A very limited number of authentic Pope style rifled barrels have been made on the original equipment in modern times (Ziggy where are you?). Due to the rifling methods used by Pope I would have to say that modern manufacturing techiques still would not best (probably equal) them for barrel to barrel consistancy.  Although not for the faint hearted full blown Pope muzzle loading gain-twist blank should cost at least $1k (and maybe significantly more) considering the 40 to 80 hours of time involved in using the original fabrication methods.  One important factor is that the Pope methods allows a great flexibility in start, end, midpoint, and other twist (form) related parameters.  Someday these will be available again from the private sector however we need to encourage the gentlemen to complete his facility and start taking orders.   

Sorry (Z)...... But i couldn't help myself.

The way I see this explained, this is more or less the original design Henry rifling BUT with taper and gaintwist.
FWIW, The original Henry rifling was almost never made as such, the concave part (bottom center) of the grooves being rather hard to produce accurately in large quantities...

pope and alex henry used virtually identical rifling styles. henry prefering the odd number of lands and grooves, [7], and pope the even number,[8]. they employed a completely flat cutter as opposed to one that follows the radius of the bore as todays conventional rifling does. this means the corners of the cutter start cutting first and work their way inwards until the cutter touches right at the apex of the bore's radius. kind of like dragging a hoe through a furrow with a radiused bottom, the corners will engage first until the hoe eventully bottoms out in the trough.....get it??? it also employs a wide cutter that leave a "pyramid" shaped land with a very narrow top, [approx. .015" wide]. this style of rifling worked well in muzzleloading form where paper patching is employed. pope also used a gain twist where as henry employed a constant twist....1:20 inches, i believe. both of these had a degree of taper to the bore as they would have been most likely "square" reamed, [ the most common method of the day], which produced a choke to the bore due to the shim wearing as the reamer was pulled or pushed through the bore. although popes barrels were very good, they are not necessarily better than that of george schoyen, a contemporary of pope. some believe that the gain was more of a "gimmick" of sorts to set pope apart. it was hard to reproduce, therefore giving pope a "mental" edge if nothing else. no slam on mr. pope, he certainly knew his salt...thanks..blue

I most disagree The differences between Pope and Henery rifeling are numerous. An illistration of both is in Roberts book Muzzle Loading Target Rifles. The differences are:
a.) The lands in Pope rifleing are thinner than Henery.
b.) The grooves in Pope rifleing are curved to the inside so that the high point of the curve supports the bullet.
c.) Most Popes were made with a gain twist. Henery rifleing is uniform twist. 
d.) The lands are generally much more pronounced in Henery rifleing.
e.) Pope rifleing is left hand twist Henery is right.
In general Henery rifleing has more in common with Metford rifleing than Pope.

40 Rod

If we were to assume that Pope's Rifling was better than others we could also assume that barrel makers would be making barrels on the Pope system.  The best shooting rifles we have today the 6PPC and 30BR do not use barrels that are gain twist or choke bored or even cut rifled I know its another ball game [modern benchrest] but if these type barrels were better we can be sure thats what they would be making. A good shooting barrel is a good shooting barrel.
                                                 leadball

Gentlemen - I have been following this thread with some interest - please let me quote from the book "Respectfully yours, H. M. Pope" Compiled & edited by Gerald O. Kelver fome some of Mr. Popes personal corespondence.
"The Pope system, so called, is, as previously stated, nearly the same as the Schalk, the difference being the shape of the cut, and that my barrels are cut to the correct shape, while Mr. Schalk's were leaded.  Mr. Scchalk's rifling had eight flat grooves and eight narrow lands, with sharp corners to lands.  My rifling has eight wide groves, which are on a radius about three times the radius of the bore, and has the corners rounded out, so dirt is easier removed, and it is cleaner to use.  This groove is cut just deep enoughto clean the bore in the center and give a depth at the corners of about .004 inch, which is about one-half depth of the Schalk, but which is of ample depth, and works cleaner, and leaves less to depend on the upset of the of the bullet, and is therefore more reliable."  There it is from the words of the "master" himself - you don't have to believe it - but he did.

Repectfully to all,  rimfire

For anyone who has the book The Muzzleloading Cap Lock Rifle by Roberts, on page 28 There are illistrations of 7 different types of rifleing. Center row far right shows a profile of Henery rifleing. Third row far right shows Pope's rifleing profile.The differences between the two seen aparent to me. Then you add the fact that Henery is a uniform twist with an odd number of grooves and Pope is gain twist with 8 grooves. The only thing they have in common is they are sperial grooved tubeing.
As far as Kreiger's advertising lumping Pope Shalk and Henery rifleing togeather to me is like saying all cars are the same because they have wheels. While Pope used Shalk's rifleing as a starting point he changed the profile to inprove the Shalk gain twist system.
As far as I know Kreiger makes a wonderful barrel but all their barrels are uniform twist which excludes them from being either the Pope or Shalk systems let alown the differences in the rifleing profile.

40 Rod

Unfortunatly me picture Juu Juu is bad on this site I have tried in the past and failed every time.
I can't be the only guy with this book. How bout a hand out there.

40 Rod