I've had to bend several barrel to get them shootin true, and the first lesson i learned was that it takes a whole lot more pressure than you'd think, at first. I used a 20 ton press and a dial indicator to measure my progress. I was shocked at how much movement it took to gain results. Sometime as much as 7to1. Modern barrel are so much stronger than the old wives tales would have use believe. The "spring back" in our steel today is phenomenal. Bending barrels is not for the "faint of heart", but then, shootin smoothbores isn't either. We are a nation of rifleman, and will always be! Smoothie shooters are a separate state, er state of mind. And must be approached as such. A local, now defunct, club had for decades reigned supreme in the smoothbore community. Many of it's member's using original Curly Gostomsky Old Northwest gun's. They/We all understood the difference, and the fact that we're in the minority. Using the term's accuracy and smoothbore in the same sentence was simply silly. Kinda like Indy vs. Nascar. Same game, different rules. If'n when ya'll step over that line into the world of smoothie's, ya gotta understand it's a whole nother world, hell, it's a whole nother planet. It took me almost 3 yrs to figure it out, but then again, i'm a slow learner. Since then, I've became a better rifleman because of it. And a better smoothie shooter as well. All that has changed is my expectations. It's hard to fight an uphill battle if'n ya don't know what's at the top. My retrospect; Buzzard