What is the "crown" of a rifle barrel?

Question

I hear about it more on ar-15's but what is it?

Answer 1

as already stated, the crown is at the exit end of the barrel and is the final point that the projectile touches the barrel.
as you know, the rifling spins the bullet to cause it to have a flight path much like a quarterback throwing a football
you have seen tight spirals and you have seen wobbly passes. the way that the ball leaves the fingertips controls the spiral.
the rifling inside the barrel causes the spin , the crown is designed to release the bullet from the rifling at the same instant on all surfaces, thus keeping it from being thrown into a less than desirable " wobbly pass".
this is one reason why it is inportant to run cleaning rods from the chamber to the end of the muzzle instead of inserting the rod fron the muzzle end which may damage the crown, thus depleting accuracy

Answer 2

The crown of a rifle barrel is the found at the end where the bullet exits. All guns have crowns. As someone already mentioned, the crown is the last part of the gun to touch the bullet before it is sent into the air. Any imperfections in the crown can be detrimental to accuracy, especially at longer ranges. Typically, for that reason, most crowns are tapered or recessed on heavy barrels to help prevent dings and other such things that could cause a bullet to yaw or drift excessively.

Answer 3

Since the crown is the last part of the barrel that the projectile touches before flying on it's own, it's likely the most important and critical single point on a firearm.

A precision crown will keep the projectile flying as straight and true as possible, while an inprecise, damaged or misshaped crown will cause horrible accuracy problems.

Since the crown is at the end of the barrel, it's often one of the most exposed and fragile parts of the gun too.

Answer 4

A barrel crown is the tapered end of the muzzle.
http://yarchive.net/gun/barrel/barrel_crowning.html

Here's a picture

http://www.staffordsales.com/boyd-crown.jpg

Answer 5

The crown usually refers to the radius put on the muzzle of a barrel.