Guns of youth--Which ones?

[keith66]

First gun was a Bsa meteor super, second was a FWB sport one of the first imported, i got it back of my dad recently, i must find the time to sort it out!
Also got a nice Crossman1300 medallist pistol the other gun of my youth!

[Martin(rockape)]

Cannot remember the name of my first air rifle albeit that it was a break barrel, probably a cheap import ? but the rifle that I always associate with my youth was a .22 BSA Airsporter which I bought around 1975 76 ish.

I sold it to my dad a good few years ago to help buy a fly rod, a tactical sale there as i know that he will not get rid of it and will come bouncing back to me.

In fact this christmas I bought my dad a set of hawke scopes for it to replace the bsa 4x20's which still work.


Regards

Martin

[ralphfcooke]

My first gun was, I believe, an old Haenel, 0.177 break barrel, but with an interlock at the joint to help the alignment, don't know which model but I think it might have been prewar. I got this from a secondhand shop when I was about 12, must have been 1963. A couple of years later I used my dad's lathe to machine out the back of the barrel to take a 0.22 short blank, which I fired by means of a steel rod fitted in the transfer port, nowadays it makes me shudder to think about it! The main problem was that it used to rip the heads off the pellets but leave the skirts in the breech. I was totally inaccurate but great fun.
At the ripe old age of 15 I bought a brand new Diana Mod 50, with the full length stock. I had great fun with that gun for a couple of years but eventually sold it to help get enough money together for my first car. Since coming back to air rifles almost 40 years later I'm still on the lookout for a good .177 Mod 50.

[ggggr]

Having got a couple of paratroopers recently, Im pretty pleased that I didnt buy one new in the 70,s. NO THEY WONT GO THROUGH A MILK BOTTLE WITHOUT SMASHING IT OR SMASH A WINDOW AT 200 YARDS. (this is just an opinion--I havent been trying it officer).

[silva]

I'm a bit lucky in that I still own every gun I've ever had.

I started shooting as soon as I was able to pick up my dad's MK2 Airsporter.
When I was eleven he bought me a brand new Hawk Mk2 for Christmas.
Then I bought a Meteor for £2 off a mate at school, and I just carried on buying.

I seem to have collected all my family's shotguns as well.




In the early Eighties I stopped shooting for a while to concentrate on Beaver hunting.
Unfortunately this period in time coincided with some of the greatest advances in airgun technology and design, so I missed out on a few guns which I should have bought at the time.

I still have a couple of guns on my wish list but I'm sure I'll be able to buy them one day so all is not lost.


All the best Mick

"In the early Eighties I stopped shooting for a while to concentrate on Beaver hunting. "

Yes, as a young dog I sold all my hard earnt childhood airguns to help fund the werewithall for daft eighties clothes,
pernods and blacks and vodkas and orange.
To be honest it was money very well spent - you can always buy another ropey old meteor, hw80 or ensign elite but you can never again sup at that delicious distant elixear of youth !
Got me thinking about selling off various treasures, while I still have time to fund a mid life crisis !

[MrGreengrass]

as a matter of interest,which guns from your youth would you like to have now? I suppose one criteria is if you saw one at a reasonable price in used condition in a shop window,that you would buy it on a sort of whim. Did you have one as a youth or was it something you just fancied trying? I wanted a webley mk 3 but as they had stopped making them a few years before and i couldnt afford one as they were about 1 1/2 times the price of a new airsporter. I always fancied a bsa merlin after reading about them in airgun world. Also a cadet major. I have actually got one of each now and do enjoy them.
I remember paratroopers were highly regarded (usually by the kn--heads) and jackals were on the wanted list(there was a sussex armoury shop in manchester) but i never really wanted those although a paratrooper is on my list to try now. Up here,milbro/diana,s were never really sort after but having tried a g36 and the older diana 25,s i quite like them.
Any how--over to you lot.

bsf 55 luxus .22
webley senior .22
crosman 140 .22

[maximus otter]

My treasured old BSA Meteor Super, serial number TE 31xxx, bought for me on my 14th birthday from Gallyons in Cambridge.

It is now - unbelievably - 40 years old! At a conservative estimate it's had 50,000 pellets through it. The total could easily be a multiple of that.

I'm in the - very slow - process of doing it up.

I can't wait to crack open one of those lovely sky-blue tins of .22 Eley Wasps and start rattling cans around over iron sights.

maximus otter

[Microtia]

My treasured old BSA Meteor Super, serial number TE 31xxx, bought for me on my 14th birthday from Gallyons in Cambridge.

It is now - unbelievably - 40 years old! At a conservative estimate it's had 50,000 pellets through it. The total could easily be a multiple of that.

I'm in the - very slow - process of doing it up.

I can't wait to crack open one of those lovely sky-blue tins of .22 Eley Wasps and start rattling cans around over iron sights.

maximus otter

I had a Meteor at age 14, and eventually used it to shoot loads and loads of collared doves, rats and woodpigeons for a farmer a few miles away. In retrospect it couldn't have been putting out more than about 8-9ft lb in .22, but it killed many, many pigeons out to about 30yds. Superb summer days, with an old BSA 4X20 scope on top..

[cambrai1917]

Mine was a Slavia back in the mid 60's. Don't remember the exact model but I do recall it being a beauty.
Calibre .177, break barrel - accurate as I could ever need!
No scopes of any note available then (not to me)!
That didn't matter as my eyes were then capable of using the iron sights!
Bought it from the Exchange & Mart for about 20 shillings (I think?).
I think my parents had to sign a type of disclaimer to say I was over 14 years of age!
How things have changed!!

[fighterG]

mine was an old pumpmaster 760 it was rusty very rusty but it worked it was my dads as he was a kid

[westy1946]

My first shared gun with my mate was a .177 "MILETTA" break barrell. It cost us 5 shillings and you could watch the pellet drop out the end of the barrel.
My mate worked part time at a butchers shop and his gaffer had the gun away to his mates who done it up for us, and what a job he done, he charged us 3 shillings for his expertise. He tightened every thing down and resolved the power crisis and it shot spot on with the open sights. I would love to know the energy output that gun was doing, it really had a kick to it. Although I say it myself we were very careful with it we did not shoot it all over the place, infact we only ever took it out to where we went fishing and that was a deep cut canal in Warwickshire, and never had any probs with the law or local people or shot at any birds (HONEST)

[harry mac]

I've still got the first 3 air guns I ever owned. A Webley Hawk MkII bought for my 11th birthday, a Crosman 1300 bought me for christmas the same year and a Jackal AR7 bought from the Spotsman in Paignton when on holiday in Torquay one year.
The first airgun I ever bought for my self was a BSA Mercury S in 177 calibre that accounted for rats, rabbits and pigeons by the boat load. The Mercury S, along with a big chunk of my collection was sold to buy furniture for my first house just 8 years ago. If any one has Mercury S 177 serial number WH01266 let me know, I'd like to buy it back.

[christy]

When I was 11 I had a Webley Falcon. I used to share it with a gunless mate. One day he cocked it and snapped the rudy barrel clean orf. I was soo close to punching his lights out. It took about 6 months to get sorted at a local gun shop and 9 squid which was a fortune.
Best youth gun was a MK2 Airsporter.

[Gambo]

My first was a Webley Osprey in .22, which I still have! Most of my mates had meteors,hawks etc, but if You had a Vulcan, Airsporter, or Mercury, then You were considered to be "King Dick".

[jmsniper]

webley with interchangable barrels my first ever gun,cant remember which model it was great gun though