Baikal IJ-38m;advice needed please

[harry palmer]

Hello folks;-I`ve just picked up a much neglected but complete IJ-38m for a tenner (marked "made in U.S.S.R.).The rifle shoots really well ,-I`ve put a JSR 6x32 AO scope on it and I`m getting one hole ragged groups at 10 and 15 metres ,but I`m wondering what power it should be doing.

I`ve got a new leather piston seal and a suitable spring from (T.W. Chambers http://www.gunspares.co.uk/shopdispl...24282&cat=IJ38 ) ,but I don`t want to take it down for nothing if the 5 ft/lbs it is already doing is typical.

Incidentally, this little rifle is really well made and solid, the external look of it does not do justice to how well it is put together inside and the trigger ain`t bad either!.

Any thoughts or help would be appreciated!

Take care

Kenny.

[Phil Russell]

I had an IJ 38 many many years ago. If I remember correctly you should get about 8ft lbs out of it, possibly a tad more but do not expect much more. Mine came with a spare spring and piston seal.
Cheers, Phil

[ggggr]

A lovely gun. Bearing in mind that the later Baikal 512 was being sold off by our host in 2007 for £35 and was quoted as 5.5lb, I would not expect the Ij to do much more. However, I picked up an Ij a couple of years ago that looked like it had the original mainspring, a lovely, fat , plenty of coils job that was lovely to shoot. guess this was doing the 5.5 to 6 ft lb. When I got another later one with a knackered spring, I tried a couple of other mainsprings in it. guess the first one was doing 9ft lb but felt a little bit harsh and the 2nd on about 8ftlb and still a little harsh but not worth stripping again as it was not bad at all. I think both springs were Webley Hawk diameter and fairly sure a Meteor one will fit. If you are not killing things with it and it shoots ok, then I would just strip and lube it. I did a strip down on the "idiots guide" sticky at the top of the page. 1st dibs if you decide to sell it----form a queue lads----we all know you want one

[dave8352]

I had one, bought it about 1987 for 25 quid brand new, i thought at the time it was rubbish, as it seemed underpowered.

Looking back it was actually nicely finished and well made, if i remember it was about the same power (tele directory test) as a webley Jaguar, which is a low powered junior rifle

[Iain K D]

Some actual measurements at the time (this is in a book dating from 1987) give muzzle velocities up to about 500 ft/s, equating to muzzle energies of between 4 and 5 ft.lb.

This, as is pointed out, is in spite of advertising claiming the gun to be 'powerful' with velocities 'up to 700 ft/s.'

It's possible that the results were obtained with brand new guns for test with whatever basic, slopped-in, lubrication regime the Russian factory had applied, and which could probably be improved upon, but I still wouldn't expect too much from it.

Iain

[harry palmer]

A lovely gun. Bearing in mind that the later Baikal 512 was being sold off by our host in 2007 for £35 and was quoted as 5.5lb, I would not expect the Ij to do much more. However, I picked up an Ij a couple of years ago that looked like it had the original mainspring, a lovely, fat , plenty of coils job that was lovely to shoot. guess this was doing the 5.5 to 6 ft lb. When I got another later one with a knackered spring, I tried a couple of other mainsprings in it. guess the first one was doing 9ft lb but felt a little bit harsh and the 2nd on about 8ftlb and still a little harsh but not worth stripping again as it was not bad at all. I think both springs were Webley Hawk diameter and fairly sure a Meteor one will fit. If you are not killing things with it and it shoots ok, then I would just strip and lube it. I did a strip down on the "idiots guide" sticky at the top of the page. 1st dibs if you decide to sell it----form a queue lads----we all know you want one

Thanks everybody,-I`ve found GGGR`s guide and it`s brilliant!.I bought a Titan XS mainspring no TS07[ which fits the Webley Hawk,HW30s and other lower powered stuff] ,which Chambers shows as an alternative to the unavailable original ,so we`ll try it first with a lube before I go as far as changing the leather piston seal.

Thanks for the replies

Take care everybody

Kenny