Having done so much shed tuning / sleaving / chopping / engineering "corrections"...

[Shed tuner]

... I now want to get my hands on some old guns from my youth and make then shoot decent !

Pretty well done this with my meteor (11.2 FP and sweet with it's HW sealed head), and my ASI Center pistol (reduced TP), but there's quite a few I want to get my hands on....

- Airsporter, ideally an RB2. Have great hopes here
- FWB sport (but I have two, and can't bring myself to do anything too drastic beyond a port tickle and piston diet, so would have to find a real old dog of a gun)
- Annie 335
- Hw35
- AA sidelever

[hmangphilly]

original 50 would be a challenge .

someone had quite a go at one of these a few months ago ..how did that turn out ?

[landymick]

A HW35 better than they do already,that would be nice.
Just put a synthetic seal on a Vixen as the leather seal although looked good would not work,it is now full power.

[bigtoe01]

HW35's are easy, thorough clean, seal the breech, reduce TP dia to 2.6 to 2.8mm if a 4mm one, drop a new seal on and they shoot well. All the vixen had that was remotely special was a sealed breech, everything else done was cosmetic imo.

To give an actual example, I sealed up a 35 Lux a few yrs back now, 9fpe at best, sealed breech with same spring was doing 13+ (gun is .177) I shortened the spring, installed new guides, vortek piston and breech seals and cleaned/relubed the trigger...took 1 hr to rebuild and test once the breech had been sealed over night. It was one of the nicest shooting stock 35's I have done...sweet as you like.

No fancy chromed piston and spring...not needed

To see the ultimate 35 have a look at T20's build thread....now thats a HW35 and some.

[TonyL]

HW35's are easy, thorough clean, seal the breech, reduce TP dia to 2.6 to 2.8mm if a 4mm one, drop a new seal on and they shoot well. All the vixen had that was remotely special was a sealed breech, everything else done was cosmetic imo.

To give an actual example, I sealed up a 35 Lux a few yrs back now, 9fpe at best, sealed breech with same spring was doing 13+ (gun is .177) I shortened the spring, installed new guides, vortek piston and breech seals and cleaned/relubed the trigger...took 1 hr to rebuild and test once the breech had been sealed over night. It was one of the nicest shooting stock 35's I have done...sweet as you like.

No fancy chromed piston and spring...not needed

To see the ultimate 35 have a look at T20's build thread....now thats a HW35 and some.

Agreed.

[landymick]

The Vixen also had the spring made to fit the standard guide properly it was also longer with more coils & smaller diameter wire,the T.P was also opened up from 3mm to 3.6mm some were 3.5mm.
So not all just cosmetic but back then changing to smaller diameter springs was fairly new.

[NickG]

HW35's are easy, thorough clean, seal the breech, reduce TP dia to 2.6 to 2.8mm if a 4mm one, drop a new seal on and they shoot well. All the vixen had that was remotely special was a sealed breech, everything else done was cosmetic imo.

To give an actual example, I sealed up a 35 Lux a few yrs back now, 9fpe at best, sealed breech with same spring was doing 13+ (gun is .177) I shortened the spring, installed new guides, vortek piston and breech seals and cleaned/relubed the trigger...took 1 hr to rebuild and test once the breech had been sealed over night. It was one of the nicest shooting stock 35's I have done...sweet as you like.

No fancy chromed piston and spring...not needed

To see the ultimate 35 have a look at T20's build thread....now thats a HW35 and some.

just been handed an early 35 to fettle for a mate,, Its a mess at the minute, painted barrel rust ox spring etc, do you seal the breech with Loctite, I was thinking of sleeving down to 25mm, as this woulkd ensure a good seal, but not sure if its worth the trouble, its a .22

[TonyL]

just been handed an early 35 to fettle for a mate,, Its a mess at the minute, painted barrel rust ox spring etc, do you seal the breech with Loctite, I was thinking of sleeving down to 25mm, as this woulkd ensure a good seal, but not sure if its worth the trouble, its a .22

I think BigT used to use JB Weld, but then moved to a Loctite product....no doubt he'll be along soon to advise.

As regards sleeving, if you think the gun is worth the effort, I'm sure the results would be very pleasing.

Not sure how you'd re-configure the cocking shoe "horn", but Tone or Mick'll be able to advise on that, too.

[Hsing-ee]

just been handed an early 35 to fettle for a mate,, Its a mess at the minute, painted barrel rust ox spring etc, do you seal the breech with Loctite, I was thinking of sleeving down to 25mm, as this woulkd ensure a good seal, but not sure if its worth the trouble, its a .22

Nah, its not worth the trouble. Just seal the breech and rebuild with standard spring etc... maybe some fitted guides if you have a lathe.

[TonyL]

... I now want to get my hands on some old guns from my youth and make then shoot decent !

Pretty well done this with my meteor (11.2 FP and sweet with it's HW sealed head), and my ASI Center pistol (reduced TP), but there's quite a few I want to get my hands on....

- Airsporter, ideally an RB2. Have great hopes here
- FWB sport (but I have two, and can't bring myself to do anything too drastic beyond a port tickle and piston diet, so would have to find a real old dog of a gun)
- Annie 335
- Hw35
- AA sidelever

Knowing how nice that Meteor of yours shoots, I'm sure that these would all be worthwhile and intriguing projects.

Relative scarcity of some of these may present a problem, though. The HW35 and Airsporter (tap version) would be the more plentiful and also available in varying degrees of condition, from mint to total knackerbags. The 35, with the Rekord trigger and super-solid breech lock would be less of a challenge, as they can be lovely even with just a minor fettle, but the project would lend itself nicely to reduced stroke or bore. All been done before, but I'm sure you could refine it to your tastes.

As you say, I can imagine your reluctance to perform major surgery to a real nice example of the FWB, and I think the same would have to apply to that classy little gem, the 335. I think really nice examples are better left unmolested.

Of the tap loaders, although you will, no doubt, get them shooting much nicer and more efficiently, ultimate accuracy may be harder to come by, just depends on your goals.

A shorter rotary breech project would be very intriguing!

How about a Mercury to play with, too? Similar power plant to the underlever, but with direct to breech loading. They can be very nice. And with your skills, and the excellent result with the Meteor in mind, could turn out pretty awesome. Reduced piston weight and stroke. And not too shabby a trigger, too.

[NickG]

... I now want to get my hands on some old guns from my youth and make then shoot decent !

Pretty well done this with my meteor (11.2 FP and sweet with it's HW sealed head), and my ASI Center pistol (reduced TP), but there's quite a few I want to get my hands on....

- Airsporter, ideally an RB2. Have great hopes here
- FWB sport (but I have two, and can't bring myself to do anything too drastic beyond a port tickle and piston diet, so would have to find a real old dog of a gun)
- Annie 335
- Hw35
- AA sidelever

There is a bloke on face book selling a tx and throwing a side lever in with the deal

[hmangphilly]

how about a bsa scorpion pistol . ....

or any pistol of that era come to that .fwb 65 not allowed

[Shed tuner]

how about a bsa scorpion pistol . ....

Funnily enough I do have one I rather like.. I long stroked it a while ago, but I can think of plenty more sophisticated improvements.. good call, that's one for the list...

[ggggr]

Funnily enough I do have one I rather like.. I long stroked it a while ago, but I can think of plenty more sophisticated improvements.. good call, that's one for the list...

Re the Scorpion pistol, I would be quite interested to see what a tuner got out of one of these, stroked and with a steel (O ring) piston head, before any other tuning mods and then detuning. Any triggr mods would be interesting

How about a Webley Tempest like was asking about months ago? With a shorter stroke I know that you lose some power but eliminate (well it just feels like it) recoil. I am in favour of taking about 3 coils off the mainspring of these for ease of cocking. If you could do that and get the power up a little, I would be very interested in how you did it.

[Shed tuner]

Power is no problem for the scorpion with a decent seal. Not got a tempest, but the layout seems reasonably capable of power (like an HW45), so it might just be internal design issues that are hurting it... no promises, but if one turns up for pocket money, I may invest...