BSA recoilless air rifle

[Vic Thompson]

A rambling thread : I was reading the "Airsporter" thread a few mins ago and it struck chords in my memory as when I first started to become interested in old air guns whenever I picked up a BSA that was either slightly different to others that I'd seen or had bits missing that I didn't have a pattern for, I'd phone up BSA and speak to their technical staff and they'd be very obliging in providing information including technical drawings (Blueprints etc) that I'd use to make replacement parts from. One person that I bored endlessly was Roger Wackrow who never failed to spend endless periods on the phone with me talking about BSA's development of post war Air Rifles, including the Airsporter series (information now long forgotten by me unfortunately). Anyway, the Airsporter thread triggered a memory, so I googled R W and found the following reference in John Walters "Guns and Gunmakers" (only the interesting (to me) part provided : British Patent no. 1428027 was sought on 6th April 1973 to protect the ill-fated BSA recoilless air rifle.

I've eventually got to the point of this posting, my memory has let me down, what's was the "BSA recoilless air rifle", as nothing obviously springs to mind in my case.

Thanks, Vic Thompson.

[I. J.]

Of a similar vein - what about all those weird and wonderful Webley recoilless rifle prototypes that appeared in the Wallis & Wallis (2006) auction? Several were bought by the owner of Target Sports in Bolton and, as I worked ( ) there part time, I had the pleasure of playing with several of these plus other weird guns. For example there was a pre charged rifle that you filled by inserting the probe into the end of the barrel. It took us a while to figure that one out. Then there was the prototype Omega (which eventually came home with me) a adjustable gas rammed Omega and Vulcan (again they found their way into my gun room ) but I could never afford the recoilless rifles. Many went back into another auction (Holts?) a few years later when the shop closed.
I still have the catalogue from the W & W auction.

ATB
Ian

[Shed tuner]

BSA - was it sledge or opposed piston ?

I can see the airsporter being a reasonable starting point for a sledge type gun, much like the TX200 and the SR...

[Airsporter1st]

At risk of diverting the thread, I well remember how obliging BSA were when you contacted them. In the early 60s, I was contemplating a summer holiday of shooting my Airsporter, when horror of horrors, my trigger spring broke.

We were one of the few households in our street to have a telephone and in desperation, I rang BSA. The gent I spoke to was very sympathetic and promised to put some springs in the post FOC. They arrived next day. Wonderful service, which I never forgot.

[junglie]

I havn't seen any recoiless prototypes by bsa, but I remember their exellent customer service well.I was asked to fettle a meteor mk1 a pal of my dads had that woudn't cock in the late 70's & it needed a trigger sear.I wrote to bsa to ask if they had any & price & recieved one the next week foc in the post.What a difference to when my sons R10 had to be fixed by them a few years ago.

[I. J.]

In contrast to the good BSA service. I once had a Airsporter which I bought brand new from M/c Air Guns. It was the first .177 rifle I had owned and was amazed at how little hold over you had to give target at long ranges using open sights. I put this down to the wonders of .177. It was only when I came to fit a scope and couldn't zero it that I noticed the barrel had an upswept bend. I took it back to M/c Air Guns who sent it back to the factory () Several weeks later it returned and the only thing they had done was bend the barrel back down. It was like a dogs back leg. It was returned again, and again, several weeks later a new action, with no serial number, came back. That was fine.

ATB
Ian