Why don't Air Arms make break barrels?

[oneseven]

You are speaking purely personally. You may well be prepared to buy one but that doesn't make it a viable business proposition. The market is crowded AND their history with the PE will make them extra cautious.
AA have limited production space and choose to use that in making higher added value PCPs'.
Don't get me wrong-if they made a break barrel I'd certainly look to buy one too but I won't be holding my breath.

Sure, but you'd agree that if they start to hear more demand for a particular gun they will be more likely to produce one. I still think it's a huge gap in their product range, a break barrel should be a staple for them. If people start emailing they might wake up to it.

[Clanchief]

It's possible they could do a run of 100 modded by them from a first company spec. A bit like when SFS bought 50 Longbows from Venom to turn into a SFS Phantom, even back then the run finished at thirty purchased as interest faded, thankfully I have one of the left twenty.

Perhaps AA or a custom tuning house could purchase 100 95's from Hans and re spec them in house and re stock them to a one off run of a tidy spec' d break barrel.

The custom house or AA would still be shelling out 40k for a gamble of what kind of mark up and turn around on your outlay, marketing and investment ?

Perhaps a pipe dream but what about a pay up front bbs boinger special, if you want one sign up and pay up to a custom house 100% of the estimated final cost, they will then source the suggested spec items and assemble to the design spec, only once the final true cost has been established and final payments made would the new one off rifles be able to be owned by the new individual of the collective.

There may be a minimal run that the first supplier Hans could do so maybe 30 to make it worthwhile for the U.K. gunmaker to assemble and turn out, kinda like MG of days gone by.

This may be the only way to see a limited run of a Break Barrel anytime soon.

[Geezer]

I fear it is a pipe dream, however appealing.

Back when springers ruled in the 80s, there were at least a dozen places offering high end custom jobs, varying from just bunging a stock action in a CS stock and making vague claims that they had "tuned" it, to the full-on Venom and Airmasters stuff.

Now, V-Mach is basically Steve Pope. And there's SFS, Wonky, and that's about it. Because the same sort of person who in 1985 wanted a Mastersport 77 now wants a Daystate or a Steyr or an FWB FT rifle.

Worse, a lot of the real tuned springer lovers, many of whom are on here, have worked out that, if you are mechanically handy, you can equal or exceed the custom shop work in your own shed for less money.

We might all say on a thread that we'd buy a new super break barrel, but in practice how many of us in the real world would stump up 500 actual quids for something that is no better than a tuned HW (which we probably own more than one of already)?

[look no hands]

It's possible they could do a run of 100 modded by them from a first company spec. A bit like when SFS bought 50 Longbows from Venom to turn into a SFS Phantom, even back then the run finished at thirty purchased as interest faded, thankfully I have one of the left twenty.

Perhaps AA or a custom tuning house could purchase 100 95's from Hans and re spec them in house and re stock them to a one off run of a tidy spec' d break barrel.

The custom house or AA would still be shelling out 40k for a gamble of what kind of mark up and turn around on your outlay, marketing and investment ?

Perhaps a pipe dream but what about a pay up front bbs boinger special, if you want one sign up and pay up to a custom house 100% of the estimated final cost, they will then source the suggested spec items and assemble to the design spec, only once the final true cost has been established and final payments made would the new one off rifles be able to be owned by the new individual of the collective.

There may be a minimal run that the first supplier Hans could do so maybe 30 to make it worthwhile for the U.K. gunmaker to assemble and turn out, kinda like MG of days gone by.

This may be the only way to see a limited run of a Break Barrel anytime soon.

Well the amount of interest I didn't have when selling my custom HW95 (it's sold now) probably proves that people want other things, when ever anyone puts up a "what rifle" thread, instantly you get HW99 or 95 mentioned by 80% of the replies, so I found it a little strange that there wasn't much more interest in mine considering mine was how a lot of peoples end up like, if you were to add up the total cost of getting my rifle into the tuned and customised state it was in would cost you well over £800 if you bought everything separately (not sure if a custom house could do it for less) now that sold for £270 plus post (£300 posted in the end), now yes I agree with you lot who are shaking their heads in dismay and disgust (I can actually see TonyL pulling his hair out) that I must be a bit bonkers to sell on such a lovely rifle but I have a strange way of doing things, now at the end of the day if AA did a few custom 95's that all it's going to be, it will still be a custom 95 with a fetteling from AA, no different that what V-mach, SFS or Wonky does, now all the tuning info that gets put up on here about short transfer ports and short stroking etc, AA would have to produce a rifle with all of those things perfectly (to not get any criticism from Jon Budd) now if they do that with a bought in 95 then it will still have the same specs as a 95 (unless they really go the full hog and reduce the length of the transfer port and make proper pistons to get the right swept volume but that cost a lot of time and money), what ever gets made needs to be made from scratch with everything designed in on the drawing board.

Pete

[Taz72]

Well the amount of interest I didn't have when selling my custom HW95 (it's sold now) probably proves that people want other things, when ever anyone puts up a "what rifle" thread, instantly you get HW99 or 95 mentioned by 80% of the replies, so I found it a little strange that there wasn't much more interest in mine considering mine was how a lot of peoples end up like

Pete

For what it's worth, I don't think yours was necessarily through lack of interest: I'd have bought it in a heartbeat and saw the ad and your mentioning on the other thread.
I simply didn't have the money to hand because of other expenses over Christmas and the fact that I've had to tone down my airgun purchases lately. No point blowing smoke up a seller's whatsits and replying too say how lovely something is if you're shopping with no money.. .

I suspect that maybe other potential buyers were the same boat.


On the AA break barrel, as mentioned on the thread they have allegedly had a break barrel on the back burner for ages. No great shock there - they make airguns and the break barrel springer is the most obvious and common format of any of them. They already have the manufacturing and purchasing connections in place to do it, so it can only be that they don't see enough money in it at present.

How the prospect of an air rifle manufacturer making a decent variant of the most common format of air rifle can't be viable has me baffled, but then I used to work in the niche side of the car industry at one point, and many times we had similar questions being asked by customers, with "you should do such and such" or "why don't you make a so and so".

But in some circumstances even well regarded, well known companies aren't quite as flush as the marketing blurb would have you believe and if you sink a few thousand quid into getting tooled up and new production, you have to be damn sure that you're going to get a return on it pretty sharpish. The current economic climate is no place to be playing fast and loose with new products that need money throwing at them.

Having said that, they've seen fit to throw out the Ill fated 510TC, and the collectors-only RSN70, so who knows?...

[Trumpetier]

I agree with Pete. I've sold a few 95,s in the past and considering how popular they are supposed to be, they do seem to struggle to sell sometimes.

[tinbum]

I agree with Pete. I've sold a few 95,s in the past and considering how popular they are supposed to be, they do seem to struggle to sell sometimes.

Unless its to you.

[Trumpetier]

Unless its to you.

Hee Hee might be getting another on Saturday

[Muskett]

Gun trade for air rifles starts when the sun comes out. Its not sunny right now
Lot of 95's sold so a lot already have them. Your custom tune isn't someone else's custom tune. I have one and unlikely to get another, lovely rifle, lovely weight, one of the best triggers going, good looking furniture, not sure what could be improved. Even the price isn't outrageous though tuning adds a heft to the end price. Mine was second hand with an in house V-Mach tune already done and cost the same as a factory boxed new; I didn't take the hit. Once invested, job done.

AA would need to be as smooth, as good in every department. Room for more lovely wood, room for deeper bluing. Not much more to add, the rest would be price. Have to look absolutely fantastic and shoot fantastic too. Who knows they might have one in design, but would they make it? The risk possibly too high at present??

[Rapidnick]

Sure, but you'd agree that if they start to hear more demand for a particular gun they will be more likely to produce one. I still think it's a huge gap in their product range, a break barrel should be a staple for them. If people start emailing they might wake up to it.

Certainly but they would probably resist. My experience with AA involving the non availability of a left handed Pro Sport leads me to remain sceptical. Bear in mind that the PE was a failure whereas the TX and Pro Sport have been good sellers.