Remington Express - Titan #1 Spring Length

[venoman]

I'm surprised anyone has problems with this rifle being underpowered.
Mine came new, warranted as sub 12 fpe, but was 13 fpe in standard trim.
The dimensions of the mechanicals confirm it is capable of much more
As I was putting in a tune kit anyway, I just took it as a good sign that it was put together ok.
One area that might make a little difference to power and consistency is the breach seal.
Its often a poor fit in that it doesn't stand proud enough to make a good & consistent seal.
The shim that sits under breach seal from a Diana model 34 works, though I have another rifle with the same breach type and made one that fits just as well.
A standard 2.5mm c/s x 8.5mm ID "O" ring works fine as a replacement breach seal
The "O" ring is then pennies to replace and as often as you like.
The piston seal can be replaced with any 28mm Diana type 28mm seal, so you have a choice from Diana, Vortex, Customairseals, Maccari Large Apex etc.
I chopped the barrel to 13 inches and added a V-Mach slip-on silencer (expensive but very nice).
I re-crowned with a conical grindstone in a hand drill.
The accuracy with JSB Exact 5.52 is outstanding.
The tune kit is by Welshwilly which includes a top-hat, guide & spring and power bands.
I assume the spring is a Titan, but as to which one, I dunno.
There is very little preload to easily achieve 11+fpe
Lastly, Venoman off of here does a very nice setback trigger in brass which has twin adjustment screws and for sensible money.
You can get away with removing 2 of the 3 washers under the trigger sear engagement to get the standard trigger to a lighter feel if you don't want to spend on an aftermarket trigger blade. However, the Venoman blade is very nice

The first of the .22cal rifle i had were often high on power and i had to adjust the power to sell them, then the later ones the power was down your lucky if you get one doing 11ft bs i have had some under 10.5. I dont know if they had a number of them returned and the have now lowered the power, the problem is that when you cut to much off the spring you often cant get the power back by adding pre-load due to the spring being weak . If you put one on a flat surface you can press on it and it will start to compress easy, i fit the stage or the AR1 kit to solve the problem.

[W&SP]

My .177 RE was more accurate and delivered higher fpe with h&n trophy and rws superfields 4.51. Jsb wasn't the best by far.

Thanks for the tip - have ordered sample packs to test!

[Rickenbacker]

When I worked on my Remmy Express, a most important thing was to de-burr the inside of the holes & slots machined into the cylinder.

The factory fitted piston seal was obviously ruined during fitting, and the same would happen to any replacment seal, due to the rear section of the cylinder being like a very sharp cheese grater.

[venoman]

When I worked on my Remmy Express, a most important thing was to de-burr the inside of the holes & slots machined into the cylinder.

The factory fitted piston seal was obviously ruined during fitting, and the same would happen to any replacment seal, due to the rear section of the cylinder being like a very sharp cheese grater.

Just use the side of the blade on a small electrical screwdriver to guide the seal passed the holes and cut outs.

[W&SP]

Another update:

Adding 8-10 mm pre-load seemed to sort out power - now around 11.5 lbs sq ft.

I'd taken off the front sights so maybe that had an affect on accuracy? Anyway, re-crowned which resulted in decent grouping using JSB Exacts. Haven't yet tried the sample packs of the H&N trophy and RWS Superfields.

I took off some metal off the rear of the trigger which seemed to help the feel of 2nd stage.

Lots of learning going on with this project which is fun once you get a result

(I won't bore you with some of the fundamental errors that I've made on the way... all part of learning!)

[steveiep]

There are generally 3 washers under the sear engagement screw that is just ahead of the trigger blade.
If you remover 2 of the 3, you still get safe engagement & a much lighter trigger.

[W&SP]

There are generally 3 washers under the sear engagement screw that is just ahead of the trigger blade.
If you remover 2 of the 3, you still get safe engagement & a much lighter trigger.

Thanks. Yes did that first. Well worth doing. I took out one initially and now have it with both removed.
Changing the trigger profile was the next stage of fettling.

[prosport.177]

UPDATE

Post installing new spring, the RE was averaging 11.3 pounds sq ft without any power bands. Since 'running it in' (100 pellets or so), power has dropped to 10.6. I thought that they normally increased once bedded in. Looks like yet another strip to add some washers. It has new breech and piston washers as well as new HDPE sleeve, new guide/TH so all should be OK. Anyway, the previously reported 5 coils chop might not be be right!

The other thing that's annoying is that I cannot get a grouping of less than 1" at 10 yards (hand rested on bag). I've cleaned the barrel, checked that everything is tight etc. By comparison, in the same session / set-up (was checking scopes) my HW97 was doing under 1 cm groups. This is the reason that I re-checked the power - to check it's consistent, which it is. Wondering if I need to re-crown?

It's been fun fiddling with this rifle. I bought it for a song so even with the small amount spent on it, it's still cheap. But I do wish I could now stop 'fixing' and start shooting!

Could be it no longer likes the pellets you are feeding it. You might have to try a few different tins an see which it favours ,)

[W&SP]

Could be it no longer likes the pellets you are feeding it. You might have to try a few different tins an see which it favours ,)

I had a quick go at 25 yds today. I tried RWS Superfields and they weren't any better than the JSB Exact 4.51s. Haven't tried H&N trophy yet but I think my main problem is twofold:

1. I always struggle to get a decent/consistent hold when resting my hand on a bench/bag compared to normal non-supported hold. Might continue fine tuning the tele-sights & choice of pellet without using a bench.
2. This rifle doesn't seem to like too light a hold. The loose grip I use on my tuned HW97 gets nice tight grouping. But with the Remington I'm getting much better grouping when I hold the front a bit tighter. Goes against most of what I've read about 'best practice' springer shooting. I wonder if a silencer or weight might help?

One other thing that I must attend to is sometimes the rifle fires when I let off the safety! The trigger adjustment screw worked a bit loose over time. So I set it tighter to give the spring a better hold. Might have to use a bit of threadlock. Or a stronger spring? Other possibility to investigate is changing the number of turns of the safety screw inside the action - might need bit less or more turn to work properly since I changed the trigger rear profile. I only let the safety off when the rifle is pointing at my backstop but it's happened twice now which is twice too many! So back t o the workshop before my next session.