Reply With QuoteGot a complete Tornado if you want it. Piston washer is split, but rifle is in good nick otherwise. PM me if interested.
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Some time back I had a chance of getting one of these but it wasn't in the best of order although it appeared complete asside from a pivot pin fashioned from a nail. The metalwork was rusty pretty much all over except for the trigger guard. The stock had lost areas of finish but the chequering & forend grooves were undamaged. There was damage to the heel & toe where it had stood on a hard surface but there seemed plenty of wood there to regain the original profile. Oh, & it didn't seem to want to cock, it felt pretty solid with no movement to the piston on the start of the cocking stroke. I diddnt try to force it but it was locked up tightly.
Never owned a Relum, but I wondered how this one might turn out with a bit of time applied to it.
Stock off, easy.
Trigger mechanism, two pins,a spring, trigger & sear, ok.
Underlever & cocking link, funny leaf spring through a guide under the cylinder, bit of a fiddle but out & clear.
End cap, pin, mainspring(s) & piston next. Spring compressor set up & ok. All ok but the piston was really tightly held in the cylinder. Lots of tapping with drifts etc after a squirt of two of fluid. Eventually it came out. Shiny rear portion, tooling marks all over it, no burrs,just grooves, irregular, horrid marks.
That's when I was surprised by what I found, the skirt of the piston was round but a greater diameter than the bore of the cylinder. Measured on a digital caliper. I can't be certain that it's the original piston/cylinder combination but it looked like it. If so I don't see how this thing ever worked in the first place. Additionally the blob on the underside of the piston which runs in the cocking slot was a tight fit too. Oh, the cylinder was round as well, it hadn't been squashed in a vice or bashed out of true.
Has anyone seen this sort of thing before?
So the tail of the pistons been reduced a fraction to get a sliding fit in the cylinder, it didn't need much off it, but it was more than a polish.
Still wondering about using a one spring set up, just leaving out the inner one rather than finding an alternative to the original pair, which by the way look dead straight no kinks etc. ( maybe not surprising if it wasn't possible to cock it).
Cleaned up the major parts of the metalwork with wire wool & oil. They look pretty fair, not deep rich polished gun blue more of a slightly matt utilitarian blackened finish. We're they polished & shiny when new or were they matt, more of a satin sheen?
Need to have a think now because when I was looking at the barrel/cylinder I noticed there was a wobble. The joint between the two is loose & I need to have a look at that before long. Wondering what will sort it out, oversized pin in the same spot as the original, seperate the two dimple the barrel & drive it back in, shim, epoxy,,solder, braze, machine a collar & weld it or weld it. Or a combination of a couple.
Pretty determined to get it working, working well would be better, don't want to spend too much money on it but I don't mind putting in some time, oh & the stocks to do.
Any one else cured a wobbly barrel, appart from getting rid of it & bbuying anothe Relum.
Not my favourite make but something to keep me occupied for a while!
Cheers
You can't say muntjack without saying mmmmm
Got a complete Tornado if you want it. Piston washer is split, but rifle is in good nick otherwise. PM me if interested.
The South of England has 2 good things, the M1 and the A1. Both will take you to Yorkshire.
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Done about 12 of these in the last couple of months, have two waiting at the moment. I have seen two types of triggers and two types of piston (see pic). The piston body diameter is around 24.9 mm but is expanded at the rear by about another 1 mm. I try never to fit the inner spring unless requested as it does not seem to add much to performance and makes cocking less smooth.
Baz
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Shame but I can't get the picture to load, not sure which type piston is in the one I've got but yes the tail end seems about 1mm larger than the body for around 15mm at a guess.
To me the two spring set up seems prone to introducing problems not present with a one spring design. I'm hoping one will be ok, all it needs to do is be reasonably smooth & consistent, with enough oomph to put a hole through a paper target 10-15 yards away......if I can fix the barrel wobble!
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One piston just has a rectangular hole slot in it and the other type has a raised V shape for the sear to catch on. If you get 8 to 9 ft lbs out of it be happy.Originally Posted by trajectory
Baz
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This ones got the raised lump at the end of the slot.
Do you know which was the earlier design? Just wondering about datin it, I know it's got a serial no. But hadn't thought about trying to find out when it might have been made till just now.
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Benelli B76
Hi, picture opened up this morning, thanks.
Have you ever seen a loose barrelled Tornado amongst the ones you have come across? If so can I ask how you got round it, I'd be interested in knowing what works best, thanks
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Hi
Had one of these new in 1970 and it was my main hunting rifle for about 12 years and served me well. Bought another for nostalgic reasons about 2009 and fitted single spring, PTFE head and Delrin guide and TH and also a PET piston sleeve and slip washers. Worked well pushing out 9 ft.lbs but with lousy MV variation and a shotgun spread pattern at 20 yards! Maybe just been spoiled nowadays!
Here's a drwg of the internals I had in the second rifle but it was the same sort of piston in the first! The bump on the piston skirt is the trigger bent!
http://freepdfhosting.com/3cfe1c06e2.pdf
The second one had a S/N 80995 if that's any help! Didn't record such things in the 70's!
Interesting project though! I think that a Mercury spring was mooted as a good replacement for the dual concentric originals which were a disaster!
Good luck!
atvb
David
May today be the best day of your life and all your tomorrows even better!!
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That's an interesting set up for the internals, thanks for posting the description & drawings. I think I'll get things to a stage where the piston is free to travel the length of the cylinder without binding & locking up before trying it with the one original spring. If its fairly smooth & power is adequate for 15 yd paper punching then all well & good but if not then a spring swap & some form of guide / sleeve might be required.
I'm sure you are right about that piece being the trigger bent, but it definitely looks like a lump. I'm intrigued by the design, on one hand it seems all about ease of manufacture, cost minimalisation & function. Yet I would have thought the two spring set up wouldn't have got off the drawing board, or testing based on the latter. It's no LP53.
Still can't work out how the piston is so tight, cylinders don't shrink & steel pistons don't grow......
Unless I can sort out the barrel wobble on this one it might not be capable of anything where the word accuracy is used to describe its capabilities........
Lord of the Springs
It was the Meteor spring, David, not the Mercury.
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Thought I'd read somewhere else that a Meteor spring might be the one, that pretty much confirms things, thanks.
Hopefully I will get around to separating the barrel from the cylinder tomorrow & get a better idea about how to rejoin them without the wobble. Guess if it goes back out of line with the scope rails I'll stick to the open sights on the barrel! Wonder how they make underlevers at the factory; would they join the barrel to the cylinder & then 'bend' the barrel so it shoots in line with the cylinder? It's just I've never noticed one poi drifting left or right with changes in range. Underlevers I've fired all seem to shoot straight.
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Just looked at one of the rough ones I have to rebuild. There is a large hole for a cross pin that cuts through the top of the barrel. This should help lock the barrel in place and is a method used on a lot of revolvers to lock the barrel after it is screwed into the frame. If your barrel is quite lose I would smear plastic metal on it, push it into place and fit a tight cross pin. if there is no existing pin hole, drill one across making sure you just skim through the outer barrel without breaching the bore. See pic..
Baz
Last edited by Benelli B76; 29-06-2017 at 07:04 PM. Reason: Add pic
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Good job some-one is watching me!! Thanks Jim! I didn't use either as far as I recall; just one which calculated out near enough from the spring box. You know a Scottish Dwelling Yorkshireman wouldn't spend money if it could be avoided!
It's a while since my nostalgia trip and won't be having another (for a Tornado that is!). That should please IJ!
Good luck to all the tinkerers and restorers!
atvb
David
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Well the barrels off. Drove the retaining pin out easily enough & because the barrel was already loose it came off quite easily. Pretty much a straight pull as its not threaded but the portion that runs into the cylinder is very rough. Annular rings all over it, presumably so it can be driven into the bored hole in the cylinder, which has a better finish, & pretty much hold itself there & once in place cross drilled & pinned to finally secure it. There was no sign of any jointing compound or thread lock in the joint, it seemed purely mechanical.
Decided to clean it up, with a wire brush, dimple it a bit with a centre punch avoiding the curved portion that fits around the loading tap, close the pin channel up a bit then apply a high modulus filled epoxy, drive the barrel back in replace the pin & wait till it cures.
In the meantime I can have a look at the stock. I think I'll keep the same pale colour, it reminds me of a school desk. Probably about the same vintage as the Tornado.
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When the barrel was off I cleaned out the hole in the cylinder where it fits but noticed some light showing from around the loading tap! It was comming in from the top, the loading tap was in place but the gap was on the barrel side of loading tap at the top. I guess this is filled by the curved portion of the barrel that fits against the tap, but I was surprised the loading tap wasn't cut a little further back in relation to the loading apperture. Hence light at the end of the tunnel.
Just an observation.
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