BSA 240 Magnum - the way it should have been.

[Geezer]

Very interesting, and great that Clarky got that thing working better. These are intriguing guns, in part because of their combination of great strengths and significant flaws.

You might want quickly to edit the first sentence of your second to last paragraph so as not to risk contravening forum rules on what may and may not be said.

[stagmanv835]

Sounds like a great job done

[Waisted]

A good write up, this seems a familiar story a good design made on a shoe string. But can be tuned to perfection.

[thoro]

Very interesting, and great that Clarky got that thing working better. These are intriguing guns, in part because of their combination of great strengths and significant flaws.

You might want quickly to edit the first sentence of your second to last paragraph so as not to risk contravening forum rules on what may and may not be said.

Thanks for pointing it out Geezer...appreciated.
I certainly don't want to break any forum rules so apologies to everyone if I was doing so.

[Blackrider]

Good OP, very interesting !

I bought a very nice .22 240 Magnum a while back and was/still am, delighted with it and was hoping it would come close or equal the standards of the HW 45 but sadly is does not. The short barrel length is quite disapointing.
It is still a handsome pistol though and one well worth collecting !

[thoro]

Blackrider,

You don't mention in what way the short barrel is disappointing but I am guessing lack of power. I am sure your BSA could be tweaked to perform as well as mine; after all the internals are identical regardless of calibre.
I personally prefer both the BSA and the HW45 in cal .177 over .22 as I take a flatter trajectory over slightly more energy, but many others out there would disagree so I guess horses for courses.

I have got a HW45 as well in .177 and it is a good one.
I ran the same pellets through the chrony as I did with the BSA and got these results:

Meisterkugeln:
586.6 fps low
594.5 fps high
592.5 fps average

Falcons:
575.8 fps low
580.7 fps high
577.4 fps average

AA:
537.4 fps low
549.2 fps high
548.6 fps average

It clearly does not like the AAs very much but the other two pellets give great velocity. It is another specimen that actually lives up to the velocity hype; I think Weihrauch states 570fps, whereas Beeman states 600fps for the P1, both usually overrated for most HW45s out there unless they did their testing with very light pellets. Many won't go over 520-530 fps so maybe I was just lucky with mine. It has got the power without dieseling.
I still enjoy shooting the BSA more (especially after Clarky's tuning); it is lighter and easier to feed pellets into, so not so fatiguing on longer sessions.
Again, I know many others out there would disagree with me

[ETCHY]

Cool & very interesting info', sounds like some great work was done on it.

I have a standard .177 240 Magnum.

I know it's unpopular & I know it's not as good in many ways as an HW45 (I have one of those too). However despite all that I really do like the thing, it looks great (to my eyes) & for me is accurate enough, also it has real character. That character may come from the fact it is a bit Heath Robinson in design & the grip isn't the best (although I don't mind it overly much) but somehow it just makes me smile when I shoot it !

[arjimlad]

I had one of these when they were new out, and I really couldn't get it to hit anything at all. I never got satisfying accuracy out of it. If only... mind I was going from a Gamo PR-45 recoilless pneumatic pistol !

Glad you have got yours behaving better.

[thoro]

It definitely has something that makes me enjoy shooting this pistol more than the HW45, although the latter is superior in most ways.
And Clarky's predictions regarding the velocity increase also came through.
Last weekend saw some bad weather so I did not manage to get much shooting done.
I did,however, manage to run the three ammo types originally tested through the chrony again:

Meisterkugeln:
516.7 fps low
526.5 fps high
520.7 fps average

Falcons:
496.1 fps low
500.3 fps high
498.7 fps average

AA:
483.3 fps low
486.2 fps high
484.3 fps average

A noticeable difference from when I first got it back (although the velocity figures were very respectable then too). The velocity spread with Falcons and AA's is neglectable. A bit more with Meisterkugeln, but still far better than a standard Magnum.
This pistol is now behaving beyond anything I could have hoped for and is very pleasant to shoot.

Cheers

Tom