New vs old in modern times

[Barryg]

I once would always prefer new, but now I would say if you get lucky old would be best, the guns from just a few years ago seem better, anyone agree?

PS I am talking about boingers as I don't have enough experience to comment on the puffers

[junglie]

Yes i agree, everything seems to be built down to a price these days.

[look no hands]

Totally agree, if you compare my old Supersport custom up against a newer Supersport, you'll see a hell of a difference in materials and build quality, over the years even quality makes like HW have been getting worse or corners are getting cut.

Also a lot of reasons is because of the craftsmen who make things, not just in the gun industry but also cars, motorbikes and boats etc either retire, die or are laid off because of modern machinery/techniques so the products don't get finished properly and don't have that "Eye" cast over the manufacturing process and finished item, someone said on another recent thread that QC is no longer about.

There doesn't seem to be much pride about with what's made anymore, unless you're prepared to pay through the nose for it and have someone who gives a toss make it for you but I'm going to contradict myself here and say Nick 'Tinners' is one of the rare cases, as he doesn't charge a fortune and does give a toss about what he produces and his customers.

Just my thoughts.

Pete

[cooper_dan]

I'm not big into puffers either. But I know people who would argue some older ones are better. For example the Air Arms EV2 is still preferred by a lot of people to the current mega-pcp's

[jonnyone]

Very much agree Barry,

I recall opening the carton of my 1984 HW80 with its hand cut checkering. It seemed hand crafted. I greatly doubt I would get same feeling unpacking a modern springer of any make not least HW...

[bozzer]

I'm a little on the fence on this ...

We've all opened up old springers and found very crude pistons made from rolled up sheet. Dreadful looking things. The modern day pistons are mostly much better re manufacture. Diana may even decide to start making round ones any day soon ( sorry Barry ). Piston seals are also much better ... maybe that's just development in materials rather than manufacture.

The earlier HW spring guides were woeful ... just splayed at the end. There was the period where we just got chopped off springs. These things have been improved on.

Some of the modern springers have better technology and manufacturing in the moving parts but some of the other parts seem to have been skimped on to keep the price marketable. Maybe I'm thinking Walther there!

Re Pea-Shooters ( If I call them 'Puffers' my two 20 odd year old sons will don their PC police hats and give me another b*llocking. There are so many words I'm not allowed to use in my own home anymore. They seem to be so busy policing the world and telling me what everyone is doing wrong, that they have forgotten to get on with their own lives. ) ...

I had an old AA SM100. It just looked like someone had machined it properly out of lumps of metal. The blueing was unbelievable. It was so deep it was hypnotic. So I'd have to put that down as an old Pea-Shooter that looked and felt well made.

[Geezer]

Basically, yes. I just posted something similar in the last few days on a couple of threads.

Maybe some of this is nostalgia, but not all. If someone can show me modern boingers that, in performance, build quality, finish (etc) are better than my FWB127s, Webley Omega, Tomahawk, Longbow, early 77s, etc, then I shall be impressed and eat my metaphorical hat. Apart from the AAs (where I still think the Mk1 TX is a better rifle, at 12 ft-lbs than the current ones) and maybe the LGV/LGU, I do not see current guns being anything other than lesser versions of the best from the late 70s through to Webley's demise in 2004.

Even below the top end of factory springers, really, would you rather have, say, a nice Webley Vulcan (£90-120) or a new Chinese/Hatsan/Gamo for more?

Which is not to say that there aren't a lot of poor to mediocre older springers. Consider the Webley Hawk, Relums, anything Milbro, or Mk4-6 Airsporters.

But who in heck would spend more money on a new HW than on a good older example of the same model? HW98 maybe excepted (though even there, I'd prefer a 98 stock with an 80s HW85 action it it).

[Jenny Dipple]

I looked at Remington Express today, it bore more than a passing resembelance to an SMK on the rack next to it.
On Gunstar they have an Air Arms Jackal Hi Power at £375 it was as rough anything, a BSA Airsporter MK2 I think £595
it was not a minter; and yes guns and m/cs were better made in the past!
Jenny Dipple

[Geezer]

I looked at Remington Express today, it bore more than a passing resembelance to an SMK on the rack next to it.
On Gunstar they have an Air Arms Jackal Hi Power at £375 it was as rough anything, a BSA Airsporter MK2 I think £595
it was not a minter; and yes guns and m/cs were better made in the past!
Jenny Dipple

"Remingtons" and other SMKs are all Chinese, made in the same or similar factories.

A lot of gun star prices are completely insane. In the last 2-4 years I have paid a bit over 100 for a heavily restored but still nice and good shooting Airsporter Mk1 (and Mk1-2 not beautiful/mint in box is worth max £200-250) and well under £200 for a very very nice Jackal Parabellum.

[Hsing-ee]

BSA Airsporter Mk 1 and 2 were very well made, then the next lot went down and down in quality... then up again with the Airsporter S which was really nice, but by then a sad old design ... then they made the excellent SuperStar and slightly fragile Goldstar ... and then they split in two and started to make excellent PCPs (in UK) and less good springers in Spain...

The old/new thing doesn't really apply to BSA, its more like a chip-shop, depends when in the cycle you dip into the vats.

The old Feinwerkbau Sport had numerous faults, yet was and is vaunted to high heaven even though a standard TX can kick it into the long grass, and no-one wants to buy the new one even though it is clearly a superior tool.

The HW99 is a POS compared to the old HW50S but no-one bought the HW50S as they were all wanting 11.9 fpe from the HW80 (actually about 16 fpe as no-one had a chronograph and there were lots of ones sold with 'hot' springs.

As I have said time and time again, it is THE PELLETS that make the difference. In the old days the pellets were SHIT, with the exception of the Match ones made by RWS and H&N, and these flatheads were only good to 20 yards.

If you get an old leather-washered HW35 standard, strip it, clean it, lube it properly, stick a good modern scope on it, it will print superb groups. It won't be quite as powerful as a modern plastic washered one, but the accuracy will be there. As it will be with the new one, which is only about £225 from SGC.

The answer is that some modern rifles are 'good' and some old ones are 'good'. Maybe old ones had craftsmen working on them, but they also had inexperienced apprentices, and while modern ones might lack finish, they are often made on CNC equipment that pisses on the tools of old in terms of precision. Look at the machining of the compression cylinder in your old rifle versus your modern one.

Rose tinted glasses are rubbish, as are whatever the opposite are (glass half empty glasses, smeary negative glasses?). Look at the individual tools and pass judgement on them.

Weihrauchs are now as ugly as anything, with their name engraved in the wood, how utterly gauche, whereas BSA springers are elegant and smart looking. Who knew that would happen when Weihrauch used beautiful walnut on its Export and Luxus models and BSA had theirs made up from old school desks?

I am not sure what point I am trying to make but I rest my case. Nostalgia is not what it used to be and by golly you dont have to put up with shite like Whalley Crosmans, Wobbly Webley Vulcans and those awful, awful sidelevers from the Sussex Armoury like the Jackal. You just have to know how to use a piece of emery paper on a HW99S and you can enjoy excellent shooting. Be grateful!

[Geezer]

You are very very right on pellets. Back in the day, the old Crosman Premiers suddenly cut group sizes in a good rifle by 30/50%. Until then, we all thought an inch at 30 yards was pretty much the best and anything less a miracle or happy coincidence.

I do not the have the time or energy to debate the rest, but refer you and others to my earlier post. I half agree. But only half. Anyway, nothing made now beats a Longbow.

[Hsing-ee]

And if you go back to before 1979 or so, only the Feinwerkbau Sport and the HW35 were any good, amongst the sporting rifles, and even then the HW35 was often a 9.5 fpe rifle even in .22.

The match rifles were excellent, but no one in a 'normal' income bracket (non-match airgun shooting being an almost wholly working-class sport) could afford one of those and they wouldnt want to anyway as they only did 6fpe.

So in the 'old days' your best choices were the FWB Sport or the HW35. People clung on to their favorites but these were 'the quality'.

Maybe we should talk about the 'Golden Age of the Springer' between 1981 and 1991 when the TX200, for all intents and purposes, ended the development of the spring rifle.

[FPoole]

I haven't seen the innards of new TX200's, but I think they would be pretty much as good as ever. The bluing on the newer ones is amazing, for a standard mass produced gun. I do wish AA would go back to the old stroke, but even the current MarkIII spec guns are nice to shoot. I have seen that the HW line seems to have gotten better in the bluing, probably because of AA.

[look no hands]

BSA Airsporter Mk 1 and 2 were very well made, then the next lot went down and down in quality... then up again with the Airsporter S which was really nice, but by then a sad old design ... then they made the excellent SuperStar and slightly fragile Goldstar ... and then they split in two and started to make excellent PCPs (in UK) and less good springers in Spain...

The old/new thing doesn't really apply to BSA, its more like a chip-shop, depends when in the cycle you dip into the vats.

The old Feinwerkbau Sport had numerous faults, yet was and is vaunted to high heaven even though a standard TX can kick it into the long grass, and no-one wants to buy the new one even though it is clearly a superior tool.

The HW99 is a POS compared to the old HW50S but no-one bought the HW50S as they were all wanting 11.9 fpe from the HW80 (actually about 16 fpe as no-one had a chronograph and there were lots of ones sold with 'hot' springs.

As I have said time and time again, it is THE PELLETS that make the difference. In the old days the pellets were SHIT, with the exception of the Match ones made by RWS and H&N, and these flatheads were only good to 20 yards.

If you get an old leather-washered HW35 standard, strip it, clean it, lube it properly, stick a good modern scope on it, it will print superb groups. It won't be quite as powerful as a modern plastic washered one, but the accuracy will be there. As it will be with the new one, which is only about £225 from SGC.

The answer is that some modern rifles are 'good' and some old ones are 'good'. Maybe old ones had craftsmen working on them, but they also had inexperienced apprentices, and while modern ones might lack finish, they are often made on CNC equipment that pisses on the tools of old in terms of precision. Look at the machining of the compression cylinder in your old rifle versus your modern one.

Rose tinted glasses are rubbish, as are whatever the opposite are (glass half empty glasses, smeary negative glasses?). Look at the individual tools and pass judgement on them.

Weihrauchs are now as ugly as anything, with their name engraved in the wood, how utterly gauche, whereas BSA springers are elegant and smart looking. Who knew that would happen when Weihrauch used beautiful walnut on its Export and Luxus models and BSA had theirs made up from old school desks?

I am not sure what point I am trying to make but I rest my case. Nostalgia is not what it used to be and by golly you dont have to put up with shite like Whalley Crosmans, Wobbly Webley Vulcans and those awful, awful sidelevers from the Sussex Armoury like the Jackal. You just have to know how to use a piece of emery paper on a HW99S and you can enjoy excellent shooting. Be grateful!

If you're talking about the Supersport when you mention BSA then they differ a lot between years, the newer ones are even more Gamofied than the older ones, Airsporters and Mercs just had different stock styles and open sight mounting points (on the Airsporters).

Pete

[Shed tuner]

(though even there, I'd prefer a 98 stock with an 80s HW85 action it it).

Exactly the stock my old 85 is sitting in