Pistol bolts, why on the right?

[El Garro]

Maybe to save it jamming in the holster when you need to draw quickly outside that saloon

[PaulR]

Although the CP2 does not qualify as a match pistol it has the bolt on the left hand side which is really annoying as I am left handed.

[Tony.T]

Such a good point- I've been saying this to shooting mates for years. They're all back to front aren't they?

[Rickenbacker]

Not a full-fat target pistol, but they thought of that with the Titan and Falcon air pistols by putting all the cockery/loadery on the left hand side of a right hand pistol:

falcon-fn8.jpg

[Geezer]

Because a lot of people who design airguns are production engineers, not airgunners.

Frankly, a lot of gun designers are production engineers, not shooters.

Take a look in the firearm world at the classic and well-regarded HK G3. Not an awful rifle, pretty reliable and crucially able to be sold at well under (IIRC half) the unit price of its main rival the FN FAL. But the FAL has the controls (safety, bolt catch, mag release, cocking handle) exactly where they should be. The HK's human engineering is much less good. It's only virtue apart from cost is accuracy (once you have learned to tolerate bad stock design, heavy trigger, poorly located safety, etc). But it and its variants have served in about 100 countries' armies and national police forces.

[Geezer]

On a more prosaic airgun level, if you are, say, Crosman, and you want to use the same parts for a carbine (2250) and a pistol (2240), you pick the right-hand option. Crosman are a master class in using the same basic parts in a wide variety of guns, often for decades. Some of the Chinese makers are now at the same level, producing the same base design in PCP, multi-pump, CO2, and rifle and pistol variants.