Originally Posted by
Geezer
They are odd aren’t they? I think they came out in 1977, so only a year before the 45, which was much more on the late 70s and 80s zeitgeist for high power at all costs.
I have always assumed the idea was entry-level budget target rifles aimed at the big German 10M match market, sized for kids (25DS), youths (27S) and adults/big adolescents (35S) - all running at German sub-7.5J power.
I strongly suspect that the regular and S models competed heavily against each other, to the detriment of M&G’s bottom line.
Accepting my German 10M hypothesis, i’m not sure what “better” entry-level rifles were eating into Diana sales that would make the S guns a good idea. The stock 27 has a good case as being a near-perfect lightweight mid-power plinker, barn gun, or base target air rifle, especially in the 70s. The 27S (I have one) isn’t so much better as different.
The Webley/BSA/HW/everyone else model of making the same gun in standard and fancy stock deluxe models is a much better business model than making mechanically different variants of the same action at the same level of finish.