Alros Starfire CO2 8 Shot

[rapidshot]

Morning all. Back in the 90's I purchased a second hand Alros Shadow M400 in .22cal for £150 , the stock was very nice indeed with an Alros Emblem set into the bottom of the pistol grip. The cocking mechanism was a bit agricultural but worked fine. Very accurate rifle from memory. Was offered £300 for it so I let it go.
I had also picked up a Starfire as CO2 rifles were becoming popular and I wanted to give them a try. It took 2 x CO2 bulbs but a couldn't get it above 8 ftlbs. Anyway, I tried to contact Alros but found it impossible. As I lived in Leek, Staffordshire I nipped over to their trading address at Cold Meece not far outside Stoke/Hanley. It was a small industrial unit ...I banged on the door and a gent answered...turned out to be Alan of Al -Ross. Really nice gent. I explained the issue and he invited me into the workshop. Apart from the two of us it was deserted. I was expecting him to ask me to leave the rifle with him but he took it straight over to a large workbench that had a lot of...probably 40.. Blued barrel blanks lined up on it...he chose one ...took the action out of my rifle...and literally drifted the barrel out of the breech with a copper/brass drift and hammer. He then compared the barrel to the ones lined up on the bench and chose one longer than the original. Then drifted this into the breech, changed the hammer spring from a selection that were in small tins on the bench.I can't remember there being any grub screws to secure the barrel into the breech but there may have been..After reassembling the rifle, which included a silencer, he tested it using a Skan chrono......11.4 ftlbs...I was happy with that.
I then started chatting with Alan and asked why had it been so difficult to make contact by phone. He then went into some detail.....he and his business partner were having difficulties between them, no detail given, and the business was struggling to source wooden stocks for the rifles at a cost effective price...he told me that Webley, Air Arms and the 'big boy's ' had priority over everybody else....and he couldn't find a viable source of stocks anywhere in the UK. He showed me a bench that had maybe 30 rifles on it ready to assemble...barrels, breeches, buddy bottle etc etc. To be honest, and it's quite a vivid memory, he looked and sounded totally browned off ! I asked him how much I owed him and he said give me £40 ...which even back in the 90's was too cheap...he wouldn't accept more....he gave me the old barrel back and told me that the previous owner had chopped the barrel as it was way too short. By the way, Alan told me that they only used Lothar -Walther barrels which was something that I didn't know at the time. Not long after my visit I heard that Alros had gone out of business....I still wonder today what happened to all of those unassembled actions that lay on that bench ?