Pro Target Cocking

[LouisCorney]

I bought a dog of a Pro Target second-hand recently, which has been plauged by all kinds of problems. I've sent it back to air arms for a service to fix the leaky reg etc. and I thought they'd fixed the cocking (seemed ok at first). Took it to the club this morning, and it was back to its old ways; really stiff to cock and requiring a good hard yank to stand any chance of cocking it.

I've done a few searches on here, and it seems the problem is quite common. The trigger follow through travel adjustment wasn't the culprit (wound out enough) and I couldn't find a problem with the sears engaging (it would cock when the case was off and when I was pressing down on the big cocking arm to keep it in place). And then I realised it might be the cocking arm "slipping" if you catch my drift. I placed a washer under the brass shim and it now seems to cock fine now (fingers crossed).

Now here come the questions (as usual):

1. Would placing a washer underneath cause any harm/stress on anything?

2. Anybody had any similar problem?

There's a (rather poorly annotated ) pic here and thankyou to whoever I nicked that photo from

[Ray J]

Hi' Louis,

My one used to feel jerki' when cocking. I put a spot of gun oil on the shaft. It feels much better now,

Ray

[wornspring]

Poor louis. Have you broken a mirror recently?

Have a look at the sear contact to that rounded shoulder, is there any apparent wear on that part of sear? or on the shoulder of the bolt?
Dont thinkk a washer or shim will stress anything as far as i can tell from that pic

[LouisCorney]

Ray, tried some lubrication on the shaft (oo-er) smoothed it up but still needed a lot of effort and a good yank.

Pete, it's working fine now! Must have cocked and fired at least 20 times with no problem. I couldn't forsee a problem with it, but best just to check with engineer-type people like yourself. S'easy this gunsmithing lark innit?

(sits back and awaits comments from the usual suspects )

[Gnhouse]

When you took the Tigger side plate off was the brass spacer holding the cocking lever of quite a narrow overall diameter?

DUH just looked at the pic (never saw that)

What can happen with the smaller brass spacer, is that when you cock the gun the slide wants to push the cocking lever sideways. Over time as the brass spacer is quite small it can round over on the edges allowing the cocking lever to slip sideways and the edge of the cocking lever to burr on the hammer. If this happens you can fix it as you have with putting an extra spacer/shim in as you have, just make sure its not binding. If its too serious (or gets that way) you may need to replace the cocking lever (if you clean up the burring you can remove the tempering on the part and it will wear away again quickly) and the brass spacer, the new spacers AA were supplying are of a much larger surface area giving more strength to the cocking lever to stop it slipping. I had the same problem with my older PT and after replacing the trigger parts it was back to being sweet.

Garrick

PS I'd recommend that you run the slide as free from lube as you can its a fairly close fit and as its exposed the lube can gather dust and rubbish turning it into grinding paste not something you want in your trigger or slide. When I needed to I used to use a very very light ball bearing lube on my slide one drop would penetrate (ohh err) and wiping off the excess I never had a porblem

[Paul Hudson]

S'easy this gunsmithing lark innit?

(sits back and awaits comments from the usual suspects )

[LouisCorney]

Thanks for the info Gnhouse. Seems AA do exactly as you do; when I got it back from the service the gunk I'd put on had been replaced by a thin coat of a similar substance to the type you mentioned. The brass spacer was the narrow type. I'l have a closer inspection at the wear and tear and I might just order the new parts from AA just to be on the safe side.

Louis

[Jonathan]

There's a (rather poorly annotated ) pic here and thankyou to whoever I nicked that photo from

That'll be one of my pictures Louis, and you're more than welcome mate.

Jonathan.

[LESS THAN FORTUITOUS KENNETH]

Louis,
hit the bugger with a BIG hammer. BIGGER the better!
You know it makes sense.

[tyke]

Louis,
hit the bugger with a BIG hammer. BIGGER the better!
You know it makes sense.

Thats what Mr Baines would do

[LouisCorney]

Just thought I'd drag this up again, in case anyone actually does what I have . You have to be careful not to let the washer/shim make the cocking arm "stick" i.e. not spring back as this will affect the performance greatly (steady 789 down to a steady 695 )

Also, just thought I'd give AA the credit they deserve for excellent service; the friendly woman who answers the phone and the very knowledgeable gunsmith who actually understood what I was saying (must have some experience of dealing with idiots )

p.s. thanks Jonathan

[tyke]

Is that Saturdays problem solved then

[Darren Petts]

Does it now cock AND fire at 780 ish or still one or the other?

[LouisCorney]

Yup Now I've just gotta.....

Darren, orginally it would do one or the other, but after a little tinkering it now does both.

[Darren Petts]

And now the umpteenth go at setting the hound up.