Waiting for an old D34 to arrive

[Barryg]

Ah, the elusive Diana 26. Thats one of the guns I'm still looking for.

Just for interest

[jonnyone]

Just for interest

Stumbled onto a model 26 back last year. Don't think they were that popular...
Dave

[Geezer]

Stumbled onto a model 26 back last year. Don't think they were that popular...
Save

Well, at least we both have one. Lack of popularity was surely down to it not making “full legal hunting power” - which the only slightly more expensive 34 would, easily.

To me, it’s possibly the blandest, least interesting air rifle I have ever owned. It does what it is supposed to do very well. It has no obvious faults or flaws. Almost every aspect of it rates as “OK”. It would be a great first gun for a teenager (and the auto-safety is an advance on previous Dianas for novices).

But it’s just dull. Same goes for the 24. Which is different from how I feel about my 25D or 27S.

A sort of (showing my age) 80s Vauxhall Cavalier 1.6L. Reliable, practical, decent value, does what you need, but just a bit boring.

PS - this is not a sales advert for evert. And if he doesn’t get the car reference, try instead the Volvo 340, made by DAF in Holland, and which were ubiquitous and ubiquitously tedious when I lived there in the 90s.

[Drew451]

Well, at least we both have one. Lack of popularity was surely down to it not making “full legal hunting power” - which the only slightly more expensive 34 would, easily.

To me, it’s possibly the blandest, least interesting air rifle I have ever owned. It does what it is supposed to do very well. It has no obvious faults or flaws. Almost every aspect of it rates as “OK”. It would be a great first gun for a teenager (and the auto-safety is an advance on previous Dianas for novices).

But it’s just dull. Same goes for the 24. Which is different from how I feel about my 25D or 27S.

A sort of (showing my age) 80s Vauxhall Cavalier 1.6L. Reliable, practical, decent value, does what you need, but just a bit boring.

PS - this is not a sales advert for evert. And if he doesn’t get the car reference, try instead the Volvo 340, made by DAF in Holland, and which were ubiquitous and ubiquitously tedious when I lived there in the 90s.

I think you are exactly right re. the 26's lack of sales success being down to it falling between the 24 junior gun and the full power 34. If the 26 is a Cavalier then the 28 is an Opel Ascona: essentially the same but sportier/ nicer. But it still didn't sell well due to it not being full power. As a young chap, jumped from 24 to 34 straight away, with no consideration to either model in between. I think in only recent years has there been an appreciation of lesser powered air rifles, sporters anyway. No one bought HW50's decades ago, it would seem.
Somehow, the leather washered 25's and 27 are that little bit sweeter and more desirable. I also think a bit of nostalgia applies here also. If the 25/27 was the junior gun to have when you were a youngster then they are the ones that you favour even if they were dead equal in performance with their effective replacements.

[evert]

Shot the gun some more today, and I still like it a lot. It does not have the "long" shotcycle of the normal D34 family, which is one of the things that has made me prefer HW's over Dianas prevoiusly. The slanted breech does not have a proper taper, so it tends to pinch pellet skirts, but the taper can be improved gently. I still think about a slightly softer spring, but for now, I'll just shoot it, and perhaps fine tune the trigger. The guns performance has been everything I was hoping for, and thats unusual for me, most factory products disappoint me.

This gun fits into my thinking that springers really were at their best sometime in the mid eighties to mid nineties.
The factories had figured out how to balance a springer mechanism for good performance, and European factories were still producing quality airguns.
Then the velocity craze set in, and modern consumerism demanded that we get everything cheap.

[Geezer]

Shot the gun some more today, and I still like it a lot. It does not have the "long" shotcycle of the normal D34 family, which is one of the things that has made me prefer HW's over Dianas prevoiusly. The slanted breech does not have a proper taper, so it tends to pinch pellet skirts, but the taper can be improved gently. I still think about a slightly softer spring, but for now, I'll just shoot it, and perhaps fine tune the trigger. The guns performance has been everything I was hoping for, and thats unusual for me, most factory products disappoint me.

This gun fits into my thinking that springers really were at their best sometime in the mid eighties to mid nineties.
The factories had figured out how to balance a springer mechanism for good performance, and European factories were still producing quality airguns.
Then the velocity craze set in, and modern consumerism demanded that we get everything cheap.

That’s great. It’s nice when you get a thing that just seems to be “right”.

I personally think we’ve had two “golden eras” of post-WW2 airguns (and I am mostly thinking springers).

The first is the 1950s and early 60s. All those German gunmakers and shooters then not allowed to make or own “real” guns.

You get very high materials quality, excellent build quality, and real innovation - whether Big Things like the Giss and FWB sledge systems, or lesser ones like really good normal triggers and DSTs (not that good triggers were completely unknown pre-1939). Stocks got better, in some cases.

Sights really improved - not just diopters, but also regular open sights like the wonderful complex front and rear sights on the better 1950s Dianas. Even the British guns at least had innovative design and styling (BSA) or outstanding fit and finish (Webley). Ironically, Diana’s “E” (for export, or England, or both) models had cheaper, simpler, worse sights, because M&G presumably judged (correctly?) that British shooters wanted to hit rats at 10 yards, not small bullseyes at 10M.

It then all started to go to crap with cost-cutting.

The second Golden Era I suggest began with the FWB Sport in the early 70s. Finally, a gun designed from the ground up for power and accuracy, with a barrel and main action components (if not the trigger and safety) made to exceptional standards and a synthetic seal. And, critically, FWB had twigged that the key to useable power was long stroke, not a stiffer spring or bigger bore.

Others had to play catch-up. M&G with the D45 (bigger, longer and heavier than the FWB, but no more powerful, because of its leather seal: the problem the D34 (with bore/stroke dimensions almost identical to the FWB and a synth seal) was invented to correct. Webley with the Vulcan (often overlooked, but a mid-size springer in 1979 that could get over 12 ft-lbs was still a rarity then) and then HW/Beeman with the HW80.

If you are being cynical, and looking beyond Beeman’s hype, he may simply have asked HW to make a bigger more powerful FWB Sport, because the recipe is the same: long stroke and a synth seal, and please make it hit 1000fps with a .177” RWS Hobby.

An honourable mention for the HW77, which is of course a marvellous and important gun, which I love to bits. But it contains not a single new feature (maybe the underlever catch, which is irrelevant). It is an example of something fairly common in successful guns (see FN MAG/GPMG as just one example): an agglomeration of different designs that happens to hit a sweet spot.

Sorry, hadn’t meant to write an essay when I started this.

[Drew451]

Shot the gun some more today, and I still like it a lot. It does not have the "long" shotcycle of the normal D34 family, which is one of the things that has made me prefer HW's over Dianas prevoiusly. The slanted breech does not have a proper taper, so it tends to pinch pellet skirts, but the taper can be improved gently. I still think about a slightly softer spring, but for now, I'll just shoot it, and perhaps fine tune the trigger. The guns performance has been everything I was hoping for, and thats unusual for me, most factory products disappoint me.

This gun fits into my thinking that springers really were at their best sometime in the mid eighties to mid nineties.
The factories had figured out how to balance a springer mechanism for good performance, and European factories were still producing quality airguns.
Then the velocity craze set in, and modern consumerism demanded that we get everything cheap.

I've always found the 34 series very nice in all it's formats. I think I may be more used to long stroke guns than yourself. I do not find the relatively long stroke of the long cylinder T01 era guns detrimantal to accuracy at our sub 12 limit here. I can appreciate the responsiveness of the early 34's but do not consider them better performers, just different.
The T06 34's feel very much like the 34 you have in all but trigger.. And their breech's have been opened up very slightly to make inserting a pellet easier. The current 34EMS has a straight breech face and a short straight transfer port. Very un-Diana like. Both totally unnecessary (straight breech face handier for the barrel swapping aside) and offering no improvement in the gun at UK limits anyway.
I would be interested to hear which Weihrauch's offer you the sort of performance you look for, Evert.

[Geezer]

I've always found the 34 series very nice in all it's formats. I think I may be more used to long stroke guns than yourself. I do not find the relatively long stroke of the long cylinder T01 era guns detrimantal to accuracy at our sub 12 limit here. I can appreciate the responsiveness of the early 34's but do not consider them better performers, just different.
The T06 34's feel very much like the 34 you have in all but trigger.. And their breech's have been opened up very slightly to make inserting a pellet easier. The current 34EMS has a straight breech face and a short straight transfer port. Very un-Diana like. Both totally unnecessary (straight breech face handier for the barrel swapping aside) and offering no improvement in the gun at UK limits anyway.
I would be interested to hear which Weihrauch's offer you the sort of performance you look for, Evert.

Same here, on the last.

I also have a weird thing that while I think I prefer my faster-action springers (e.g. tuned 77), I’ve never found the soft-spring sub-12 long-stroke guns (eg early Tomahawk, D52, D34/36) to be as “bad” as is often made out on here and on other sites.

My theory (which I cannot currently test) is that it may be possible that the “slow, soft, etc” set up might offer greater variation in group size with different holds/positions than a more efficient set-up (which is what people typically test for), but no greater or - importantly - less variation in POI shift. Which, if you are using a variety of positions in the field when hunting, matters more than whether your 25M group is 0.4” or 0.9” if the pellets still land around the same POI, or close to it.

PS - sorry for sequential thread de-rails.

[TonyL]

That’s great. It’s nice when you get a thing that just seems to be “right”.

I personally think we’ve had two “golden eras” of post-WW2 airguns (and I am mostly thinking springers).

The first is the 1950s and early 60s. All those German gunmakers and shooters then not allowed to make or own “real” guns.

You get very high materials quality, excellent build quality, and real innovation - whether Big Things like the Giss and FWB sledge systems, or lesser ones like really good normal triggers and DSTs (not that good triggers were completely unknown pre-1939). Stocks got better, in some cases.

Sights really improved - not just diopters, but also regular open sights like the wonderful complex front and rear sights on the better 1950s Dianas. Even the British guns at least had innovative design and styling (BSA) or outstanding fit and finish (Webley). Ironically, Diana’s “E” (for export, or England, or both) models had cheaper, simpler, worse sights, because M&G presumably judged (correctly?) that British shooters wanted to hit rats at 10 yards, not small bullseyes at 10M.

It then all started to go to crap with cost-cutting.

The second Golden Era I suggest began with the FWB Sport in the early 70s. Finally, a gun designed from the ground up for power and accuracy, with a barrel and main action components (if not the trigger and safety) made to exceptional standards and a synthetic seal. And, critically, FWB had twigged that the key to useable power was long stroke, not a stiffer spring or bigger bore.

Others had to play catch-up. M&G with the D45 (bigger, longer and heavier than the FWB, but no more powerful, because of its leather seal: the problem the D34 (with bore/stroke dimensions almost identical to the FWB and a synth seal) was invented to correct. Webley with the Vulcan (often overlooked, but a mid-size springer in 1979 that could get over 12 ft-lbs was still a rarity then) and then HW/Beeman with the HW80.

If you are being cynical, and looking beyond Beeman’s hype, he may simply have asked HW to make a bigger more powerful FWB Sport, because the recipe is the same: long stroke and a synth seal, and please make it hit 1000fps with a .177” RWS Hobby.

An honourable mention for the HW77, which is of course a marvellous and important gun, which I love to bits. But it contains not a single new feature (maybe the underlever catch, which is irrelevant). It is an example of something fairly common in successful guns (see FN MAG/GPMG as just one example): an agglomeration of different designs that happens to hit a sweet spot.

Sorry, hadn’t meant to write an essay when I started this.

Sums it up pretty well methinks.

[evert]

That’s great. It’s nice when you get a thing that just seems to be “right”.

I personally think we’ve had two “golden eras” of post-WW2 airguns (and I am mostly thinking springers).

The first is the 1950s and early 60s. All those German gunmakers and shooters then not allowed to make or own “real” guns.

You get very high materials quality, excellent build quality, and real innovation - whether Big Things like the Giss and FWB sledge systems, or lesser ones like really good normal triggers and DSTs (not that good triggers were completely unknown pre-1939). Stocks got better, in some cases.

Sights really improved - not just diopters, but also regular open sights like the wonderful complex front and rear sights on the better 1950s Dianas. Even the British guns at least had innovative design and styling (BSA) or outstanding fit and finish (Webley). Ironically, Diana’s “E” (for export, or England, or both) models had cheaper, simpler, worse sights, because M&G presumably judged (correctly?) that British shooters wanted to hit rats at 10 yards, not small bullseyes at 10M.

It then all started to go to crap with cost-cutting.

The second Golden Era I suggest began with the FWB Sport in the early 70s. Finally, a gun designed from the ground up for power and accuracy, with a barrel and main action components (if not the trigger and safety) made to exceptional standards and a synthetic seal. And, critically, FWB had twigged that the key to useable power was long stroke, not a stiffer spring or bigger bore.

Others had to play catch-up. M&G with the D45 (bigger, longer and heavier than the FWB, but no more powerful, because of its leather seal: the problem the D34 (with bore/stroke dimensions almost identical to the FWB and a synth seal) was invented to correct. Webley with the Vulcan (often overlooked, but a mid-size springer in 1979 that could get over 12 ft-lbs was still a rarity then) and then HW/Beeman with the HW80.

If you are being cynical, and looking beyond Beeman’s hype, he may simply have asked HW to make a bigger more powerful FWB Sport, because the recipe is the same: long stroke and a synth seal, and please make it hit 1000fps with a .177” RWS Hobby.

An honourable mention for the HW77, which is of course a marvellous and important gun, which I love to bits. But it contains not a single new feature (maybe the underlever catch, which is irrelevant). It is an example of something fairly common in successful guns (see FN MAG/GPMG as just one example): an agglomeration of different designs that happens to hit a sweet spot.

Sorry, hadn’t meant to write an essay when I started this.

I agree with most of what you are saying.
Especially the Vulcan really is a great gun if you adjust the jaws and set it up with a good tune.
But the Sport has never impressed me. Sure, the build quality is great, but that's where it stops for me, it just doesn't feel right.

[evert]

I would be interested to hear which Weihrauch's offer you the sort of performance you look for, Evert.

The HW77 and the modern HW50/99 are really good. The Hw95 is close, with its stroke beeing a tiny bit too long, but I still find it to be a much better gun than the "normal" D34.

But this is all subjective to some degree, lets not make this into the usual "Diana VS. HW" argument...

But did Diana ever make the model 26/28 with the first type safety?

[Drew451]

The HW77 and the modern HW50/99 are really good. The Hw95 is close, with its stroke beeing a tiny bit too long, but I still find it to be a much better gun than the "normal" D34.

But this is all subjective to some degree, lets not make this into the usual "Diana VS. HW" argument...

But did Diana ever make the model 26/28 with the first type safety?

They did do both with the first type safety. Plain stamped steel or with a soft touch cover.

[evert]

Its now doing a health 850-860fps with the 7,9 grs JSB's- good thing we dont have power limits over here

The good thing is that the gun behaves really well, so I'm really happy with the shooting characteristics so far!

So, a couple weeks later, the "new gun love" has worn off, and I'm able to judge this gun more objectively...
It is still OK for the format and power, but needs to be calmed down, theres too much movement and vibration during firing.
It shoots OK, but my semi-sorted HW95 is a much better gun.

When I find time and motivation, a JM/ARH HW50s spring is definitely going into this gun on tight delrin guides, I still belive in the potential of the short stroke early D34.

[CapitalBee]

So, a couple weeks later, the "new gun love" has worn off.

As someone who collects a few rifles myself, I can really relate to this sentiment. You compare the rifle to what other models you have in the stable and that comparison will generally dictate how often it gets shot. I always like to come back to some of these rifles at a later date as you can sometimes change your opinion. Point of case for me was the Original model 27 I have (and one I owned previously). Shot in comparison to an HW30, I convinced myself it was inferior, yet a good session a few months later changed my mind.

[evert]

They did do both with the first type safety. Plain stamped steel or with a soft touch cover.

Did they deliver the gun without the soft plastic/rubber cover on the safety, or have the covers on some guns just gotten lost?