Kral Puncher Auto

[Racing]

Offspin if ever but.. we´re all gun nuts i guess so..

For those not in the loop what a Chassepot is, here is my rather rare Chassepot cavalry carbine which is about mint. Made in 1868.

The Chassepot is often regarded as "the worlds first modern rifle" and in essence it´s a single shot bolt action jobbie that uses a paper cartridge of 45 caliber.
They have a rep of shooting far, just not very accurate. Well. I set out to solve that, and did. Since we use what´s known as bore rider boolits for them and they´re since as accurate as any modern rifle just about. Still blackpowder but will take stout loads of Triple 7 or even duplex loads to (blackpowder and smokeless powder mixed). The original cartridge compares to a 45-90 approx, so this thing packs a bit of whallop when asked to.





As i believe i´ve touched upon before we´re allowed to use n shoot these old ´uns sans any FAC or similar. Powder as well as caps and what not is readily available so to use these things to us is just one big "go ahead".



As they use a paper cartridge they seal the chamber via a rubber obturator. In short when the powder goes off that steel "umbrella" there up front gets shoved rearwards which makes that rubber ring swell and thus seal the chamber.
The whole thing actually works very well.

But yeah. That´s what i used Impact springs for from the onset. The OEM hammersprings of these things are after all 150+yr old by now so.. let´s allow them being a bit tired

[Racing]

Ah! Yes! The good stuff! Good as gold, in this case
Did it do the trick? Yes. Yes it did, and we´re now scooting them 25,4 pills downrange @ 1050 to 1080fps. So.. platform one - CHECK!
Next up..
Going to toss an idea at the valve.. i´ll get back to you as i see how it irons out.

That said i´ve also made good with the guys down in Slovakia on a 25cal barrel and two clips for that. Now for a decent regulator and then fab a plenum of my own..


Btw. The difference in quality n detail for these springs vs the ones we see in the Kral, Hatsans and what not?
Not even on the same map. This is, industrial style, the real effin deal. Made out of a special temper "valve spring steel" SIS-2090. Those of you in the loop i guess are aware that this place, where i live, is reknown for its steels...and that ain´t no lie. Let me tell ya..

[Racing]

She´s no doubt coming full circle. Stock handed linseed as we go.
Where we´re at pushing 25,4´s dowrange @ a steady 1040-1050 approx.

Came to hand the trigger attention. The one that was so god awful at the start. Well. Adjusted that a tad to deep i guess.. went back just a smooch.. Need to look into that even more cause as the thing is performing since yesterday it deserves a "match grade" fall of that trigger.

Then i took a closer look at that piston ring on the piston running the auto load, shot. Turned a new one, actually 4 of them, to arrive on what was reasonable. Being fairly anal about dimensions.
Ring is out of plastics so no biggie really owning a lathe. Plugged up a few holes, opened a few others up. Where i´m at right now it auto loads ca 90% of the time, and of course i won´t settle until we´re at 100%.

Need to replace a few o-rings that i lack on my shelf. Namely the one for the pellet probe which is shot. IOW i expect muzzle speed to jump yet a little bit that done.

As stated, 1040-1050. So for SnG i loaded up with a clip of 18 grainers. BOOM! FX brick wouldn´t register! Lucky me i´ve got a LabRadar next to it then...
Yep. Sound barrier.. LOL. It´s kind of interesting to see how much pill speed kind of "climbs by itself" as soon as the pill has broken the barrier.
But yeah.
We´ll keep from that from now on out.. LOL

So for the next couple of weeks, details. Happy camper in short as this Kral has no doubt reached platform 1 in the progress of it. Have a box of 34 grain Javelins ordered, going to be interesting seeing where that ends up speed wise.

That done? Regulator time. I think. It comes down to if the rifle really needs it. I use them for pest control only as noted, and of course plinkin away too but that said the tank on this one is rather large at 425cc´s.
Pondering the idea of a yet larger 300 bar tank (the beauty of the buddy bottle setup) and at that rate a reg IS mandatory to bring pressure down no doubt.
Decisions.. LOL

But where we´re at since yesterday.? We´re good. What has struck me is how well the thing performs at least at shorter distances with pellets and slugs both. Impressive even.

[Racing]

Yeah. So. I´d say this thing is coming together. A fair bits way it´s come too - in a rather short time.



I´ve come to grow rather fond of the piece, have to admit to that, and as such thus giving thought to my various options on it. Think it looks real good even.



Where we´re at, as i told above, we´re currently sending 25,4´s downrange at approx 1040fps. Seeing that ZA made Javelins @ 34 grains are heading this direction... question is where to aim for. Power wise i mean. If i get to propel 34´s downrange at mid 900´s i´ll be a happy camper as that lends i´ve basically got a semi auto 22 at around 100J (just short of at 950-970. Approx 95J)
I like the adjustability of PCP´s and as such then.. this Kral lacks the little knob the "manual" Kral rifles got, the "power adjuster wheel". Be that as it may i guess that comes down to the auto load function and its in all honesty lack of adjustability. Or at least quick and simple adjustability.
That i do NOT like.
Being able to dial the thing between 10J and 100J is my aim. No doubt. Lose the semi function at 10J, yes i will and am fully aware of this.



So. Yep. What i´m giving thought to.. hm. First up though. I took a long good hard look at the trigger group. As is, haven´t measured the pull, it´s.. usable at least. Say that it touches down around a pound n half or so. IOW not insanely light, but again.. lack of adjustability.
As is the M3 grub screws in there, their pitch is simply to coarse to be of use. To dial the trigger i´m down to moving the allen key used like 1/20th of a rotation..even less. At the one end stiffer than needed, and the other end.. sear won´t lock in. Damned if you do, damned if you don´t kind of. As it sits.. i could sure use it being half a pound lighter. But hey! That´s just me!



Power. Adjustability. Hear me out here.. cause what i THINK i´ll do is first up one of them more or less generic pressure regulators available for any buddy bottle setup. Just one thing, it needs to be disc operated. A spring one is just plain out. Then.. off the stock 200bar flask comes... to be replaced by a 300 bar one.
In this manner i can up working pressure basically as i see fit and get ample room for air no matter. So yeah.. They´re not an arm and a leg anymore, and nor is the regulators in case.
So i regard it as such that a generic reg "saves" me money and these savings are put into a 300 bar bottle. Done deal.



In turn, as much as i appreciate that cheap 8-32*56 on there i need to adress the idea of IR. My PCP guns are all used and thus earn their stay, and that with a prime intention. As rodents are on the menu that means nocturnal and.. you guys get it.
I´m SO pleased with the Pard NV-008LRF on my Impact but hey.. Even used it´s still like YET another 500€. Be that as it may though, what are my options really?
For now, got a Yukon laying around i could (and most likely will) put ontop there. For starters at least. That way i at least get to use the rifle for its intended target.



Yes. It´s all in the details isn´t it?



As sort of half asking you guys i guess..?
Where i´m at that regular scope on there will suffice just fine for plinking and regulat target work out to an easy 100 meters. 30mm tube scope which brings that it shares that with the Yukon IR. IOW.. just a matter of letting off on the yokes/top braces and toss n turn i guess with an at least REASONABLE repeatability. Ie; you won´t have to sight yourself in halfways to death to get back on target when mixing the two scopes depending on situation.

In turn. Need to have a few o-rings replaced. The one sealing off the probe is so shot it isn´t even funny, and mind you i STILL get 1040 albeit that friggin STORM out by the probe.
That said.
A reg and a 300 bar bottle i believe to be the correct route here. It´s eating the cake and get to keep it as i regard it.

What would be YOUR take here?
Let me know please guys will you?

[Racing]

C´mon guys!
Surely SOME of you has an opinion or two to share on the matter.?

[Shed tuner]

it's interesting, but I think you have to understand that we can't do semi auto here, and there's not much interest in FAC air over 50 joule as it's just noisy and inconvinient - the licensing requirements are the same as for the .22 rimfire (which ironically we can have a semi-auto for, just not airguns). so once you get more than 40-50 joule, just get a rimfire.

When I have FAC air, 30 foot-pounds is the sweet spot for me personally. Maybe we could push that to 40 foot-pounds, but that's pretty much it (not technically, but in terms of it being useful).

We also can't get this rifle

[Odjick29]

Not sure which way you should go with the rifle but whichever you choose, please continue to update as your threads are a fantastic read. I will pick up an NP02 in the near future and it has been good to see that the Kral action is decent quality.
Regards
Jon

[Shed tuner]

Kral actions are a decent platform IMHO. They need "finishing" - tweaks, smoothing out, whatever, but are fundamentaly decent.

[Neil54]

I have enjoyed your tinkering with this rifle.
Keep up the interesting threads.

[Racing]

Thx lads.



So push came to shove and i´ve thus far only got one Pard 008.. so out the old Yukon Photon XT came. It´s the 6,5*50 flavor but it can´t be helped and needs to be told...
It just feels Stonehenge once you´ve gotten the taste of that Pard. Sry but that´s just the way it is. Sighting in it was done in a jiffy, no ills there.

Then. These, as i´ve told many a time by now, are working guns to me. Use both the Pard and the Yukon with a stand alone IR light. Mainly to conserve battery, and yes it´s a plan that IS good and DOES work as intended.
Nights can get pretty long on occasion. Bare in mind, this is not a permission per se it´s just outside the door at my shop and the intent is to keep it clean of rodents.

So dispatched of 5 the other night and then 3 tonight but...

Edited

..one of them sure was the full grown flavor! That´s 1,2kg worth of rat, right there! (Which is like what? 2.6lbs?) I´ve downed a few of the large ones but this one ranks right up there. Mid fall one was actually of 1.5kg (3,3lbs approx) but.. This size they´re like small cats for the love of gawd.
The small box next to it? What we call "snus". Tobacco like chewing, just.. you don´t chew. Just place a portion of it underneath your lip n.. One of the peculiaritys of this place i guess That box about fills your palm, gives an idea of size of that thing.

That said. Out of curiosity i had ordered some ZA made "Javelin" hollow points. 26´s and 34´s. The 26´s.. have to say they shoot REAL well out of the Kral in case and hits like a ton of bricks. Energy transfer is truly massive (why i don´t show the other side of that thing) as it is with most slugs as speeds climbs. The Javelins though, have used them in 22 mainly these nights and.. accurate, hits harder than a hammer (Tonya Harding 2000) and sure gets the job done in one blow.
Thus they´re good stuff in my book. Being imported up here makes them a tad expensive TBH but hey..
In this case set to exit around 950 approx.

(Btw. If this place is a "no pics of dead critter" zone just let me know and i´ll edit that pic out in a flash. No idea if ok or not so just let me know.)

[eyebull]

Hi dude it is in the rules, no pics of dead animals, I'd delete that sharpish.

[Odjick29]

Have you considered making a video of your rifle modification and hunting trips. It would be interesting to see it in action. As you said, that rat is more like a cat!

[Racing]

Read and understood.
Didn´t know, hence my writing. Sorry.

[Racing]

All them positives, don´t i have ANYTHING negative to say about the Kral Puncher auto?

Well.
Yes.



I guess in many a ways it´d be asking a lot seeing their price point, but they sport a pic rail up front for the stock bi-pod and that pic rail is out of plastic. Now.. no. Just.. no.
So i unbolted that thing and threw it in the bin, replaced it with a ground level piece of aluminium instead.
While at it, the stock setup is a 1 screw affair, i added a second screw and done deal.

The stock bi-pod in turn.. WAY WAY WAY better than the crap that gets delivered with the Hatsan jobbies but.. not foldable and so on. Nothing per se inherently wrong with the piece of kit however and i could sure get away with using it for bench shooting.
Hunting though, not so much. At that rate the thing NEEDS to be able to fold away and what not.



In this case it came to touch down with one of them chinese ripp off Atlas jobbies. These have a rep of having their massive center nut working loose, which is simple enough to make way better by applying a semi liberal coat of blue Loctite to the threads of them.
Then of course.. there´s nothing on there that compares to the original. Of course not, but for the average hobbyist these days i bet that more often than not a ripp off is what gets installed seeing what the originals run.

Happy? On a general whole, yes. Very. Does what it should and so on so.. no complaints. Caveat being that it NEEDS to be picked completely apart and then put back together again. Anything rough needs to be sorted.
But.. yeah. Yes.

[eyebull]

Read and understood.
Didn´t know, hence my writing. Sorry.

No worries
He was a big old boy though!

Looks like you've got yourself the perfect rat smashing machine. As regards things like atlas bipods, I'm a a firm believer in the law of diminishing returns and for a lot of these top flight accessories you probably wouldn't see the benefit on a PCP, when some of the copies really are quite good.
This thread has reminded me that I need to sort a NV rig out as I have a permission waiting once I'm ready to go. The Kempton fair has swallowed my disposable income for the time being but now I have a suitable PCP I'll be in the market for a Pard (I think) soonish...