Fairground airguns

[edbear2]

That's interesting, I've never seen a speed loader for the magazines. I only remember stall holders having the shot in a pouch that they put their hand in with an empty magazine & a little while later out came their hand with a loaded magazine. One stallholder had two leather buss conductor style money pouch/bags. One was for the takings, the other full of shot. Even in those days he was wary of people detaching the magazines & making off with them.
The targets were paper bullseye ones for those that wanted a souvenir or falling metal fingers, circles or ducks, a few clay pipes & spinners too. For the more adventurous there was a row of self re setting falling ducks. Somehow at a tender age I was hitting the ducks very consistently & must have impressed him. They didnt give prizes but when I finished shooting he took the rifle from me & popped in a full magazine free if charge. I was chuffed, half went on the ducks the ithe half on a paper target which I kept for years.

A guy with a 4.4 rifle (can't recall which type, ie. Haenel or Annie) stall a few years ago at the Bristol Balloon festival had a contraption which looked like a pukka set up of the period, cast metal possibly with a lever / hopper system, wish I had taken more notice / taken a photo, but I did comment on the time saved as I watched him load mags in seconds and was told it was something bought / supplied and not knocked up and was a rare bit of kit.

He even then was talking about the shortage of mags as obviously diecast and get a hard time, so when I said I had airguns he asked where he may get some as always looking for new sources.

Maybe a showman's forum and find the operator as probably still out there, as it's a small community.

ATB, ED

[mallyally]

There are two on Guntrader just now.

wow I have a mint condition one with 6 and 12 shot mags ! wonder how much thats worth nowadays ? wouldn't sell it though

[trajectory]

Ed, thats a bit of a shame you didn't get a picture of the magazine charger but your idea of maybe being able to find the stall holder via a guild might be worth trying. Wouldn't think there would be many shooting galleries knocking around these days.

I'm trying to visualise how a charger might work; got a couple of ideas but seeing one would be nice. I can certainly see the benefit of one to a commercial set up. From memory I can remember the chap loading the magazine with one hand, all by touch as his hand was in the leather bag. Years of practice I guess, takes me five times longer to load a 12 shot one than it does to shoot them all! Magazines seem to be an issue, not through poor reliability just plain unavailabilty to replace losses. They do appear occasionally in 12 shot guise but more frequently 6 shot capacity. Imagine a long spring & a 30 shot snail drum? 10 min to load & 60-90 seconds to fire.......

[Dutch]

Such speed loaders for the 4.4 ball repeaters are already commercially available, for example at https://www.versandhaus-schneider.de...ducts_id/37725

[Dutch]

I do have a couple of these fine fairground rifles! both the 49a & the 275's are my favorites. Reliable, accurate and very well build. Its always a joy to have a little plink competition with the guys in stead of a poker night. I have got 2x49ers & 2x275. I like the 275 a bit better, its is really quite a sturdy instrument, build to take years of beating from ignorant fairground visitors. Last summer we had a stall near by and I tried to buy one of the 275's of the stall holder, failed attempt, he loved his tools, hhh.

[trajectory]

Such speed loaders for the 4.4 ball repeaters are already commercially available, for example at https://www.versandhaus-schneider.de...ducts_id/37725

Dutch, that's brilliant, thank you for posting the information & picture. I've never seen one before, it looks deceptively simple

[Lakey]

I have a Haenel 400, which was one of the last of the turn bolt models.


Lakey

[trajectory]

I have a Haenel 400, which was one of the last of the turn bolt models.


Lakey

Darn it, that's another one I've never heard of. Got to go look it up somewhere!