How much would you pay for a top end off the shelf springer?

[Geezer]

I think that if a grand plus springer were to go on sale from the likes of Air Arms it would sell. Lets face it, the standard of guns they put out for a lot less than that sell very well, and I am sure that should a "deluxe" custom tuned springer became available they would have plenty of takers, a gun much like the special that was auctioned off for charity by them a few years ago. I understand the economy of scale, but using their current product line and spending a bit more on a full blown custom stock and some upgraded internals would not involve re-tooling and much additional expense.

Andy

Let's do the economics.

I'm AA. I take on a new full time staffer to run my custom programme. £20-25k.

My custom programme involves some light disruption to the regular production line. That costs.

I get my customs blued by Paul Chell or Colin M. And tuned by one of the half-dozen well-known tuners. Say those costs come to £200 all in.

Add in a very special CS type stock at £250.

I am now looking at selling them for £5-600 (allowing some profit) more than the stock items. Whereas enthusiasts can do the tuning work themselves, or spread the costs of refinishing, tuning, and fancy stock as and when, or just buy a used Venom/Airmasters rifle for the same or a bit less.

And I still have to pay my new staff member.

[Hsing-ee]

Apart from the Whiscombe FAC rifles, I think it would be hard to sell a springer for more than £600 or so, and even then it would most likely have to have a nice walnut stock as standard.

Springers are simple beasts and there's a point of totally diminishing returns, which hits the ceiling at around the cost of a new walnut Prosport. Like someone said earlier, additional spend would have to be on tailoring it to your own fickle tastes. Many customised rifles are not my cup of tea at all, especially those with huge bulky stocks, and the manufacturers get it right quite often. Apart from the fishscale chequering, the TX200HC and ProSport are very hard to fault from a design or quality point of view. If the TX200 had come out in 1980 Venom arms would have closed immediately.

In the end it is just an air-rifle, for the enthusiast to fling a small pill of lead 40 or 60 yards down-range accurately. Taking out a mortgage to pay for a springer is like a fashionista paying £2000 for a pair of shoes. There are limits!

[MikeHW45]

I'm not sure my enthusiasm would be all that for spending mega bucks on a springer. Realistically i'd probably stretch to £600-700 for a higher end springer that is sweet from the box and to be honest I don't think that's impossible. The quality of the likes of the TX, 77, 98, 97 etc is excellent and they all retail as standard for around the £400 mark. This would then leave £200-300 for improvement and I believe companies such as Weihrauch, AA etc could produce some beauties with the extra budget. I still feel that it is important to produce affordable rifles though for the likes of people like myself who are just financially an average joe and then leave us to our own devices to improve it gradually at a time when funds are available. But for the people who are a little wealthier in life it would be superb to be able to have the option of a top bit of kit without shed loads of after market tuning required.

[Amac]

Would it really be necessary to employ an additional member of staff to assemble a normal production gun using none standard components? Would it be necessary to try and improve upon existing very high standards of blueing Air Arms currently provides? Could Minneli not produce some higher grade walnut furniture?

I do not think it would be as expensive or troublesome to produce a higher grade gun for a manufacturer such as AA personally.

Andy

[lensman57]

The younger shooters coming into the sport I think if faced with a shiny pcp which they know shoot well straight from the box or a springer at the same price which as we all know require more practice will probably take the pcp

. For us who remember our younger days of the springer when pcps were in very early stages of development we have more nostalgic memories of Shooting and like to relive those days. I'd imagine lots of younger shooters have never heard of Venom, Theoben etc and only experience of spring guns are the lower end budget type springers.
Unfortunately for spring fans Competition shooting is now dominated by the pcp. That being said there are still very good high end springers being made and we still have talented tuners and stock makers out there so all is not lost.

This is exactly part of the problem that I mentioned. A young boy or girl can spend £700.00 on a PCP and scope and within a week be hitting 50 yards spinners from a rested position. Who in their right mind would want to spend that kind of money on a heavy, recoiling difficult to master air rifle and probably give up shooting after a few weeks because they can't hit a barn door at 30 yards? Dare I say that we or certainly myself are of a generation who started with a spring powered air gun and it has some kind of nostalgic hold on us, plus the fact that it is hell of a lot of fun ' tunning ' it. I doubt if they hold the same appeal for the younger generation of shooters even at £200.00 for a decent spring powered air rifle let alone £1500.00~£2000.00. Even top end PCPs have a tough time justifying that kind of price tag but for either bling or competition shooting.

A.G

[fieldandtarget]

To be fair I don't think the market would be young people looking to get into shooting to start hitting those 50 yrd spinners straightaway.The PCP will still be there to start with but if they get interested in the hobby they will probably add a quality springer in the future as they look to explore other avenues of their chosen hobby.

I used to fish a lot and I was always amazed how much ordinary working class people spent on their pastimes.The cost of fishing poles/fly rods & reels/carp gear.it was often thousands.
Its the same with shotguns.ordinary folk treating themselves for example to a new £1300 o/u and
airgunners treating themselves to the latest PCP at £1200-£1600.
It happens everyday.

After getting interested in shooting again after a bit o a break there's nothing new(and a bit special) springerwise that interests me off the shelf to look to buy once Xmas is out the way so probably won't bother and just stick with what I've already got.

Just my thoughts,but I would've thought there is a market for both a lightweight custom break barrel and a heavyweight fixed barrel one.

Atb

[Rapidnick]

I think a £1000 price tag would not sell many new spring rifles. I would suspect that £5-600 would be the high water mark for the price. This equates roughly to the price of an existing top end springer plus the cost of a V Glide. Fancy expensive stocks should always be priced as extras but certainly a decent walnut stock should be standard. The 'enthusiast' market is not really a guide to whether a high end factory-standard springer would find favour with more shooters. I suspect it wouldn't.

[where's it gone]

The true value of an air gun is in it's use. They are not to be admired for their looks, like a picture, but for their use. Remember that they a tool to be used. That said, if it does the job, and looks nice, by all means admire them. Personally, the precision engineering of some is a thing of beauty. I can't remember which Weihrauch I had, but the way to feel for the end cap join from the cylinder was to run your finger nail down, it was that good.

[Mach 1.5]

TX200HC and ProSport are very hard to fault from a design or quality point of view. If the TX200 had come out in 1980 Venom arms would have closed immediately.

As from thread from above. Prosport is copied off a Mach 2 and internals from Prosport/ TX are copied off a lazaglide so without Venom / and Mr Turner. These rifles wouldn't have been born!!

[Hsing-ee]

TX200HC and ProSport are very hard to fault from a design or quality point of view. If the TX200 had come out in 1980 Venom arms would have closed immediately.

As from thread from above. Prosport is copied off a Mach 2 and internals from Prosport/ TX are copied off a lazaglide so without Venom / and Mr Turner. These rifles wouldn't have been born!!

It's true!

What I was clumsily trying to say is that the Air Arms TX and ProSport have the tuning innovations built-in, so no real need for a tune. Of course they can be improved on, as Mr Budd and others have elegantly shown, but the main improvement is that they are easier to shoot rather than improving their accuracy which is already innately excellent.

[Rickenbacker]

I see no reason why there couldn't be an AA factory "Custom Shop", offering nice mods & extras fitted at a price.

Same with HW, or if they're too big to be bothered with it, perhaps the importer could do it.

Leupold have a Custom Shop, and on a different note (pun), so do some quality guitar manufacturers.

This whole "it would cost money to do it" argument is weak if you ask me. Not that anybody did ask me.

[Baxterbasics]

.......but if the rifles were supplied already fettled / tuned / customised, what on earth would the bbs springer collective do with all that free time?

[Geezer]

TX200HC and ProSport are very hard to fault from a design or quality point of view. If the TX200 had come out in 1980 Venom arms would have closed immediately.

As from thread from above. Prosport is copied off a Mach 2 and internals from Prosport/ TX are copied off a lazaglide so without Venom / and Mr Turner. These rifles wouldn't have been born!!

I was trying to make the same point in an earlier post.

A similar parallel could be drawn with the Webley Tomahawk and Webley Longbow (loosely based on the Mach1), if only they were still in production. Though the internals are not as refined as the TXs.

.......but if the rifles were supplied already fettled / tuned / customised, what on earth would the bbs springer collective do with all that free time?

. Yes, they/we would all be on here explaining how a shed-tuned 99 was better than a product of the notional AA Custom Shop, at a third the price. Apart from Barry, who would be saying a Diana was better.

[Clanchief]

Venom did the Mach 1 and Mach 2. JW did his wonderful guns back in the day and they sold. My Mach 1 cost me £1500 in 1990 so how much would that be in today standards!. People will pay for quality...shotguns, Watches, Cars etc. Yes it's expensive, can I afford it? If so, treat yourself...Mach 1.5

You are so correct. Knowing the waiting time for bespoke services, I started the ball rolling last year to have something special for my fiftieth this year.

The cost in total is nearer £2.5k',,,,,,,,,,,,,this will get you a HW80,,,,sleeved and glided by V Mach with a Venom slimtech silencer and breech conversion, a top end Gary Cane stock, and a Delta Optical Titanium scope to top it off.

The scope had me in circles which to choose as some of you know I had bought many, tried them on top and sold them on, I settled on the 2.5-16x50SF from Delta, the thing that on top of the quality glass from Japan was the daylight visible centre dot which you can increase in intensity, the Richard Utting channel shows them off to perfection.

[FPoole]

Would it really be necessary to employ an additional member of staff to assemble a normal production gun using none standard components? Would it be necessary to try and improve upon existing very high standards of blueing Air Arms currently provides? Could Minneli not produce some higher grade walnut furniture?

I do not think it would be as expensive or troublesome to produce a higher grade gun for a manufacturer such as AA personally.

Andy

Have to agree. AA has beautiful bluing already. They could bring back the old MarkI stroke and have one of the assembly line guys use only guides that fit the spring snuggly. Now take a few minutes setting the trigger to a finer let off. Top this off by hand picking only the best looking walnut stocks that they already have. This would be one perfect airgun at a reasonable price. AA could probably do this to the TX for the same price they get for a Pro Sport.