Howa 55G
This is getting off topic.
Mk1 Airsporter is the most graceful mass-produced air rifle made.
Graceful. Everything swoops and tapers and just fits together fluidly. It has grace.
Not most appealingly Gothick (Mk2 Service?). Not most Baroque (1950s Diana 50?). Not best handling (lots of contenders). Not best looking (ditto). Not even most classical (FWB Sport?, Beeman R1?), just graceful.
Certainly not "best". Not even necessarily best-looking. Just most graceful.
Ironically, the Airsporter when introduced seemed jet-age modern, like contemporary cars, despite their pre-war underpinnings (Google "Bristol 401" - lovely and then some). Later it seemed old. Now it seems historic.
It helps that the early 'sporters are also built well, and shoot fairly well.
Howa 55G
No offence to anyone but it's just silly to state as a fact which is the most graceful air rifle. It's completely in the eye of the beholder.
Personally I find the Airsporter (MKs 1&2) pretty but the knowledge of their awful triggers spoils the visual image for me ().
To me the Mk2 Service is the most graceful air rifle ever made and I'm sticking to that.
Vintage Airguns Gallery
..Above link posted with permission from Gareth W-B
In British slang an anorak is a person who has a very strong interest in niche subjects.
Iwill second that motion.
airsporter stutzen
Yes, alright. Of course, you are wrong on the MkII, which is visually a bucket of bolts and very "steampunk ", but that's entirely a matter of taste. . Not "graceful", in my personal book, but very appealing.
In architectural terms, the MkII is 1300s Decorated Gothic, whereas the 'sporter is 1800s Greek Revival classicism, or even 1900s Le Corbusier modernist.
Whereas things like the Webley Tommie and Longbow have the functionally best stocks ever in a factory springer. Not graceful, but brilliant handling.
(Is it only me where the spell-check tries to change "factory" to "Fat Tory"? Weird.)
another one for the stutzen
In the eyes of this beerholder the Air Arms SE90 has always raised a neck hair or three, I think it more elegant than a Pro-Sport.
Not mine.
Polar opposite
I sell TatarGan in the caliber of the pope. Iron sits in the crocodile. A light bun turned out.
Does the Giffard count as an air-rifle ? If so it probably gets my vote by a whisker over the Webley service Mk11. They are both elegant, graceful rifles and superbly well engineered.
My FWB Sport is hard to beat on elegance of its lines.
A walnut sexy stock would lift it even higher.
(Anyone want to post my picture?)
Vintage Airguns Gallery
..Above link posted with permission from Gareth W-B
In British slang an anorak is a person who has a very strong interest in niche subjects.
Last edited by aimless; 08-02-2018 at 05:44 PM. Reason: inserting picture does not work again :-(