Category Archives: maintenance

maintenance category

The difference between strikers and hammers

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

A history of airguns

This report covers:

  • What are firearms?
  • What is an explosion?
  • What starts the burning?
  • Ignition
  • Smokeless powder
  • The hammer-fired system
  • Evolution
  • Hidden hammer
  • Striker
  • On the airguns
  • Valve stem
  • Summary

Today I want to explore a gray area in airguns. It’s gray because airguns operate differently than firearms, so we will begin our discussion with firearms for better understanding.

What are firearms?

Firearms are devices that launch projectiles by means of a chemical explosion. To start the explosion there needs to be some kind of initiator. In the beginning, when the gunpowder that we call black powder was in use, all it took was a spark or a hot coal to start the explosion.

What is an explosion?

An explosion is a violent expansion of gasses. Pop a balloon and it explodes. Anything that burns can explode under the right circumstances — even dust. The flour that bread is made from can explode so violently that it can kill people and even level huge buildings. read more

Diana 35: Part 4

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

Diana 35
Diana 35 pellet rifle.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

A history of airguns

This report covers:

  • Disassembly
  • Trigger pin
  • Mainspring and guide out
  • Dry inside
  • Out comes the piston
  • Cleanup
  • Assembly and lubrication
  • Mainspring
  • Gettin’ it back together
  • Assembling the trigger
  • Done
  • The difference
  • How does it work?
  • Summary

Today we do something that’s been on my mind for months. This Diana 35 was part of a deal I made with reader, Carel, from the Netherlands. I bought it because I wanted to turn a larger Diana into a sweet-shooting rifle like reader, Michael’s, Winchester 427/Diana 27 that turned out so nice. The Diana 35 is larger than the model 27 and I thought it was quite similar in the powerplant, which would allow me to tune it the same. It turned out there are significant differences between the two rifles that I discovered as I did the work for today’s blog. We are now going to disassemble, clean, and lubricate a Diana 35. read more

ASG CZ 75 Shadow 2 airsoft pistol: Part 2

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

CZ75 Shadow 2
ASG’s CZ 75 Shadow 2 airsoft pistol.

Part 1

This report covers:

  • The history of airsoft
  • BB gun wars
  • Airsoft shooters
  • How accurate is airsoft?
  • This pistol
  • 0.25 gram “BBs”
  • Biodegradeable
  • Remove the magazine floorplate
  • Fill
  • Load BBs
  • Velocity
  • Trigger pull
  • Slide blows back
  • Accuracy
  • Summary

Get ready for an odd report! Today we look at the velocity of the ASG CZ 75 Shadow 2 airsoft pistol. As I told you in Part 1, this is not your run-of-the-mill airsoft pistol. It retails for $180 and is considered a serious competition airsoft gun — just as the thousand-plus dollar firearm (suggested retail of $1,349.00 for the USPSA Production Division) equivalent is considered ready-to-go right out of the box. Of course no champion will ever leave a gun alone — be it firearm or airsoft, so look for another $500 to $1,000 worth of modifications and accessories to be to be bought/made for/ to the airsoft gun — so long as they remain within the rules. read more

Aligning a scope with the axis of the rifle bore

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

This report covers:

  • Texas Airgun Show
  • The question
  • The bad news
  • Details
  • The barrel
  • Is the scope base parallel to the axis of the bore?
  • What about side-to-side?
  • Scope mounts
  • The answer
  • Greater precision?
  • However…
  • Close enough
  • What is meant by tweaking?
  • Never perfect
  • Summary

Texas Airgun Show

The 2019 Texas Airgun Show will be held on Saturday, June 22. Here is the website with information. This year they will offer FREE TABLES for people bringing a few airguns to the show! In the tent outside the entrance to the hall there will be several tables that are available to people who bring several of their guns but don’t have tables. These are the guys who normally walk the show holding onto airguns they want to sell and trade. You can now put those guns on these tables for free. There will be lots of table sharing going on, and you need to bring everything you need, because these tables are bare. This has never been done at an airgun show before and the promoters are hoping it will help those carrying their guns around to lighten the load. read more

AirForce Edge 10-meter rifle: Part 3

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

Part 1
Part 2
Testing Baracuda FT pellets — Part3

AirForce Edge
The AirForce Edge target rifle.

This report covers:

  • 18-inch Lothar Walther barrel
  • Leak!
  • Accuracy
  • The test
  • No sight-in
  • How do velocities compare between the three barrels?
  • What you see
  • Next
  • Summary

Well, RidgeRunner — this one’s for you! Today we look at the AirForce Edge target rifle that reader RidgeRunner had Lloyd Sykes modify into a fancy plinking/sport air rifle. Lloyd boosted the power at the cost of 3/4 of the shots, by adding an air chamber after the built-in regulator. It is an elegant solution!

A normal Edge set up for target work gets about 110 shots from its tiny reservoir. This one gets 25. A normal Edge shoots target pellets at 500-525 f.p.s. This one shoots heavier RWS Meisterkugeln rifle pellets at an average of 713 f.p.s. (estimate — read Part 2 of this report) for 9.31 foot-pounds of energy at the muzzle. read more

Diana 35: Part 2

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

Diana 35
Diana 35 pellet rifle.

Part 1

A history of airguns

This report covers:

  • The rear sight
  • Breech seal
  • What to expect?
  • RWS Hobby
  • Cocking effort
  • Trigger
  • Summary

Today we start looking at this Diana 35 that I got from reader Carel in the Netherlands. This is an older rifle that doesn’t have a manufacturing date, but it was probably made between 1953 and 1964. It has the features of the early model (stock with finger grooves), yet it has a hooded front sight with a fixed post that isn’t usually found on rifles this early. Of course the sight could have been added at some later time. The rear sight, though, is quite different.

Diana 35 rear sight 1
The Diana 35 rear sight is different than any I’ve seen. read more

ASG CZ 75 Shadow 2 airsoft pistol: Part 1

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by Tom Gaylord
Writing as B.B. Pelletier

CZ75 Shadow 2
ASG’s CZ 75 Shadow 2 airsoft pistol.

This report covers:

  • Different
  • Batteries
  • SHOT Show 2019
  • Bashed Sig
  • Bob Li
  • Not stocked at Pyramyd Air
  • The airsoft gun
  • Caliber
  • CO2 powered
  • Hop Up
  • My plans
  • Summary

Different

Something a little different today. Many newer readers aren’t aware that years ago I wrote a lot about airsoft guns. I even rebuilt some guns with tighter barrels, stronger mainsprings and advanced meca boxes (airsoft term for the actions on automatic electric guns — AEG). In 2013 and 2014 I wrote a 3-part airsoft primer to bring interested readers up to speed.

Over the years I have tested various airsoft guns for you. I won’t link to them all, but back in 2007 I reviewed the UTG Shadow Ops Type 96 sniper rifle and even tested it for accuracy at 50 yards! If you want to see more of these reviews, type airsoft into the search box at the top right of this page and hit the Go button. read more