Donation

All Springer/NP/PCP Air Gun Discussion General > PCP/CO2/HPA Air Gun Gates "The Darkside"

The 177cal Chief let off the leash

(1/4) > >>

Racing:


Backstory, cause there is one, is that one of our local hardware store chains for some reason has come to offer a Beeman Chief rip-off, in 177cal only. These are going at 135Ģ/165$ and as we came to chat at coffee break.. we arrived on picking one up as sorts of a dare.
Thing is..
I went to pick it up and was about dead set on this being an expensive toy. For children.
Well.
I was wrong i guess. Nope. Didnīt even fire it, just tore it apart to see what it was made of and to my surprise the thing was put together neatly. Very much so even.
Sharp tools had been used and things fit together better than many 1000$ rifles iīve been into  :o

No. Of course no threads on barrel for a moderator and of course no scope or stands and of course no pic rail or bi-pod. But hey.. 165 bux. Hello!



As i had the thing apart i tossed the barrel on the lathe first thing and actually opted to go a little different for this one, cutting it 1/2"-28 UNEF out front. As some of you know iīm into making my own moderators and have a few around carrying that thread - which i honestly like and find better than 1/2"-20UNF.

That being said the thing went back together again aaaand...
The trigger.
It HAS to be the most god awful thing iīve ever experienced. Yeah. Carries a few adjustment screws but.. no. Just.. NO!



In all honesty. As is itīs not usable. Not even on the best of days.



About as basic as they come i guess, but shutter angles are so off to start with that.. Yeah well, whatever. I polished the living daylights out of everything in sight and as the parts are steel at least adjusted it as "fine" as itīd go.
At this state.. BARELY to use. Mark BARELY.

While at that shop, well.. they sell the 8,4 grain JSBīs too right so picked a tin of those up and in turn these "super duty" scope rings  ;D
Nah. None of it put me in the poor house exactly. That being said, it says on the tube not to fill beyond 2000psi or 138bar. Yeah well, as an engineer.. no. H*ll no even.
A fair guess is that the stated 2000psi in this case comes down to keeping power back. Only reason i can see at least.. But, i digress.

Fired the thing and was rewarded with a pattern sized was this a scattergun. Ooookey.. Off the barrel came again, quick polish of the crown and chamber followed by a decent clean.



Okey! So. 30 meters, but as measured with an FX brick it handed approx 7,5J. I presume these are marketed in Germany too, where thatīs the limit to keep exempt.
It at least came to hand me a grouping.

That being said..



Apart. Again. Like i write above, most of the parts on this piece are actually quite alright. Valve for instance is held in place "floating" via three pieces of allen cap screws where the load in shear is on their heads. Smart move! Compare that to other ultra budget PCPīs like the Stormrider and its 200 cousins.. Materials used, again in contrast, sure isnīt the crappiest stuff around either. No.. i refrain from using the word good, but.. decent i guess would be a fair nomer.

For some reason tho the design is such that thereīs a massive dead blow hammer stop within the tube, and this is set at such a depth that the poppet spindle turns very very long, unsupported.
Weīll get back to that..



For some reason the piece lacks a traditional transfer port. Instead what is used is like a "cut to shape" semi hard plastic piece, i guess POM, that is sandwiched in between the tube and the receiver. NOT exactly my thoughts on how to keep this thing leak free so.. Shoved an 8mm endmill into the exhaust port of the valve, and same thing on the receiver why i turned a more traditional transfer port sporting regular o-rings on its ends.
So yeah.
At this stage we were running ports juuuuust a tad over 4mm. As such, back together and this time out.. well i had ordered me a tin of H&Nīs 20 grain hollow points and in turn their 21 grain "Piledrivers" too.

...aaaaaaaand, back to scattergun.
Upon closer examination, i shoved a No of pills through the bare barrel, it turns out sheīs on the large side. So much so in fact that none of the slugs engaged the rifling. At all.
What to do?

Well. This might be a trick worth something to someone, but as our pills are swaged i reasoned as such that i could sure try and "swage them a little more".



So i kind of recut a regular drill bit to the approx shape of the nose cone and drilled this piece of brass out with a 4,5mm drill bit. The honed it to 4,57 by hand on the lathe. Turned a couple of mandrels to fit the rears of the pills. Massaging them to 4,55-4.56mm diameter and.... bingo.
At least as far as the 20 grain H&N hollows.

Racing:


Again at 30 meters, and of course at decent speeds this time out seeing the englarged transfers.

Then to go astray a little.
The hammer on these things, the stock item is an absolute BLOB of steel. Didnīt put it on the scale before i cut into it, sorry, but a fair guess is vs the 100 gram mark. Might actually be even more..
So diet time. For real.





This thing has since undergone a few iterations. For a while there at 50+ grams.. then 44.. now 37. Truth be told though iīm now running a dual hammer spring setup and i bet a "golden middle" would have the thing come in around like 45-47 grams and then just one appropriate singular spring. Recall that insane long poppet stem?
What i opted to do, best as i could, was recut the actual striking face of the hammer to protrude way deeper beyond that hammer stop and then cut back accordingly on the poppet stem. Truth be told it might very well be that upcoming iīll make a completely fresh hammer with an even more pronounced so, to be able to cut the stem back even further. At that point.. might very well be with a 2mm stem too.
Anyways..



De-pinger, through hole was of course upped as well. At this point... to *(&^ with them 2000psi. Win or lose, YES iīm aware of what iīm doing here, i opted to go 250bar.
Now we were getting somewhere. Them 20 grain slugs came to exit at the most around the 1065-1070 mark, which is saying something.



True. By now not so much a "mere 165$ gun" anymore -seeing the time invested. None the less what i had in hand was a 177cal (my first experience with that caliber btw) el-cheapo PCP showing REAL good accuracy for "minute of rat" no doubt.
So.
An old Yukon IR iīve got laying around and rats.. here i come. From a practical point of view i was a tad discouraged at first. Being used to the downright mayhem the 25cal do on the rats.
Truth be told though, 177cal or no they were still dead as doornails. No floppin around, no helicopter movement nothing the likes. Just, *pft*. Youīre dead. Hm.
From a minescule little 4,5mm projectile?
I truly learned something new here, that much was for sure.



Yep. Can is home brew too, out of steel. Yep. Weighs its fair share no doubt (approx 380 grams) but the puff doesnīt seem to mind.



But enough was enough already. Albeit the bolt handle on these are out of steel that actually WORKS (Stormrider, *blink**blink*, nudge nudge) itīs designed to fit the palm of a 6yr old so.. Made a new one, that i cut a brass end for.
WAY better and now i had no issues what so ever pulling the bolt.

However. Although tank capacity is larger than on a Stormrider it still isnīt anything to write home about right.. and at the levels i was..enough.



Now. I wanna be very very very clear here on that the fabbing of high pressure vessels is NOT for the novice. If you ainīt EXTREMELY familiar with what youīre doing here.. just donīt. Pressures involved are enough to kill you, and then some so tread gently and carry a BIG stick!
That out of the way, high pressure seamless tubing and according end pieces - out of steel. Ends were threaded and then TIG welded on 140A and that done i drilled into the material from the side and "rosette" welded in 4 points on each end as well.



Yeah. You all see where this is heading..  ;D
A tad of math told iīd be the north side of 300ccīs, which is WAY more like it. Note here.. for some reason, i thought there and then, the thing stonewalled no matter what i did at approx 1070fps using them 20s.
As it turned out, a true brain fart cause i had upped through holes and dimensions alright.. just forgot about the "lid" for the valve that holds the return spring in which was still at approx 4,5mm. Doh!
So upon reassy.. donīt need that where weīre going! So no more return spring, no more "lid". Enough already.

Racing:


Keeping tube diameter on 38mm let me keep most of the wood intact. Foster fitting got replaced by a stand alone such, which the original sure is not.
Now on a slightly shorter tube thereīs no issues what so ever getting the fill fitting on there anymore.





Remarkably enough all "the little things" got ironed out smoothly and it was time to let her rip, and did she ever.
FX brick went blank and i was rewarded with a rather hefty super sonic boom...  :o No more 1070fps i guess huh!
No. I still havenīt checked with my LabRadar, will have to get around to that.. But suffice it to say i turned the hammer spring adjuster WAY down to get her to come to a rest at approx 1030.



..and this is how she came to reward me cause that there is all in all 9 shots at 30 meters at dusk (in short done with that old POS Yukon IR).

Call me impressed. This.. 165$ gun hands accuracy like it was going out of style. Yep. Still "re-swage" them 20 grain hollows and yep.. it sure does the trick!

Since sheīs downed yet a No of rats and leaves no room for debate what so ever. Mission accomplished in short.

But.
This of course has fed a few follow ups. What about the trigger? Itīs an abomination to be quite candid. Have looked into implementing the small bits from Kral actually, to make it into a "weighed" unit. Even checked how a trigger group for an Artemis M-16 would fit (which it will with a tad of tinkering).
Same in turn, maybe make it sidelever?
As some of you know i am NO fan of bolt actions for PCP guns.
But yeah.
On a whole, there ya have it. The el-cheapo 165$ 177cal Beeman Chief rip-off that went ape.  ;D

Back_Roads:
 That is one screamin Beeman :)

SwampHunter:
Nice gun and write up!

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page