GTA
All Springer/NP/PCP Air Gun Discussion General => European/Asian Air Gun Gates => Turkish AirGun Gate => Topic started by: Blowpipe Sam on November 07, 2021, 07:41:52 PM
-
I’ve been having some problems with two of my Hatsan break barrels suffering from a barrel pivot screw that keeps loosening. The pivot screws on the Striker and the Mod 125 both have scallops cut into the head of the pivot screw so that a small guard screw can be used to lock the pivot screw in place. Except that there is a problem with this design. This is the tricky part.
The pivot screw is a flat head that has a slot cut across the screw head. When the pivot screw is tight the guard screw fits into one of the scallops and locks the pivot screw in place. Unless the scallop is adjacent to the screw driver slot in the top of the screw.
-
If the locking scallop is adjacent to the screw driver slot the poor steel used by Hatsan will distort at the edge of the slot and allow the pivot screw to loosen. This is visible in the photo above.
Below is a Hatsan Mod 125 with the barrel pivot screw correctly tightened so that the guard screw locks into a scallop 1/4 rotation from the edge of the screw driver slot
-
The above photo is my .22 cal mod125 which has over 1500 shots through it without loosening.
Below is my Striker showing it’s recently replaced and correctly tightened pivot screw.
-
Here is a photo of the pivot screw that I removed from my Striker. The locking scallop adjacent to the screw driver slot is distorted just like the one on my mod 125.
So here is my advice. When tightening the barrel on a Hatsan springer, be sure that the guard screw fits into a scallop as far as possible from the screw driver slot. The slot weakens the top of the screw and the cheap steel distorts under repeated cocking stresses. Eventually it will slip enough to affect accuracy.
-
Dears, isn't it possible to replace those lousy Hatsan screws with others made of better steel ?
-
Haven't looked too hard into this, but my understanding is that Hatsan screws and bolts are of pretty strange sizes, meaning you can't go and buy non-Hatsan replacement screws / bolts. You may need to machine them out of larger stock, with attendant tapping, heat treating etc., all of which together is anything but straight forward, if even possible, to most airgunners.
-
Stock screws can be gotten in most hardware stores, just take yours and match them up. I have and found them.
The pivot bolts I've never tried finding but as already said, you may not be able to due to '
the odd sizes, but again, at least take one and try.
As always, a good set of gunsmithing screwdriver bits is always recommended and not just standard screwdrivers.
-
My AirTact has that same arrangement, and the factory location does indeed use the position where the locking screw engages the edge of the slot on the pivot screw.
It's not a bad design, just the wrong hardware. They should've used Allen or Torx, or even a cheesy Phillips, if they want to save a cent on fasteners...
-
Well-designed but poorly made (out of poor materials) is what characterizes the entire Hatsan catalogue.
I feel my walnut-stocked H135 is really how a super mag springer should be, save for the tolerances and the metal quality.
-
They saved a few cents by using cheap metal for fasteners. If I could find pivot bolts at the local hardware stores and in Grade 8
like I did the stock screws, I'd already have them...lol.
-
Yeah, they seem like project guns.
Hobbyists get them and fix the issues caused by design or material flaws, and then turn them into good guns. I'm seeing a pattern re. them not shooting as hard as they should. My AirTact is 35% less powerful than it should be. Someone else's recent 95 was having a similar problem.
Using star washers only, instead of star washers on top of flat washers is a horrible design decision. The star washers tear up the stock. The screws also were not long enough to accommodate the star washers probably, much less when we add a flat washer. This is also a design flaw.
Whatever is causing the lower power (bad sealing of the breech?) is a quality problem that should have been caught pre-production.
Rather than invest the money to fix these things and design properly, Hatsan decided to go for cheap. My opinion is that if the wood for their stocks wasn't so nice & affordable, they would be in the same echelon as the Chinese rifles.
Kral had the same type of problem with their early PCPs; not sure if they still do, but I'm done with them too. If I'm going to buy cheap rifles, I might as well try to support The Home Team. (Crosman) We'll see how my Crosman Diamondback does; so far it's nicer than the AirTact.
-
I think one issue with regards to Hatsans losing power is the fact that they sport spring guides that are an undersized joke, leading to the mainsprings canting and losing power within the first hundreds of shots. What does a spring being heavily compressed do, unsupported? It buckles, bad. Sitting on short "guides" that are too thin by millimeters, the springs will buckle, overstress locally and cant.