A little shop time - Or making a cocking assist

[ezman604]

Getting shop time has been rare for me for almost a year now. I'm gradually getting back to the bench. I have several airguns in various stages of build at the moment. I veered away from the bench to fire up the lathe today for something totally different.
It's ALL therapy for me though.
Last week I acquired a sweet Diana P5 Magnum pistol. It had a broken front fiber optic sight tube and now I see why. These jewels were not sold with a cocking assist accessory.



Being rated as a 700+fps air pistol, you can expect some resistance when cocking. I bought some replacement fiber optics rods and fixed the missing front. Then I decided to build a cocking assist handle. This to not only help cock this beast but to help prevent breaking the front sight. I had seen folks recommend just using a piece of conduit or aluminum tube. I didn't want to use anything that could cause scarring or scuffing so I decided to go with Delrin.



Bored to fit and milled the slot. Has a tiny bit of play but it slides on easy and works like a champ.



Therapy...ahhhhhhhhh.

SAFE & Happy Shooting!!!!
Dave
 

[bgmcgee]

Nice work.  That should make a huge difference in the cocking effort.

[Joekrooz]

Perfect!  Sooo much easier with the assist.  The Diana LP8 has the same issue.  It's doable to cock without it, but the front sight makes it more difficult as well as the leverage factor. 

[MichaelM]

Nice!!! its always the fun little tools I enjoy making the most

[Yogi]

Perfect!  Sooo much easier with the assist.  The Diana LP8 has the same issue.  It's doable to cock without it, but the front sight makes it more difficult as well as the leverage factor.

Any idea what the cocking effort is on your LP-8 with and without cocking aid?

-Y

[Joekrooz]

Perfect!  Sooo much easier with the assist.  The Diana LP8 has the same issue.  It's doable to cock without it, but the front sight makes it more difficult as well as the leverage factor.

Any idea what the cocking effort is on your LP-8 with and without cocking aid?

-Y
[/quote

I really don't know, but I would guess it's almost twice the effort without assist.