Attention HW 45 owners!

[photoshooter]

Old powder burner but very new air gunner here. Took me a while to discover air guns but once I did I got it bad! Initially bought a HW 95k and was so impressed that w/in a week I also purchased a Beeman P17 and an HW45...and that brings me to the reason for this post.

The HW 45 Black Star (.22 cal.) arrived last night. I specifically purchased this model because of posts on this sight regarding its high quality, good trigger, and accuracy. After living with and loving my HW95 I was very surprised by what I found when I unpacked the Black Star. The first thing I noticed was that it rattled terribly when shook or just handled. This surprised me because I had read that it did not do so. Most annoyingly though was the trigger. Extremely long first stage with a lot of “grinding” as the trigger is squeezed...almost like there is sand or burrs in the action. Accuracy is coming around after about a dozen shops or so but I am having a hard time with the rattling and trigger pull.

My question to all of you is: is this normal and would you keep the gun?

Thanks
Tony

[7624452]

I have a standard HW 45 and it was perfect when I received it.  If I received one as you describe I would return it.

[Duckfish]

Doesn't sound like the P11 I used to own.

[aladdin]

I have a standard HW 45 .22 Bought new earlier this year.  I never noticed a rattle.  After a check just for you . There is a very slight rattle only if I shake the gun. Probably the cocking bars. The Trigger is smooth and always has been. There is some spring noise when cocking, that is better now than when new.  The HW 45 does not have the same quality feel overall as my HW30. I also have a HW75 it has a overall feel much like the HW30 smooth and solid. I will be keeping them all.

[WyoMan]

Hi Tony, I have two HW 45s, a .177 and .22, both black stars and I love them both. Yes, they will rattle if you shake them, and as aladdin noted it is the cocking arms that are moving side to side and/or up and down. If that's your rattle, don't worry it's normal.

The long first-stage that is gritty sounds like the second-stage screw (the one that is aft) isn't screwed in far enough. A 5/64" hex will engage the setscrew socket. Turn it in (CW) a half turn and check. Adjust some more if necessary noting the changes so you can go back to square one if it gets too far out of adjustment. I've found that (for me) the perfect trigger setting is when the second-stage occurs as late as possible while still allowing the trigger to fully reset when let off. But if the second-stage occurs too late, the end of the first-stage won't be smooth and the trigger won't reset.
If none of this works and the trigger doesn't smooth-out, I'd return it.

Wyo

[photoshooter]

Aladdin and WyoMan,

   Thanks for your input and experience. After a lot of investigation it appears that it is the cocking arms. If I cock it all the way open the rattling stops but as soon as I release the slide and start to close it I am able to make them rattle again. Seems like an avoidable flaw in a semi- expensive handgun, but it looks like it is what it is. After a more careful study, the trigger noise/roughness sounds like it might be a spring dragging. I haven’t opened it up yet and don’t know the interior dynamics, but that is what I have narrowed it down to. I’ll try Wyoman’s adjustments and see if I can locate the offensive spring.

All those guys that wrote to say this is a difficult gun to shoot appear to be correct. In powder burners I primarily shoot and hunt with handguns and have taken everything from ground squirrels to moose. I consider myself a fairly experienced pistolero, and that is why I purchased this gun. I’m having second thoughts....
I’ve put about 30 rounds through it tonight trying to adjust sights and figure out a hold and the best I have been able to do is about a 1.5” group at 10 yards! I’ve shot better groups with my .454 Casaull with hot home brewed hunting loads! I have not been able to shoot it consistently from a bag rest yet.

I’ve heard too many good things about this gun so I am going to adjust the trigger, live with the rattle and give it until Monday to see if I can figure anything out. As long as I know mine is not a Friday afternoon gun I don’t mind the challenge trying to figure it out. My first springer, an HW 97 I bought about a week ago, only took about 10 minutes to figure out. I’m shooting 3/16” c-c 5 shot groups with it now off of a rest at 25 yards, but this pistol promises to offer more of a challenge!

Thanks again to all who have taken the time to share their experience and knowledge to help a newb.

[photoshooter]

Not sure if this belongs here but it is related so, here goes.

When I was lurking here doing research for the HW 45 I wanted to buy I kept coming across posts for the Beeman P 17 (the Chinese clone of the now Chinese owned Beeman companies P 40). I was intrigued by not only the glowing reports about this toy priced gun but the history behind it. Enough so that I was willing to pay the $29.00 to buy one to see if they were true or not. Well last night the P17 arrived as I was trying to find a good hold to tame the HW45 so I decided to shoot them together for a comparison. At this point I had been struggling for two days with the 45, but was gaining on it. In contrast, I unpacked the .177 cal. P17 and four pellets later had it sighted in for elev. and windage on my 10 meter indoor range. I then grabbed seven more pellets and when the smoke cleared I had two in the bulls eye of the paper target I had hanging and I had cleared all of the five knock down targets I had sitting on the shelf of my home made pellet trap! Logically I should have packed up the $410.00 more expensive 45 and returned it, but oddly enough the desire to master it was now even stronger (I hate losing!). I think I’ll shoot it all weekend and decide on Monday whether to send it back and trade it in for a HW 75 that I was also originally considering.

By the way, for all you HW45 Black/Silver Star owners; how do you like the grips on your guns? I purposely chose this model over the strait 45 because I liked the looks of the grip. As soon as I picked it up though I was immediately struck by two thoughts. One, while it was ergonomically well shaped, the grip seemed too short for my medium sized hands. And two, there is a small protrusion where the grip meets the frame that hits right in the middle of my third finger rather than in a finger groove and I find it annoying. If I decide to keep the gun I’m definitely going to have to whittle on it a bit. Probably should have gotten the strait 45 as I really like the grips on my Springfield Armory .45 with a rubber finger groove insert under them. I’m wondering if the wood grips on the HW75 are the same size as the 45. They look to be the same with the type of wood being the only difference between them?

[aladdin]

Don't give up. It took me over 500 pellets to start getting the Hw45 To shoot where I wanted rather than where it wanted. I came close to throwing it out in to the woods.  Now with over 2000 down the barrel misses are rare. Finding the right pellets will really help. I settled on Air Arms Diabolo Field 16 grain.  I kept trying different pellets mostly lighter ones of the different brands I had. The AA 16 grain are the only ones it really likes. Hang in there.

[photoshooter]

Thanks for the words of encouragement and the tip on preferred pellets Tony. I started off with some Wadcutters that it obviously didn’t like so I switched to the one hole pellets I use in my HW 97, the H&N 14.6 g FTTs and it about halved the groups. I’ll give the AAs. try.

[lizzie]

With rattling...I would definitely return it.
Sounds like poor quality control at the manufacturing site.

[K_sqrd]

I posted the following on another thread re: P1/HW45.

The P11 Black Star and it's variants don't have a full frame into the hand grip section. If you don't like the grip
you are stuck with it. The P1/HW45 have a full frame into the grip and as such, you can replace the grips with
most grips made for the 1911 handgun. If thinking about purchasing one of these, try to get a "hands-on" feel
for the grip before deciding if the P11 grip fits.

[Tom Tucker]

I also suggest that you return/exchange it.  Sounds like you ran into some quality-control issues, and the grip doesn't fit your hand.

If I were you, I would exchange it for a standard grip model.

[Benny]

I have four HW45 and they all rattle a wee bit. I bought my first HW45 almost 20 years ago and it does rattle a bit more than the rest but it has no affect on anything. I have XL hands and the grips on my Black Star, Silver Star and HW75 are a little small but I've learned to deal with it. People with larger hands really should buy the standard model or the STL and then buy aftermarket 1911 grips.   

[photoshooter]

UPDATE: What a difference a day makes!

First of all, thanks to all who took the time to reply and offer advise. In all honesty, I fully intended to send it back for an exchange or different gun come Monday If things didn't drastically improve. After some encouragement and advise from other members I did some more research and came across an article by Tom Gaylord (BB on the P.A.) regarding shooting this gun like you would a powder burning .45 which is basically an artillery hold for pistols. It really rang a bell because that is how I shoot my .45 so I decided to give it a try. It took a little while and involved switching pellets,but pretty soon I was printing .5 and .75  5 shot groups from a rest on my 10 yrd indoor range with iron sights...with 68 year old eyes. Once I was able to do this fairly consistently, there was no way I was going to get rid of this gun if I could resolve the other issues that were bothering me. Especially since I also have a .177 cal. barrel on back order for it. Well, it took a little ingenuity, a lot of deburring and polishing, quite a bit of whittling and rotary rasp work, a trigger adjustment (thanks Aladdin) and some greasing and oiling but the gun is now perfect and will shoot the center out of 1.00" dia. Shoot N C target dots at 10 yards. The rattle is gone. It is caused by loose fitting cocking arms. A couple of thin nylon or teflon washers where they connect to the barrel or a thin "O"-ring around them will stop that if it bothers you...I'm compulsive so it does! The trigger needed some deburring, especially at the springs along with some oil and grease and a trigger adjustment down to about one pound. It is now very smooth and breaks crisply at the end of a good first stage. The toughest part was the stocks which were just too short for my average size hands. But then I noticed that the areas that were too short were at the roughened grip areas under my little finger and I recognized that as basically a rotary rasp finish to the wood for texture. So I got out my cordless drill, a rotary rasp and a pencil to mark the offending areas. An hour later I had a VERY comfortable grip that fit perfectly and once I re-oiled it you cannot tell where the work was done. I really like the grip on my Springfield .45 but I think I like these a little better so I didn't want of switch to the base HW45 version.
All in, I have about 3 hours worth of work in it to get to where I was expecting it to be when I took it out of the box. But it's a shooter and I had no reason to expect an exchange gun to be a lot better and it might not shoot as well. Certainly the stocks wouldn't fit any better.

Now that it fits and is shooting well I just need to shoot it a bunch to get better with it free hand. By the way, does anybody know what the set screw is under the butt end of the grip when the stock is removed is? It obviously does something to the trigger but I didn't have the time to experiment as it was getting dark and I was running out of time. Again, thanks to all for the input and advise.

Tony

[Benny]

The adjustment screw that you access from the bottom of the grip adjusts your trigger's pull weight.
I read Tom's instructions for shooting the P1/HW45 years ago and it really helped me too. 

[photoshooter]

Thank you Benny. I’ll give that a try tomorrow.

Tony

[aladdin]

It is good to hear that you got it shooting. You deserve a pat on the back for not giving up. I am sure it will just keep getting better the more you shoot it.  Congratulations.
  Could you post a picture of the modified grips. I have a HW75 that could use some work on the grips. What did you use to refinish the reshaped area.

[Tom Tucker]

I'm glad it worked out for you.  I can understand why you kept it - if the gun is a shooter, then that trumps everything else.

My P1 that I got last month wasn't perfect either, but my problem was with the finish.  I never mentioned it, but it could have been better.  The outside of the gun was covered in oil/grease when I got it, and I think the oil might have made some splotches on the finish.  It's very faint, and I can only see it if I look for it in bright light, but you know how that can be if you're an obsessive type.  The gun is a real shooter though.  I can shoot it better than my Crosman pumpers and my P17's.  Sights and trigger are both really good for me.  The power on this one is a little higher than what most people report too. Mine averages an honest 6.5-6.6 FPE with no signs of settling down.  Given those two factors, I can ignore the defects in the finish.  There's no guarantee that a replacement would shoot for the same power and accuracy.

[Chouchin66]

Curiosity getting the better of me today... can an HW pistol be super tuned in the same fashion as an HW rifle? For all the same reasons.

[K_sqrd]

Not sure what you mean by super tuned. If you are referring to increasing the power, the P1/HW45 comes pretty well max'ed out
from the factory. They're lubed and ready to shoot with no need to open them up - Usually! Sometimes there are exceptions as
the OP has noted above.