Hatsan still open?

[mikeyb]

For months now, Krale has had (almost) no Hatsan airguns available. There are really not that many places in Europe that have full-power Hatsans for sale, period. Some don't ship abroad and others have such lousy reviews I would not risk it. I've been looking for a Mod. 135, spring-powered, wooden stock, no frills, .25 cal, full-power, and it's turning out to be a chore.

This is not specifically what you were looking for, but I just received the back in stock email notice today from HatsanUSA.

Mod135 30 caliber Vortex QE back in stock... probably not for long.

https://hatsanairgunsusa.com/product/mod-135-vortex-qe-carnivore-30cal/?attribute_pa_caliber=30-big-bore-carnivore

I personally think it's a beautiful air rifle but I would not spend $300 for one when there are a fair number of PCP offerings at that price.

Last year I scored a refurbished 25 cal version Mod 135 Voretx QE for about half that price. Got very lucky when one appeared back in stock at the same time a holiday discount and free shipping offers could be used on their refurbs. The Turkish Walnut is very nice and the rifle performs as good as it looks.

I also have a 130s (30 cal acquired from a fellow GTA member - Thank You ) and it is a break barrel "cannon". I didn't really need a break barrel cannon. Then again, I don't really need any airguns at all. I just want them because I enjoy shooting and tweaking them

[Toxylon]

I got an email today from a Dutch airgun retailer, saying Hatsan told them it will be c. 3 months before .25 cal 135's are available again.

All along I've hoped to find a used one locally for little money, since getting a new one is a &^^& shoot in terms of QC (up to and including the latest batch from this past summer - see pyramydair reviews),  and the new one will still need new parts and emergency tuning pronto.

In the used market here, it seems everyone and their uncle have Hatsan 125's with plastic stocks, and extremely few have 135's with or without a walnut stock. Hatsan claims the 125 shoots just as hard as the 135, which isn't true. Since the 125 can be had for a lot less new than the 135, small wonder typical buyers opt for the 125.

[dave2288]

Honestly, id go with the 135 for the wood stock over the 125, its not even about the extra power for me.  I dont like hatsans synthetic stock

[Toxylon]

I have gone over the pros and cons of each stock type (to me). Light weight is good, but:

Magnums, like the 135 end up really front-heavy when equipped with plastic stocks, and balance is more important than weight.

Plastic stocks create a hollow and / or ringing extra sound when the gun is fired, which I'm not a fan of.

I have reservations about the durability of the Hatsan plastics. As of now I've been offered a 125 that has "a piece of the stock missing", and I've also heard about Hatsan plastic stocks cracking or even breaking in two.

Plastic stocks are hard on the eye, and the Hatsan plastic stocks are especially hideous, with their flat grey contrasting "paneling".

Lastly, I want an airgun with a walnut stock. I'm kinda bored with beech, as functional as it is. Gunstocks have been made out of walnut for centuries, for a good reason.

[Yogi]

I have gone over the pros and cons of each stock type (to me). Light weight is good, but:

Magnums, like the 135 end up really front-heavy when equipped with plastic stocks, and balance is more important than weight.

Plastic stocks create a hollow and / or ringing extra sound when the gun is fired, which I'm not a fan of.

I have reservations about the durability of the Hatsan plastics. As of now I've been offered a 125 that has "a piece of the stock missing", and I've also heard about Hatsan plastic stocks cracking or even breaking in two.

Plastic stocks are hard on the eye, and the Hatsan plastic stocks are especially hideous, with their flat grey contrasting "paneling".

Lastly, I want an airgun with a walnut stock. I'm kinda bored with beech, as functional as it is. Gunstocks have been made out of walnut for centuries, for a good reason.

Gunstocks have been made with Walnut for a long time because it is attractive and easy to work.  Maple or any hard wood is better at absorbing the vibrations that guns make.

-Y

PS plus it is/was abundant.

[Toxylon]

One of the reasons given in 100+ y.o. handbooks for using walnut for gunstocks is that it absorbs recoil exceptionally well. I have no doubt there are other good absorbers, but walnut is a mid-weight wood, whereas maple etc. are appreciably heavier, so they fail in comparison. Of course mass works well for taming a gun, but it comes with a cost. Therefore, walnut.

The attractiveness angle doesn't explain much anything, since any light-colored wood can be made to look like walnut with a simple and fast dye, and was done that way already centuries ago.

[GunnerAl]

A day or two ago, I took the stock (black synthetic) off my 125 Vortex Sniper to wipe off excess oils etc and noticed just how flexible it was at the forward end with the barrel channelling in it. You can actually squeeze the two sides together, which felt almost weird. Then trying to get the front end of the rifle screwed back down was a bit of a pain, going from one side to the other trying to hold it all in place while the forend kept splaying apart letting the metalwork slide between,, then once I got the main screw through the nylon bush, I also cursed the whole stupid screw set up with the sling swivel (non swivelling by the way) built into the screw and that sort of stupid castle type nut on the other side. You have to tighten up the castle nut on the side because the actual screw and sling swivel set up have to be kept roughly on the correct angle. I am quite underwhelmed by the whole screwing down set up to be honest.. You can now see why the cocking arm looks like it got into a fight with some sort of metal bending machine, and lost..
I think I'll be trying to modify that set up in the near future, getting rid of the sling swivel altogether..

Al

[Toxylon]

I checked Krale today. Turns out they have walnut-stocked 135 Vortexes in stock again, but no springers. What's more, on the spring-powered Mod. 135 page Krale states in red: Discontinued!

I wonder if Hatsan has really pulled the plug on spring-powered 135s? I knew that we're closing the end game with springers, but are we this far already?

I hate gasrams, mostly because my shoulder can't take the unnatural cocking effort of them. Also, I've invested a whole bunch of time and money to learn the tuning ropes with springers. I want to continue up that avenue.

I've been looking for a second-hand Mod. 135 .25 cal with a walnut stock for several months now, with zero offers.

People always ask about / advocate converting spring-powered Hatsans to gasrams, but it may be I'll be going the other way. Not thrilled at the expense of retro-fitting spring action to a ram gun. Spring, spring guide, tophat, but also piston, I presume. Possibly something else, as well.

[Yogi]

The attractiveness angle doesn't explain much anything, since any light-colored wood can be made to look like walnut with a simple and fast dye, and was done that way already centuries ago.

I believe that is dead wrong.  By all objective measures Beech is a better wood that Walnut.
But is sure is plain.  You can slather on whatever you want, but if the wood has no attractive grain.  You are just painting a pig ear.

Y

[Toxylon]

Why the hostility?

Walnut S.G.: c. .50
Beech S.G.: c. .60

John Darling switched the ugly, heavy OEM beech stock of his HW80 to a walnut one, and stated:

"Best of all, the change from beech to walnut knocked a whole pound off the overall weight."

Everyone and their uncle switches to walnut from beech when wanting to upgrade an airgun stock. A common lament on higher-end springers is that the manufacturer offers only a beech stock, and not the more desireable walnut. ARH sells custom walnut stocks for people with beech-stocked Weihrauchs, not the other way around.

You can believe what you want, but by no objective measure is beech a better wood than walnut. Beech is used simply because it's the most common dense and uniformly structured (so easy to work precisely and easy to finish) hardwood in Europe, so it's by far the cheapest working option. I know since I live there.

[mikeyb]

I checked Krale today. Turns out they have walnut-stocked 135 Vortexes in stock again, but no springers. What's more, on the spring-powered Mod. 135 page Krale states in red: Discontinued!

I wonder if Hatsan has really pulled the plug on spring-powered 135s? I knew that we're closing the end game with springers, but are we this far already?

I hate gasrams, mostly because my shoulder can't take the unnatural cocking effort of them. Also, I've invested a whole bunch of time and money to learn the tuning ropes with springers. I want to continue up that avenue.

I've been looking for a second-hand Mod. 135 .25 cal with a walnut stock for several months now, with zero offers.

People always ask about / advocate converting spring-powered Hatsans to gasrams, but it may be I'll be going the other way. Not thrilled at the expense of retro-fitting spring action to a ram gun. Spring, spring guide, tophat, but also piston, I presume. Possibly something else, as well.

If you really WANT a Mod135 Turkish Walnut coil spring version and they are discontinued, I think you should consider buying the Vortex air spring version.

I'm fairly certain the only parts needed to convert that rifle back to a coil spring are the spring guide, spring, and some simple washers/spacers. The piston should NOT need to be altered. For Mod125s I have fabricated better-than-factory spring guides, washers, and custom top-hats (not normally used on 125 and 135 models) using only a drill press and other common power and hand tools. The only part I cannot fabricate is the coil spring which HatsanUSA quoted (in 2019) at $20.

https://hatsanairgunsusa.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Mod135QE-Exploded_View-April2015.pdf

Vortek has an equivalent spring for about the same price.

http://vortekproducts.com/ourstore/airgun_springs/Hatsan-spring

FWIW I AGREE that the cocking effort of the Vortex air spring is different and may be a dealbreaker for people with arm/shoulder muscle/joint injuries.

With air/gas springs you start off with a high cocking force and finish with a slightly higher force. The body position and leverage needed during the high starting force makes them more difficult to cock.

Steel coil springers start out with significantly lower cocking force but finish with a force that is actually MORE than the air/gas spring. It doesn't FEEL that way because of the better body position and arm-shoulder leverage angle, but the coil springers force just before piston latch is higher than the air/gas springer.

I find the Vortex Hatsans almost always shoot wonderfully smooth right out of the box. That's IF the factory didn't DAMAGE the piston seal during initial assembly. Most of the coil spring Hatsans I've acquired needed a basic tune-up (clean, deburr, polish, relube) to shoot as smoothly as the Vortex versions. I have some Hatsan "doubles" which are the exact same models, one with coil spring and the other with gas spring. I can EASILY identify them by their different cocking cycles. However I, my targets, and my chronograph can't tell them apart when shooting them.

[Toxylon]

Thanks, Mike.

I'm fully prepared to custom tune the 135, turning better fitting guides etc. As people say, they are well-designed guns that are poorly executed. But thems the options for a 45 J springer. 

[Yogi]

Why the hostility?

Walnut S.G.: c. .50
Beech S.G.: c. .60

John Darling switched the ugly, heavy OEM beech stock of his HW80 to a walnut one, and stated:

"Best of all, the change from beech to walnut knocked a whole pound off the overall weight."

Everyone and their uncle switches to walnut from beech when wanting to upgrade an airgun stock. A common lament on higher-end springers is that the manufacturer offers only a beech stock, and not the more desireable walnut. ARH sells custom walnut stocks for people with beech-stocked Weihrauchs, not the other way around.

You can believe what you want, but by no objective measure is beech a better wood than walnut. Beech is used simply because it's the most common dense and uniformly structured (so easy to work precisely and easy to finish) hardwood in Europe, so it's by far the cheapest working option. I know since I live there.

Most Olympic shooters-shotgunners aside-use either laminated stock or dense composites.  Walnut is/can be beautiful.  That, and it is easy to work, are the reasons that it is used.
Most of my airguns have walnut stocks.  This not because they are a better wood, but because I like looking at them too.

The statement that you can make beech look really nice, as nice as walnut, with the proper stain is just not correct. IMHO.

-Y

[Toxylon]

Olympic shooters' choices have zero relevance to field shooting and airgun hunting, re: gun mass, maneuverability etc. Just look at target crossbows and hunting crossbows, for an analogy. But enough of that highjack.

In another news, Krale got back to me and told they have discontinued the spring-powered Hatsan 135. We'll see if that's the way it will be on a wider scale, as well. Not that there is much leeway, since very, very few European countries sell the 135s at full power. 

[Mossonarock]

If you are converting a Hatsan from gas ram to metal spring, in addition to what was mentioned above, you may also need to replace the rear plug.
That was my experience with switching powerplants between my gas ram and metal spring Hatsan 200's. They had different rear plugs.

[Toxylon]

Thanks, Tim!

Converting a gas ram into a coil springer is really far down my list of preferences, but if I go down that road, these kinds of tips make all the difference.