SpudFiles

i was watching on youtube and i found this video
you can see a break barrel air rifle vibrate rabidly
i see once an ak 47 vibrate and i see how but a air rifle !!

[youtube][/youtube]

Energy has to go somewhere...

Yeah, if this is a spring-piston air rifle, what happens, is that an incredibly powerful spring pushes a piston forward that compresses the air and pushes the round forward. So when the piston smashes into the front of the chamber, it would make the gun vibrate a lot. Cool vid though!

Maverik, can you not see that being a problem? While I've never looked inside a springer properly, I'd be willing to be that at least one of the materials in there is aluminum. Whether you knew or not, aluminum work hardens, meaning as it is worked (beaten) it gets harder and harder, until it splits or cracks. Try it with a piece of (proper) aluminum. It can be bent back and fourth a few times, but it eventually starts to crack and will break.

I'd be willing to guess there's a bumper somewhere, because work hardening truly stuffs copper and aluminum.

Poor quality or lack of maintenance. Or perhaps overpowering the gun.

inonickname wrote:Maverik, can you not see that being a problem? While I've never looked inside a springer properly, I'd be willing to be that at least one of the materials in there is aluminum. Whether you knew or not, aluminum work hardens, meaning as it is worked (beaten) it gets harder and harder, until it splits or cracks. Try it with a piece of (proper) aluminum. It can be bent back and fourth a few times, but it eventually starts to crack and will break.

I'd be willing to guess there's a bumper somewhere, because work hardening truly stuffs copper and aluminum.

Poor quality or lack of maintenance. Or perhaps overpowering the gun.

The block is usually steel, and there is no bumper - the impact softening comes from the compression of the air cushioning the blow. This is the reason why springers should never be fired without a projectile in the breech as it can cause permanent damage to the spring and piston head.

The recoil of a springer is particular because there are a lot of forces at work, not just the opposite motion to the projectile leaving the barrel. the spring hits the block, bounces back, hits it again, causing a "whiplash" effect that has been known to break telescopic sights that would otherwise have survived a magnum firearm rifle. Pellet weight affects the cushioning effect and therefore recoil.

There's a very good flash demonstration here of what I'm talking about, click on the the diagram below to access it:

jackssmirkingrevenge wrote:The recoil of a springer is particular because there are a lot of forces at work, not just the opposite motion to the projectile leaving the barrel.

Which, I would note, is completely negligible.

The recoil on my springer from the pellet is less than a five-hundredth of a joule. It'd be slightly more on a .22 version, at about a three-hundredth of a joule.
The kick from the mainspring (I tend to prefer to talk about springer "kick", because it's not really recoil in the traditional sense) is essentially everything the user feels.

inonickname wrote:Poor quality or lack of maintenance. Or perhaps overpowering the gun.

Even my TX 200, a make probably amongst the top five spring piston air rifles out there, maintained by my own diligent hand, and completely UK power legal (i.e. pretty low power) would do this.

God darn

As said, I've not had much experience with springers. With how rapidly it expands and the forces in action you would expect vibration. Though if the rifle was unmaintained, parts were loose, general disrepair etc that could exaggerate (or maybe absorb some..depends which way it goes) some of the vibration

inonickname wrote:Though if the rifle was unmaintained, that could exaggerate some of the vibration

It certainly could. It's possible to tell if I need to re-apply grease to the mainspring on my TX (the grease helps damp the vibration of the spring itself) by the accuracy going down.

This is why I'm buying a multi-pump I'm sure there's some vibration, but certainly less than a springer, as the recoil is extremely low.

It took me a long time to find how to shoot a springer accurately, because the recoil is the exact opposite of any other weapon I have ever fired.

@ inonickname, I have never seen a piston/compression tube combo made of aluminum, even the super cheap 30$ Chinese ones are made of steel.

sputnick wrote:It took me a long time to find how to shoot a springer accurately.

Yes, but that doesn't mean they can't be very, very, very good.

I have never seen a piston/compression tube combo made of aluminium.

Well, for one thing, aluminium is more expensive than steel.

That doesn't mean that there aren't parts I would have quite liked to have been ally on my air rifle. If the cocking lever were ally, it'd make the weight slightly less offensive, and would help the overall balance a mite.

I'm half considering manufacturing a replacement myself. I seem to be replacing all the rest of it bit by bit...but in the end, it'll be even more epic.

Ragnarok wrote:

sputnick wrote:It took me a long time to find how to shoot a springer accurately.

Yes, but that doesn't mean they can't be very, very, very good.

I am well aware of that, I got good enough to hit a penny consistently from 60', I'm sure there are better shot records, but hell that's good for me

i have seen potato cannons flex before in highspeed but not pellet guns

far_cry wrote:...i see once an ak 47 vibrate and i see how but a air rifle !!

I was talking with a guy who had a cheap chinese AK and lots of ammo and other guns, so he was trying to break it on purpose, shooting full auto until the barrel turned red, even dumping water and mud on it...
He said it still was working fine.

That flex in the vid looks odd, but others seem to have explained it well.

Guess that's why Bull barrels or fluted barrels are used for target stuff.

A lot of hard-core accuracy freaks are particular about the storage position too. Almost as if the metal is in a liquid state that can change shape over time(???) 8)

BTW, recoil does not really affect accuracy,
It's all about how stable the [launcher] is held before shot/during shot strings.
Also, Shorter barrels (snub nose etc.) are said to be less accurate only due to the shorter sight radius as well.
And, only a short amount of rifling is needed, but that could cause leak issues other problems... (based on good sources) 8)

THUNDERLORD wrote:BTW, recoil does not really affect accuracy

It certainly does on a springer, unless you're very particular about how you're holding it.

It's not so much recoil, as "kick" which happens before the pellet has even left the barrel. If it kicks unpredictably, you lose accuracy.

The springers vibrate and its totally normal. Shooting them normally often frustrates the shooter because of the innacuracy they end up with. To shoot them accurately you actually need to hold them loosely and allow them to do their thing. This is not to say it applies to everyone's shooting, but it is common knowledge and from my own experience as well with the Beeman Kodiak. That gun was awesome. It seemed to shoot flat no matter how far away I was.