HB17 foolery

[Madkoifish]

Ok, I hope this is the right board for this sort of stuff.
This is my HB17 project thread. This is my first REAL airgun bought back in 89 to plink birds that were crapping all over my car and porch. SO she has been abused. I plan to first start by replacing bodged bits. I had to weld the pump arm since it broke at one of the roll pins. I also plan to carbine the thing replacing the chewed up fore grip etc.

I have not decided if I will strip it for bare brass. This is one of the older guns so the entire thing is brass. Grip frame everything.

Once I do the wood I plan to modify the bolt to have a bolt handle (hate the knurled knob) I do not think I will mess about with the internals except maybe to lighten the pump force.

I will start with a doodle of the stock I am thinking of making. Unsure on what wood or final finish it will have. It all depends on what is available here (have not looked for lumber outside of 2X4s here) And what is easiest to work with. I only have a bandsaw drill press some chisels and a few hand tools. No routers mills etc.

Ignore the red dot it is way too far forward, just stuck it on and took a pic, it has since been stolen for the pc77.  Second pic is a older mock up.

opinions?

[Joshua A]

the design of your stocks are great, and I like the pictures, Looks like you might be the chip foose of airguns.. looks pretty sweet. Although, you'll have QUITE a job on your hands trying to form those stocks with hand tools though. You Might need a dremel At the very least, unless you are a skilled wood worker with years of experience with hand chisels etc. There are lots of guys that still make gun stocks with that same method. It is actually a dying Art. Now adays everyone is using some variation of power carver (myself included)..... Of course A foot pedal driven 1/2 HP Wecheer Flex-Shaft with Typhoon Carbide woodcarving bits would work..... you could have both stocks finished within an hour or so I have been working with or around hardwoods and woodshops for a good portion of my life, If there are any questions you may have, or anything I can help you with please just ask. Keep us posted on how its going.

Best Wishes

J.Austin

[Madkoifish]

Well I have a dremel somewhere with a flexi neck, wish it had a foot petal but eh. It is old. I figured if I found it Id use it but mostly Im thinking about my drill press chucked with a grinding wheel, chisels are to replace a router to which I do not have. And files. Need to get some new ones, quite a few of my old ones went walkabout. . . . . I have considered getting one of those oscillating grinder/sander. I figure it will be a long term project.

I have been fooling with wood for ages, did a lot of carving in school so it is just learning what works with guns (shapes etc) Only thing I am wary of is making each side the same. Though I am sure nothing like this truly is exact. I am going for a ambi grip since others are likely to shoot it as well.

[eric]

i'm digging the first one 

[Nate]

me too 
it knida looks lie the stocks on the dragunov sniper rifles

[NorthStaR]

How about the first one with the pump handle of the older second visual but comes back a little longer and closer to the grip? 
Like a knuckle shield?

[Madkoifish]

Have not don emuch for the stock as of yet too hot to go lifting huge boxes about to set u my tools. And I also found out some of the lumber I had been hording got left behind in Seattle. I was planning to use some cheap wood to make the dummy stock to find the proper rough shapes. SO now I gotta locate some cheap stuff and  get it trimmed down.

Anyhow,
Images show a alt sear spring. I had gotten my scopes and stuff today so I stuck the scope on and went to zero. The trigger pull is horrid. Like 10lbs lol Definitely heavy. Enough that it caused my hand to shake badly. So I removed the hinge spring scissor spring or whatever you call it. Stuffed a normal coil spring in and the pull is much lighter. Still heavy but I engaged the sear and fired sans spring and even that is heavy.

What trigger foolery have others done for their HB17s? I did notice when I tore this gun down a while back the sear was eating into the contact on the trigger. I smoothed that out a bit but didnt want to take too much material off. If there are other tricks to lighten this trigger let me know so I can give em a go.

I have figured I think out why others had such issues shooting this gun. When I was zeroing the guns in I found 3~6 pumps in my pc77 didnt affect POI much but on this gun the differences are great between each pump. Above 4 pumps it starts to tighten in to about a 1/16 to 1/8th in but say between 2 pumps and 3 you are looking at a 4 inch drift or more and it pulls to one side. Example 10 pumps in the pc77 to 2 pumps I loose maybe a inch of height. An 2 to 8 pump spread in this gun is nearly 6in at a angle. I know Tom Gaylord had gone over pellet spin and poi. I have alo read about poi changing on power decrease but never though there would be such a large discrepancy at 10 yards.  I will reshoot the target  some time this week and write up a article on it. Comparing the 2 guns. I do not have a crony atm so no FPS on the guns but I am suspecting the HB17 has some issues. Real quandary is the HB has a real kick to it and seems to fire harder but when pellets impact on wood they often bounce off. They do bury themselves as much as the pc77 in the wood but always fly off. (YEAH I need a REAL pellet trap gotta find the duct seal and metal plate)

Images show the bodge and the original spring. Also shows the wad of adapters and my old trail np scope. The 4X35 I got was good but this one focused down at 10yards at 9X and I figured why the hell not since I am not using the Trail NP, anyone wants it lemme know, I do plan to refinish the stock first though. And yeah, heh it really looks silly but I can put the pellet where I want it. Once I get the shorty stock on I should be able to move the scope back, it is how it is now mostly due to eye relief and lazyness of changing to the dove rings. Having the scope way fwd too allows clearance fo rthe breech, my pc77 is a bit of a pain. I see why people put multi shot rings on scoped 13XX guns.

[eric]

this is something i did --- very bubba but alot better than before      http://www.crosman-air-pistol-owners-forum.com/board/index.php?topic=3521.0

[Madkoifish]

What is that block in the grip frame??  It is by far less bubba thant what I did spring outta my pc77 and screwsd washers out of my parts box and a length of fuel tube.
Unfortunately the trigger with oting on it for a spring just cocking and using a allen to push it into place the trigger is still heavy. Thinking polishing up the sear might help but I think in the end it is geo thats an issue.

[eric]

i not know exactly --- probably something to do with the casting of the part --- it has nothing to do with the trigger or sear.could be completely taken out i guess with harming the gun ... the way it is you can still use the original spring if some one wanted to but this way is much better .

[Madkoifish]

It almost looks like something they had put in to do an alternative trigger set. Or some other dohicky. Did your have the same funky spring mine does? it just rested in notched areas up inside the grip frame.

I will liky try other springs and in the end I thing I will drill out the frame like you did then just drill a hole to pin the spring with a guide in the lower grip. I do not have that funny tang in the grip If I did Id notch that for a spring. So far I have not found anything that will allow engagement of the sear that is light enough to req the need to adjust it stiffer.

BTW is your gun a nicle unit SHBXX? Still looking for a replacement for my S397 or even a s392 T_T likely steroid a plain 392. Mac1 shows he has the mk3 of the s397s in but I did not like the shape of the wood on those.  off topic lol.

[Madkoifish]

Ok uh heh I tossed out the old pc777 spring for a pen spring for now, made a guide out of a bic pen and some alum spacers.
I need to make a trip for some springs since the rest of the ones I have are nasty and I do not want that near my internals on the gun (rust etc) This will work for now until I get my tools out and find my alum stock. So that I can do a better job. I will likely relocate the spring to the sear end of things like eric posted above. I will likely bodge up something for an adjuster and solder in bracing or the like so the stuff all stays aligned. A single screw in the bottom or pinning it in some manner might work too.

Least now I can shoot the gun and not have that sway from squeesing that trigger. It isnt as nice as my super light pc77 but it is SOO much better than it was.

Only remaining issues is to decide to strip the gun and polish it for the brass look, repaint it or just leave it ugly. I have not gotten any response to this yet. Reason I ask is I have not the faintest idea what I want to do with this thing outside of knocking together a stock for it.  Waffling all over on it, some days I wanna strip it others I look at it's ugliness and grin. Then I see people spraying stuff on guns and ponder how nice it would be if it had that textured finish.

I do have to look at new seals or something it is underpowered compared to the pc77 though PA does show something likw 450fps for this vs the 600 for the pc77 and Im sure with the 24" barrel it is producing more than that. I shot a string of rounds into some alum (old clipboard) and found the pc77 blows through it the hb dents it or just gets a round through. So it is loud and soso in power. Not that I plan to kill animals with it, just cans junk and paper targets. It is just way too loud.

[NorthStaR]

I like textured paint, it'll look neat and unusual for on here! 

[eric]

i don't know ---- there was also a knub about 1/4" i cut off on the inside rear of the frame --- in the 3rd picture you can just under the hole i drilled --- another thing ,why was that there  didn't do anything .the gun is a H9(.177) in nickle . your idea looks pretty neat. hows the trigger pull with that set up ?

[Madkoifish]

Seems somewhere near 2 lbs now, my poormans pull gauge a rod and a scale peaks at 2.25lbs (yeah I cannot find the fish scale)

I have done som looking around, first off the set up for these guns goes WAY back.
But I did dig this up:

http://www.palmer-pursuit.com/images/misc/PGP-45-frame.jpg
Now it is suppose to be for the benji paintball guns, yeah I know paintball lol. Apparently they just stuck a mess of things on so it can lob paintballs.

http://www.nwwone.org/world-war/worldwar-image-large/benjamin-sheridan-pgp-pump-9-shot-paintball-gun-p-g-p_120685219084.jpg

http://palmer-pursuit.com/cart/images/stroker-pgp2.JPG

http://palmer-pursuit.com/cart/images/large/-cocker%20034_LRG.jpg
huge image so link only.

Now I have not found dates and crap but that frame was on the green posted back on 07. My gun is from 98 I think. Least the serial eludes to this. Since mine is solid brass Im wondering if these paintball thing were the intro to the potmetal or whatever it is they use now. Alum? shrug. My pc77 has me all as well since it is not ferrous, but images I seen of those grips polished do not look like alum. Anyhow I wonder if those "bits" might some how relate to the paintball connection? Like some sort of alt sear set up. I am interested to find out more on that aftermarket grip. Or at least on how to find a alternative to the trigger itself. Biggest complaint since I first shot it was the trigger eats your bones.

http://palmer-pursuit.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2_64_65&products_id=882