SteveieP

The sear engagement screw (ahead of the trigger) has 3 washers under it. Remove 2 of them & refit the screw You should still have safe engagement but a lighter trigger. Further or alternatively:- Venoman (Lyn Lewington) does a brass setback trigger for these with proper screws to adjust first & second stage. I have 1 of Lyns triggers on mine ..looks nice & works well

Just removing 2 of the 3 washers from under the sear engagement (front) screw makes a big difference, lightens trigger pull considerably & costs zero. if you feel the need to go still further, somewhere around £25 will get you a brass setback trigger from Lyn Lewington. A superb piece of engineering with 2 further adjustment screws to set the trigger "just so" The equivalent of Rowan Engineering triggers but about £10 per unit cheaper. IMO, my conversion is no different to putting a V-mach kit & Rowan trigger into a HW except the start & finish points are £x cheaper & the end improvement is just as worthwhile

And they can be modified Carbined to 12.5 inches & with Lynn Lewington AR silencer. The breach seal is shimmed because the seal does not stand quite proud enough for a consistent seal. (a built in design fault common to the Remington & SMK 208 series & cost about 2 pence to fix) Welshwilly tune kit Maccari piston seal Lyn Lewington brass (curved) setback trigger The scope is a Nikko Stirling Gold Crown Airking 4x12x42 AO/IR Mildot it goes very well on JSB Exact 5.52 and performs as good as it looks Some might argue that spending the money on the modifications defeats the point of a cheaper rifle However, the mod's are what makes this one mine,

Why not give Crosman Premier Ultra Mag a try? Crosman made the Accupels until a few years ago. The Ultra Mag is basically it's replacement. It's the same shape & weight etc...and also relatively cheap as pellets go

http://www.southyorkshireairguns.co.uk/find-us-16-w.asp If you visit the above, you are also 5 minutes drive from:- http://www.sheffieldairrifles.co.uk/ In the interests of equality & diversity or just want cheaper pellets etc Please note Sheffield Air Rifles is a retail outlet & not a range

I would probably cancel & buy elswhere, as they aren't offering you best price anyway. If you don't really need IR I would go for the 4x12x42 at £70 from BAR, which hits the sweet spot on price for me The non IR versions actually have a slightly wider field of view than the equivalent IR version They only charge a fiver for postage on top. I've got 3 of the 4x12x42 (including one with IR) BAR don't seem to do the same scope you chose as an IR version, but have a look at the choices on the link below. http://www.airgunbuyer.com/Showproducts.asp?cat=Telescopic%20Sights&SubCat=Nikko%20Stirling%20Scopes For less than the £99 you've been quoted BAR would do the 4.5x14x50 IR version! I bought all 3 of my Airkings from BAR at different times & always without a hitch. Also a good place for pellets, where a bulk purchase of 10 cans gets you a 10% discount and the same excellent delivery service.

My Crosman Optimus has a cut down barrel, done by it's first owner. Cut a little shorter than I would have done, but anyhoo A slip-on silencer hasn't been mentioned as an alternative choice. Barrel is 15mm dia such as in the link http://nmproducts.net/smk-sound-suppressor-ssxs19-fits-xs15-standard-model-177-and-22-to-fit-most-150mm-barrels-p-71757.html?osCsid=058937daa2738a5d427a441897e1a97a I wouldn't crop a barrel shorter than say 12.5 inches. You can use a jubilee clip over the barrel as a guide to the hacksaw blade, so it's cut square. Recrown and add the silencer. I did my SMK TH208 myself and the accuracy is still spot on. I took about 5 inches & a barrelweight off, which was making the TH208 nose heavy. The previous owner of the Optimus didn't manage to cut the barrel square, so I trued it up & recrowned. Also added a shim-steel piston liner, which smooths & quietens things a bit too

On the cocking stroke, is the tophat striking the top of the spring guide, before the sear has chance to engage?

A silencer does make a difference to the muzzle report irrespective of the source of the charge of gas (pcp, spring or Co2) it makes no difference to the noise arising from the action on a spring gun which is right next to the shooters ear. What does make a difference to the noise of the action is installing a tune kit to elimenate much of the twang, noise and vibration. The addition of a stainless shim piston sleeve helps a lot becauseit reduces lateral movement of the spring and so damps any resonation of the spring in conjunction with a close fitting spring guide. To quieten a springer down, and make it more pleasant to shoot in the process, needs both a tune and a silencer. why wouldn't a silencer work on a spring gun? It's like saying the silencer on a car works for petrol engines but not on a diesel

Bought some ages ago in .22 after an article in an airgun magazine said they went well through an SMK XS208. I thought I'd give them a try through my thumbhole stock'd and tuned TH208 I still have over half of the 200 left. Tight fit in the bore even for a 5.50mm head size, due to a ridge just below the dome Subject to horizontal stringing at the target, so not accurate enough to be any practical use (well for me anyway). I keep them to put a couple down a barrel after maintenance or a repair, to bed components in to save wasting better pellets. They may work ok for some rifles, just not in any of the 3 rifles I have. If I want something around that weight and shape, Crosman Ultra Mag work better (for me) and are cheaper. I was twatting 2 inch spinners at a measured 52yds earlier this week with the TH208 using the Crosmans, which isn't too shaby for a .22 springer. Having said that, I bought a new can of Crosmans last week and they had some crappy black lubricant on them that makes your hands filthy. Soon washed that off and relubed with LT1.

If you like the idea of a Titan Xs spring cut to the right size and tophat / guide made for that spring, plus slip washers and power bands to put the power just where you want it, then you can't go far wrong here http://www.woodfield-gcp.co.uk/springtuning.htm Got this chaps kit in 2 rifles and both work v nicely indeed. Now also doing a range of replacement piston seals, if you scroll to the bottom of the same page. Just another option for you to consider

If it's anything like my Gold Crown Airking 4x12x42, you won't go far wrong. The Airkings are getting difficult to find now for some reason and the prices are up to around £90 for this model, when a year ago the price was nearer £75.

I expect you mean Hammerli Looks more like an SMK XS19, which is a Gamo Hunter copy. If so there's a good availability of aftermarket tuning tuning kits, replacement trigger & piston seal etc. http://www.woodfield-gcp.co.uk/index.html is more or less on your doorstep Of course, you can just shoot it. LOL

http://nmproducts.net/air-rifle-cleaning-kit-for-177-22-plus-some-spare-parts-industry-brand-qf2-p-67205.html?cPath=22_1678&osCsid=058937daa2738a5d427a441897e1a97a Above is a cheap cleaning kit. It contains 2 of the breach seals you want. It also has a piston seal you can use, but it will be oversized & need sizing down. There is also a replacement spring of dubious quality which may be of some use depending on whether the one already in the gun is better or worse than the replacement. Heck, you even get a barrel cleaning rod & some oil for the hinges on your gate.

http://www.gunspares.co.uk/shopdisplayproducts.asp?id=24886&cat=T05+Trigger+Unit# Above is a link to the schematic on the Chambers website. It's identical to the Diana T05 trigger, so you can search the web for info on that.

A piston sleeve does a number of things inc:- 1) Stops lube migrating away off the spring 2)reduces the amount of lateral movement of the spring within the piston. 3) provides an ultra smooth surface against the spring to reduce friction contact within the piston 4)stops the cocking foot riding up & down the coils of the spring during the cocking cycle. Last one I made was from stainless shim steel, though some prefer plastic sheet. The upshot is a sleeve can quieten a gun,reduce recoil, make it smoother to cock & decrease the risk of dieseling by stopping lubricant migration (i.e. actually keeping moly grease on the spring where it belongs)

SMK scopes are not that awful, just that there's better for similar money. I used & still have tucked in a cupboard, aSMK 3x9x40 mildot scope. Worked passably well & didn't lose zero. If what you buy doesn't come with mounts, Accushot mounts fron JSR are an excellent value item. Chances are, if you were looking at SMK you are on a budget, in which case either JSR own brand or Nikko Stirling Mountmaster scopes might be better options. The Nikko's tend to come with their mounts, so that's a little saving too.

http://www.jsramsbottom.com/products/riflescopes-jsr-optics/jsr3940-jsr--leapers-3-9x40-mil-dot-riflescope-with-flip-up-covers.html As above if I were going really cheap And for some mounts http://www.jsramsbottom.com/products/mounts--rails-1-tube-mounts-%2811mm-38-dovetails%29-accushot-1-mounts/acc2pd-accushot-2-piece-mounts-double-clamp-1-%5B45mm%5D-%5Bm4%5D.html I appreciate it's probably a bit more than you first intended to spend, but I've been down the ultra cheap route before & you just end up buying again or being dissatisfied with what you have

Basically it's a copy of the Diana model 34 in it's synthetic stock version. Same design of internals & a copy of the T05 trigger as the Diana. Only criticism is they need a bit of a clean, debur & re-lube but then good to go. Slight twang on them due to slightly undersized rear spring guide but not so bad you can't live with it. You'll do best on JSB Exact, AA Fiedls or RWS Superfield type of pellets. Improved with a tune kit (as mentioned above), but then you can say that about most springers. The piston seal is replaceable with the Maccari Large Apex which you can import from the US for around a tenner including postage, if you're inclined to fiddle & improve things still further. I have something similar in the SMK TH208 i.e same action in an ambi wood thumbhole stock. Also same rifle as yours comes badged as a Ruger Airhawk (same gun out of same factory but wearing a Ruger badge & costing more £'s for no good reason.) Chinese imports have come a long way over the last 5 years & even the blueing on these is quite respectable. Cheap to buy, cheap to tune, very respectable performance in the price bracket. Inevitably someone will tell you it's rubbish & can't hit a barn door because it's Chinese but dats a road of old ********. Just ignore them & keep knocking over the targets

http://www.woodfield-gcp.co.uk/pre-lubed-seals.htm for a full set of seals

What pellets were you using this time? It you were using lighter pellets than Bis Mag's you would have a lower power reading (in all probability)

It won't be too challenging a project because there isn't that much to do. The kits supplied by Woodfield GCP are no different to fitting a V-Mach kit & you don't need a spring compressor...just a little care taking the old spring out. The new spring will have little preload to worry about. No disrespect to Woodfields piston seals, but Maccari seals are top quality, hard wearing & v. cheap & easy to get hold of. On it's favoured pellet, my power is set (by me) at about 11.5 fpe. Having a 28mm diameter piston (e.g a HW95K has a 26mm dia piston) coupled with a longish stroke, means it makes the power easily. Most anything else is the usual debur & polish & a dab of moly grease. Gun is easier to dissassemble & work on than say a HW95 Woodfield tune kit includes 2 undersized pins to keep the trigger components lined up whilst the trigger group is out of the action. There's a youtube vid of an XS208 getting a kit installed. Accuracy is down to the pellet you use & is one area in which you can't skimp.Even SMK gun owners acknowledge SMK pellets are only fit for shooting tin cans. I was at the range last Sunday & my last shot of the day was the smallest spinner at 45 yards, about the size of a 10p piece. Bench rested obviously. I don't do the gun snob thing.Without bragging, if I wanted to spend £100's tomorrow on any nice German springer I fancied, I can afford it.Just I can't justify it when my 3 work v. nicely & do what I need

If you don't want to spend too much money on a tune & know how to use a screwdriver you could get a tune kit here. http://www.woodfield-gcp.co.uk/springtuning.htm I appreciate most of the kits are aimed at other guns, but an SMK XS20 is a clone of the HW95K, so the kit will fit. If you tell Will, the proprietor, it's for a 95K he'll sort you out. On my understanding of matters, the only difference is that the inside diameter of the piston on the 95K, over the XS20 is that the 95K is fractions of a millimeter wider & will take a slightly different Titan spring. Will has many rifles of his own & knows exactly what you need. The springs in the kit are all cut to length, whereas if you (say) just buy a Titan spring for your gun, the chances are it will end up illegally overpowered unless you have it on your FAC. The power warnings on the packaging for a Titan are less cautionary & more of a guarantee.

Squirrels & rabbits don't like to get wet & cold, so they're only going to be out in the rain if they're desperate for food. Squizzers are out in numbers at the mo' still fattening up before winter. They don't mind the cold but don't like the wet. One of the blighters had the audacity to turn up in my garden on Sunday afternoon, just as I was taking a rifle into the garage to clean it up after a session at the range. Bad timing for one of us. Large male with a lot of weight on him, but still dead as a *******. LOL

I bought my TH208 .22 nearly 12 months ago as I found a place in Loughborough doing them for £133. Shot less than 50 pellets before installing a tune kit & also put in a Maccari Large Apex piston seal. The seals are excellent quality & only cost around £9.50 posted from the USA. A bit of twang from the spring, before the tune kit. Whilst the rear spring guide is synthetic, it's a little undersized, but a kit fixes that. The action is based on the Diana model 34 & the T05 trigger is copied fairly well, though only the synthetic stock version bares any resemblance to the Diana. The trigger is only really adjustable for length of first stage pull. The internals were surprisingly clean, but the cocking slot needed the burs filing off to make it smooth (what's an extra 5 mins work when it's in pieces anyway?)There was a small amount of useless brown crud masquerading as grease but white spirit soon cleaned that off. The OEM spring is well finished at the ends & doesn't have to be replaced, just polish up the ends. Same gun out of the same factory is also badged as the Ruger Airhawk Elite but comes with an average 3x9x40 scope, **** scope rings & an unfeasibly high pricetag because of the Ruger name. Much better to buy under the SMK badge & add your own better quality scope for less overall cost. I added a Nikko Stirling Gold Crown Airking 4x12x42 AO Mildot. Happily for me the tune kit cost nothing because I had something the vendor wanted & we did a swap. Bisley Supefield NOT recommended for this gun. The gun is a little nose heavy till it's scoped, then it feels balanced. Reasonable ambi thumbhole stock even if the chequering is a little thin...some say the butt end is a little ugly. Accuracy just needs the right pellet. Fortunately I bought in 5000 5.52 FX pellets (rebadged AA Field) when Deben fell out with FX some months back & picked them up for the equivalent of £7.60 a can posted!Wish I could have afforded more at the time. Competent gun, reasonable finish & much better than it's pricetag suggests. Put a Weihrauch trigger blade in my tuned SMK XS20 last weekend, for a mere £13.50 the trigger is now a proper 2 stage unit as well as being gold & blingy.