Just a caution for those who adjust their tophats

Be very careful when adjusting your tophat too close to the base; when the pressure drops it will hit it (the brass base) and shift POI. I always wondered why after a good amount of dead-on shots, POI would move left until I found out that the bottom of the tophat slams onto the brass base. Now, it might seem like the valve spring is too strong to let the hammer smack the tophat all the way down. But it wasn’t until I placed my finger behind the cocking knob to about the same clearance the tophat had from the base and it hit it with some force. Additionally, I confirmed it by looking at the scope reticle upon firing and its behavior is different than when the tophat doesn’t hit the base. I learned that the scope’s reticle would move left. So, that confirmed that the tophat would impact the brass base enough to cause POI shift. As a matter of fact, it slammed with a significant amont of force that causes the gun to move before the pellet exits the barrel, which in turn will shift POI. POI change will be much more significant at longer ranges. My POI shifted to the left by as much as 2″ to 3″ at 50 yards and half an inch at 25 yards.

With my gun, once the hammer spring force overcomes the valve spring force, it will cause the hammer to slam the tophat to the brass base which generates a left-turn bias. Until I unscrewed the tophat more, the problem disappeared and windage stayed on point. If you take some time to analyze the mechanics of the valve cycle, or more specifically the way the valve spring acts when it is compressed, you’ll notice that it also dampens the vibration and harmonics caused by the impact of the hammer in the same way a damper works on a motorcycle handlebar to stabilize and smoothen ride quality and feel. But once the force of the hammer spring becomes greater than the valve spring force, of course, the tophat will slam onto the brass base. This problem is more apparent especially for those who have the newer valve spring for the Condor, as its compression rate is much lower than the older spring. The Talon SS’s valve spring is stronger than the new Condor spring. I know this because I have both. Okay, just letting you all know about my discovery.

WOK, maybe you should sticky this to the Quick Reference section.