Cocking lever prototype
After I got my Selph/Blodnob valve, and installed the super heavy spring, the Condor has been very hard to cock using the thumb.
So the wheels started spinning, and heres what I came up with.
This was originally gonna be a lever like whats used on the S410s, but that was too complicated for my brain. I found some carbon bits today from a peice we are making for Lockheed Martin, and after a few minutes with a pen and paper I came up with a design.
Basically, this is a .250″ thick chunk of carbon which is molded in the shape you see here, only 72″ long.
The handle is nothing more than .5″ aluminum rod, hollowed out and tapped to 10/24 on one end.
Crappy video captures…
The only real mod necessary to the gun was drilling a 2nd hole in the breech. This was a real bugger to keep lined up, when drilling this hole.
I made the handle parts at work, and drilled the breech here at home. Next time Ill take the breech with me and use the mill. Duh. 😳
This isnt as heavy as it looks, and its really easy to cock the rifle with that super heavy spring in there. Just lift to align with the slot, and push forward. Easy as pie. After loading a pellet, just pull back and drop into the locked position.
Im going to reshape it in a few spots, and I think I can get away with a shorter handle. I was mostly just trying to see if this would work.
Will do some chrony work this weekend to see if it affected consistency.
BTW, I can get a lot of this carbon ATM. Gonna snag some lengths tomorrow.
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This here is my “safety”
Ok, someone pull WOK’s safety, he needs to release some air… 😆
Thanks for posting the results of your breech mod. especially its effect on accuracy. That was interesting and unexpected 😕 It has me rethinking a breech design Ive been working on.
Tag,
Final report on the cocking lever. Just a reminder, this was designed to help me cock the rifle (bad joints in hands) after installing a very heavy spring to drive the hammer.
Mixed results. The lever not seem to affect consistency as far as FPS goes, but accuracy is way out of line.
For whatever reason, with the handle mounted POI changes quite often and sometimes in inches. This may or may not be caused by the very heavy spring, I did not test the original with the lever. Its a little confusing because my first string shot with the lever shot quite well.
It gets worse.
The carbon part started to de-laminate on me, so I machined one out of 6061 3 days ago. This morning the aluminum block split apart into 3 peices while I was cocking the rifle.
The forces of the hammer impact with the overly heavy spring were too much for even .25″ thick block of aluminum with a handle bolted on at 90°. I think the laws of motion have spoken here. Do not mount a lever on a violently rapid moving part, or it will cause a failure.
When I removed the screws from the breech, I found that both bolts had elongated. Wanting to continue, I epoxy filled the hole, retapped it and mounted the normal cocking knob. I glued a short grub screw in the now empty hole.
3 shots later, the O-rings blew in the breech for the 2nd time in 2 weeks. 2 sets of O-rings in under 100 shots.
Other than the elongated holes, there was no visible or measurable damage to the breech. I cannot help but wonder if they blew because of the heavy spring or the lever flopping around during the firing cycle.
I was concerned at first that the tophat on the Selph valve was too small, allowing the oring to blow. So far, Ive put over 500 shots with this valve through the SS, with a standard spring and its breech rings are holding up fine.
Time for a lighter spring and new breech for the condor. Throwing the cocking lever into the lessons bucket.
You may have to alter it slightly, I milled the slot in my frame to allow for a far greater OD on the shaft (14mm). All you’d need to do, if you wanted a narrower slot, is reduce that part of the shaft that would pass along it.
Lang, I already have that option with YN’s frame. It has a slot milled in it already and Ive thought about trying it out and making the condor frame my SS.
Thanks for the offer though. Your picture is all I would need if I wanted to try that, I just dont have the capability for inside o-ring slot milling yet. 😉
RiffRaff, if you like I’ll send you my design for a breech that’ll take an extra-long cocking-lever (you’d need to mill a slot in the side of your frame). The ones I’ve made work excellently. The shaft of the cocking-lever goes right through the breech-block, so it’s about as strong as any design could possibly be.
You may have to alter it slightly, I milled the slot in my frame to allow for a far greater OD on the shaft (14mm). All you’d need to do, if you wanted a narrower slot, is reduce that part of the shaft that would pass along it.
A lot of changes to the rifle. I got the cocking lever/bolt reshaped, shortened and added a bit of carbon to the handle for grip. Not liking the carbon part bolted to the breech though, its tough on the frame gonna have to figure something out.
Another big change, the 18″ .25 cal barrel I got from Walt in HI. No pic, its in the rifle now. 8)
I also trimmed the extended part of the PW, the part that the spring sits over. Now Brads spring will fit inside the rifle without overcompressing. Much more managable, and the PW actually can be used now.
I have the gun setup as follows.
18″ .25 barrel
Selph/Blodnob valve
Selph hammer spring, .080″ thick wire 4″ long about 15/16″ OD. Heavy.
Standard hammer 49gr, Condor weight 19gr, total 68gr.
PW = 6
Tophat at .070″ (measured from the end down to the locking collar inside)
Fill to 3000psi, after 30 shots had around 2000psi remaining.
30 shot string of Kodiaks, with one accidental FTS pellet tossed in. I had one sitting on the table for comparison, and realized what it was when inserting it into the barrel. –Loud BOOM confirmed my suspicion.
I thought the results were going to be quite different. Watching the power drop each shot, It was a surprise to see the power level off and actually rise again for a while.
The tophat on the Selph/Blodnob valve does indeed drift out, and every 4-5 shots I reached in and it would take about 1/4 turn to return it to the setpoint.
For comparison, with the stock Condor valve and a 24″ barrel, stock spring and same hammer I was averaging 965fps with the PW at 10. This power level quickly dropped off after 16-17 shots and diminished to mid 800s by shot 20.
This string is 30 shots with an average fps above the longer barrel and old valve. I really do not understand how, but I like it.
The 24″ barrel gives outrageous power with this setup, so much I cant shoot kodiaks and that barrel wont shoot EJs. This 18″ barrels seems to like both pellets quite well.
Accuracy was superb, however I did experience some POI shift the first 5 or 6 shots until the barrel settled. I retorqued the setscrews every 2 shots until the POI settled in. After all was said and done, I ended up with a 30 shot group about 1.75″, the first 4 shots went into a vertical ragged hole, and once POI shift settled the rest went into a quarter size hole. The FTS shot about 4″ above so I didnt count it.
My springs I got from McMaster turned out to be almost identical to the one Brad supplied, so I havent tried any of them yet. I miscalculated when I chose, 😳
Marc I havent done any chrony work with this handle attached yet. Sometime this weekend I hope.
With the heavy spring, to make it easier on the sears I push forward a bit on the handle while disengaging the safety. And yes, I have done the trigger mod and it did help quite a bit but only with the safety installed.
Like I said before, the damn thing will not stay engaged without that safety block in place. You think a heavier spring on the middle sear will help with that? I did try the 2nd position on the hammersear spring, but still no luck.
Im trying to find a small tube I have here somewhere which will become the new handle. With some grinding away of material on the pressed carbon block and using the tube instead of that aluminum, the combined weight will very slightly more than the aluminum knob I had on there before.
Right now the whole assembly the biggest weight comes from the aluminum and the steel cap screws. Even though the alu handle is hollowed out I wont lose enough weight by shortening it. The carbon block with carbon tube will combine to weigh less than the aluminum part itself. I can get aluminum 10/32 cap screws from work, Ill only need 2, and with the block grinding they will be .25″ shorter. This will bring the weight to a reasonable level.
Riffraf,
Does adding that extra weight to the breechslide effect your shotstring? My experience is keep that part of your rifle as light as possible!
By the way have you done the trigger adjustment screw mod? Sometimes that helpes a great deal! Normaly the hammer sear glides over the safety block and sits there actually lose from the seconds sear. When disengaging the safety you hear the hammer sear engaging the 2nd sear quite hard. My bet is this is going to be killing on your sears on the long run when using a heavy spring!
Have you moved the spring, that pushes the hammersear upwards, into the 2nd slot? Try a stiffer spring on the second sear?
The airforce trigger is a engineering miracle!! But can be tuned to a crisp predictable almost match trigger!! Although I don’t know what happens if one uses a very stiff spring!
Regards,
Marc
Ya know, I tried many times to remove this “safety” from this particular rifle. Each and every time, the damn thing would not stay cocked no matter what I tried.
Put the safety block back in, and it cocks. I found the easiest thing for my peice of mind (meaning I dont think about it too much) was just leaving it in.
I took the safety out of YNs frame and havent had a bit of trouble. This condor for whatever reason just will not work without it.
I wish somebody would hurry up and invent a modular trigger group for this thing.
This here is my “safety”
A switch that only sometimes makes your weapon fire when disengaged.
What’s a safety??
I’m following this thread with interest!
🙂
Mike
I keep forgetting to address the trigger pull.
Pull has gone up a little, but not enough to make a huge difference. Outside shooting at cans I hardly noticed it.
The safety releases a bit harder though. Not really comfortable just taking it out.
I have a couple of different springs in the mail, should be here today. Will be trying them over the weekend.
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Mixed results. The lever not seem to affect consistency as far as FPS goes, but accuracy is way out of line.
For whatever reason, with the handle mounted POI changes quite often and sometimes in inches. This may or may not be caused by the very heavy spring, I did not test the original with the lever. Its a little confusing because my first string shot with the lever shot quite well.
It gets worse.
The carbon part started to de-laminate on me, so I machined one out of 6061 3 days ago. This morning the aluminum block split apart into 3 peices while I was cocking the rifle.
The forces of the hammer impact with the overly heavy spring were too much for even .25″ thick block of aluminum with a handle bolted on at 90°. I think the laws of motion have spoken here. Do not mount a lever on a violently rapid moving part, or it will cause a failure.
When I removed the screws from the breech, I found that both bolts had elongated. Wanting to continue, I epoxy filled the hole, retapped it and mounted the normal cocking knob. I glued a short grub screw in the now empty hole.
3 shots later, the O-rings blew in the breech for the 2nd time in 2 weeks. 2 sets of O-rings in under 100 shots.
Other than the elongated holes, there was no visible or measurable damage to the breech. I cannot help but wonder if they blew because of the heavy spring or the lever flopping around during the firing cycle.
I was concerned at first that the tophat on the Selph valve was too small, allowing the oring to blow. So far, Ive put over 500 shots with this valve through the SS, with a standard spring and its breech rings are holding up fine.
Time for a lighter spring and new breech for the condor. Throwing the cocking lever into the lessons bucket.
How stiff is that hammer spring? Are you sure you have gained anything if the gun is beating itself to bits?
I use a 25# spring in my Vulture and it cocks easy enough with one thumb.
Confused wrt to why you need such a heavy spring?
Walter….