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ginoe · Member

when out airgun shooting or hunting, what's the average outside temperature?

I was recently outside at the range in 35-45f degrees sighting in my .50cal dragon claw dual tank. About 3 or 4 hours into it, the rifle would not shoot out the round ball. it held air & seemed to function normally, just won't shoot. I thought I broke it so i put it away & started shooting the .308 powder burner rifle the rest of the day. the next day, after its been inside the house for 24hrs; I test fired it again & all is well - it shot the round ball out.

I suppose this thing (like most things) has a min/max operating temp?

Kinda stinks as I wanted to use it on coyotes this winter. Maybe I can club them over the head with it...

radar · Silver Status Member

Shouldn't be a problem at all for a PCP. The pressure drops very little even with a huge drop in outside temperature...not like CO2 that won't do well below 50F. I seen Edgun on Youtube video PCP hunting well below zero.

The only thing I can think of is oil on the hammer got too thick, some bit of metal that is on the borderline of binding got cold and shrunk just enough to seize up, or it was unrelated coincidence with some other intermittent mechanocal problem.

rsterne · Moderator

Almost certainly a hammer related problem.... The lube got thick and sticky and/or a burr, as mentioned.... I regularly hunt in freezing conditions with a PCP with no problems....

Bob

ginoe · Member

Thanks you for your responses. WP from SMG suggested it was the grease used in the mechanism. I'm still trying to build up the courage to tackle this thing & take it apart. I'm trying to arm myself with the knowledge that I can find searching the 'net. I found something similar;

http://preview.tinyurl.com/ar8whdx

I've only taken one rifle apart & that was a crosman springer, another was a hatsan pistol. I'm hoping its really that simple.

ginoe · Member

in retrospect, once the dragon claw quit on me - i started shooting the marauder pistol-turned-carbine. it was subject to the same weather conditions & it shot flawlessly.

ginoe · Member

UPDATE

another cold day at the range. it's been a week and that panic of a broken claw has disappeared, time to sight in the scope (using lower rings & minus the high sitting dovetail-to-picattiny mount).

i was given a tip to try; since its freezing out, warm up the rifle action with the truck heater. so while i was unloading the gear & setting up the target downrange, i left the truck running with the rifle warming on the dash. yes, those are old worn socks. i am planning on keeping them on as 'winter camo'. gives a new twist on 'gun sock' eh?!

i started out at 77*F from inside the truck, about 14mins later it dropped to 39*F.

going by the rifle gauge, i filled to 200bar/3000psi, notice the difference between the rifle vs tank.

with my own cast of roundball, i took 5 shots at the top target to sight in @ 50yds. once i got it where i wanted it, used the bottom target for groups. i got real excited & i think i flubbed the 5th shot. it wasn't until after i finished shooting; i realized the scope was only on 3x. i could have dialed it up to 9x & maybe shoot tighter groupings!

temp keeps dropping but now the shooting is getting fun.

i got bored shooting groups so i started aiming at the tape i have hanging on the target stand i use as wind telltales. it was cool to see i hit them.

i was satisfied with the bench shooting so i tried some offhand, standing shooting. wow, not so easy!

radar · Silver Status Member

Ready for some winter hunting! Nice!