In my collection, is a Weihrauch 97 in .20 that is an absolute laser. And while I am fortunate to have many nice rifles in my collection, I wanted a .20 in a break barrel to go with my underlever. .177 and .22 Beeman and Weihrauch rifles were readily available, but other than the 98 (I have one in .177), the more traditional Weihrauch rifles in .20 seem to be nearly non-existent, at least new, and finding a used one is very rare.
About ten days ago, I found this .20 Beeman R 9 for sale on E-bay, it was advertised as in nearly like new condition, though it was several years old. I stayed with it and was the lucky bidder in the end, though I could have purchased a new .177 or .22 Beeman R 9 from AOA for what I ended up paying for this one. Realizing that I would have immediately fully disassembled a new rife for tuning purposes anyway, voiding any warranty that existed, I decided it didn't matter.
The rifle was shipped nearly immediately and arrived within only a couple of days. With the rifle came two containers of pellets, and from the looks of them (heavily oxidized), and the fact that they were nearly full, I could tell that the rifle had not been shot much at all, and that it had been a long time since it had been shot.
I didn't even fire it, before I stripped it completely down. The barrel didn't have much lead fouling at all, again indicating it had not hardly been shot, but there was some oxidation, indicating that it had been sitting along time. I cleaned and polished the barrel thoroughly as a first step. Next, I fully pulled out all of the compression components. The grease had turned hard in the cylinder and on the spring. I ordered a new Vortek PG3 Steel Kit, having Tom cut the spring down to whatever he thought would be needed to put the power level at +/- 14.5 FPE. The spring kit arrived in less than 72 hours. Meanwhile, I had totally disassembled the REKORD trigger, hand polished all of the sears and surface components, reassembled, lubricated, and adjusted it to break like glass.
The Vortek kit took some modification, as the tolerances of the steel kit cylinder and top hat were too tight. I used my belt sander and turned down the diameter of the top hat to where it fit perfectly. As for the steel sleeve on the outside of the spring kit, I cut it off just above the base and slid it off of the spring.
I replaced the breach and piston seals with new seals purchased from Vortek with the spring kit. Next came re-lubricating the rifle using Air Venturi's tune-in-a-tube. I oiled all of he external hinge points with RWS Airgun oil.
Finally, I used Loctite on all of the screws as it went back together.
I fitted the rifle with a new set of Sports Match vertically adjustable rings with a recoil stop in in the rear mount, and placed a Vortex 6-24x50 Diamondback Tactical FFP scope on top. Using my scope leveling kit, I leveled the scope up. The first test shot was 3" low and 1" right at 18 yards. Adjusting the rings, I was able to get within 1/2" of the needed vertical adjustment on the first try. The scope was sighted in with a total of 5 shots fired.
Testing began, shooting two ten shot groups each with four different pellets, to find the best pellet match, of the pellets I had on hand, for this rifle. The results can be seen in the accompanying exhibits. Note that Tom produced a spring kit that provided the exact power output I was looking for.
The real proof as to the accuracy and consistency of these rifles can be seen on the final test target, the squirrel target, as found below, putting 9 of the 10 pellets in nearly the same hole. Bear in mind that this is only +/- 120 shots after spring installation. From my experience, it will only get better and likely won't hit its peak performance until after 800 to 1000 shots have been fired.
This will be a fun rifle to own and shoot, and because of its light weight and balance, would be an excellent rifle in the field to hunt with.
About ten days ago, I found this .20 Beeman R 9 for sale on E-bay, it was advertised as in nearly like new condition, though it was several years old. I stayed with it and was the lucky bidder in the end, though I could have purchased a new .177 or .22 Beeman R 9 from AOA for what I ended up paying for this one. Realizing that I would have immediately fully disassembled a new rife for tuning purposes anyway, voiding any warranty that existed, I decided it didn't matter.
The rifle was shipped nearly immediately and arrived within only a couple of days. With the rifle came two containers of pellets, and from the looks of them (heavily oxidized), and the fact that they were nearly full, I could tell that the rifle had not been shot much at all, and that it had been a long time since it had been shot.
I didn't even fire it, before I stripped it completely down. The barrel didn't have much lead fouling at all, again indicating it had not hardly been shot, but there was some oxidation, indicating that it had been sitting along time. I cleaned and polished the barrel thoroughly as a first step. Next, I fully pulled out all of the compression components. The grease had turned hard in the cylinder and on the spring. I ordered a new Vortek PG3 Steel Kit, having Tom cut the spring down to whatever he thought would be needed to put the power level at +/- 14.5 FPE. The spring kit arrived in less than 72 hours. Meanwhile, I had totally disassembled the REKORD trigger, hand polished all of the sears and surface components, reassembled, lubricated, and adjusted it to break like glass.
The Vortek kit took some modification, as the tolerances of the steel kit cylinder and top hat were too tight. I used my belt sander and turned down the diameter of the top hat to where it fit perfectly. As for the steel sleeve on the outside of the spring kit, I cut it off just above the base and slid it off of the spring.
I replaced the breach and piston seals with new seals purchased from Vortek with the spring kit. Next came re-lubricating the rifle using Air Venturi's tune-in-a-tube. I oiled all of he external hinge points with RWS Airgun oil.
Finally, I used Loctite on all of the screws as it went back together.
I fitted the rifle with a new set of Sports Match vertically adjustable rings with a recoil stop in in the rear mount, and placed a Vortex 6-24x50 Diamondback Tactical FFP scope on top. Using my scope leveling kit, I leveled the scope up. The first test shot was 3" low and 1" right at 18 yards. Adjusting the rings, I was able to get within 1/2" of the needed vertical adjustment on the first try. The scope was sighted in with a total of 5 shots fired.
Testing began, shooting two ten shot groups each with four different pellets, to find the best pellet match, of the pellets I had on hand, for this rifle. The results can be seen in the accompanying exhibits. Note that Tom produced a spring kit that provided the exact power output I was looking for.
The real proof as to the accuracy and consistency of these rifles can be seen on the final test target, the squirrel target, as found below, putting 9 of the 10 pellets in nearly the same hole. Bear in mind that this is only +/- 120 shots after spring installation. From my experience, it will only get better and likely won't hit its peak performance until after 800 to 1000 shots have been fired.
This will be a fun rifle to own and shoot, and because of its light weight and balance, would be an excellent rifle in the field to hunt with.
