Western Airguns Western sidewinder .30 cal issue

Greetings airgunners! I just got a WA Sidewinder in 30 cal but its not producing the foot/lbs I expected. I got it from the factory with the regulator pressure preset at 170 bar. This seems rather high but i didn't make any reg adjustments. When I loaded it up with 44.75gr JSBs I got 430 fps with the lowest power setting and maxed out at only 850 fps. That's only around 70 FPE. I hesitate to go do more reg tweaking because usually at 170 bar my other guns are doing in excess of 900 fps with the same pellets. Any suggestions what else can I look at. I've heard the Sidewinders are not the quietest but mine sounds loud even wearing ear plugs. I've also noticed the noise is coming from the magazine port and I can feel air rush everytime it fires. Is this normal for this gun? Any advise from Sidewinder owners will be much appreciated. I'm not in a location where I can conveniently send the gun back so I'm trying to see if I can troubleshoot and fix it myself. Thanks in advance folks!

4890aec0-e90b-43d4-8fa3-51c9e568f36b.jpeg
 
Greetings airgunners! I just got a WA Sidewinder in 30 cal but its not producing the foot/lbs I expected. I got it from the factory with the regulator pressure preset at 170 bar. This seems rather high but i didn't make any reg adjustments. When I loaded it up with 44.75gr JSBs I got 430 fps with the lowest power setting and maxed out at only 850 fps. That's only around 70 FPE. I hesitate to go do more reg tweaking because usually at 170 bar my other guns are doing in excess of 900 fps with the same pellets. Any suggestions what else can I look at. I've heard the Sidewinders are not the quietest but mine sounds loud even wearing ear plugs. I've also noticed the noise is coming from the magazine port and I can feel air rush everytime it fires. Is this normal for this gun? Any advise from Sidewinder owners will be much appreciated. I'm not in a location where I can conveniently send the gun back so I'm trying to see if I can troubleshoot and fix it myself. Thanks in advance folks!

View attachment 388675
Don't have a sidewinder but have had both huben and lcs. The barrel to magazine gap is critical. Excessive blow by means the barrel isn't far enough back. Don't know how it's adjusted on yours but on the lcs you screw the barrel in until the magazine doesn't rotate and back it off an 1/8 turn so mag rotates. Gap should be .005 to .010 inch
 
Don't have a sidewinder but have had both huben and lcs. The barrel to magazine gap is critical. Excessive blow by means the barrel isn't far enough back. Don't know how it's adjusted on yours but on the lcs you screw the barrel in until the magazine doesn't rotate and back it off an 1/8 turn so mag rotates. Gap should be .005 to .010 inch
The problem it’s exactly like your said,thanks alot.
 
I've no experience with the Sidewinder, but own 1 LCS and 3 Hubens. Like mentioned above screw in barrel until the magazine will not rotate then back off ever so little until magazine rotates. Once the proper position is found I scribe an indexing mark the barrel and the barrel receptor. This makes rezeroing the scope a click or two back to good.
 
  • Like
Reactions: BoomStick19