Tuning What's Going On With The Regulator?

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brawler1588

brawler1588

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Sep 15, 2015
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Mahopac, NY, United States
So its a impact .25 power plenum and external plenum from Ernest built on a .35 base. It came with the fx gauge reading 150 was interested in the digital gauge from sekhmet so picked one up and it read 130bar ok fx gauges can be off took 2 shots and it went down to about 125bar ok regulator creep is a thing. Put sekhmet on the bottle side and my wika now on the regulator came in at 125-130bar ok great. Testing a few things and shot from a full tank at 250bar down to 175bar and now the regulator gauge was reading 145bar to me that seems like a lot of movement what do you all think. Next stage now have 2 sekhmet gauges one on each side to take note and hear is what its reading so far I get the bottle numbers will fluctuate from the tank cooling or temperature changes from even being in the case but for the regulator numbers to keep rising and not even 24hrs yet just seems odd to me.

9:40pm (11-3) Bottle 127bar--- Regulator 128bar

11:15pm (11-3) Bottle 251bar--- Regulator 132bar

1:30am (11/4) Bottle 246bar--- Regulator 134-135bar

7:15am (11/4) Bottle 245bar--- Regulator 136bar

11:00am (11/4) Bottle 245bar--- Regulator 137bar

2:00pm (11/4) Bottle 246bar--- Regulator 138bar
 
From your 250 bar fill, I will guess the bottle pressure dropping 5 bar, is just the air in your bottle cooling down to your room temperature.

The reg pressure increasing might also be some creep, and maybe some temperature increase also. Those 6 bars increase in regpressure while storing, seems normal to me. Just dryfire the rifle before you are gonna shoot, if it bothers you. It did after all took over 2 hours for the reg pressure to "creep" 2-3 bar (from 11:15 to 1:30), so the gun works just fine. If you did shoot the gun with 2 hours between each shot (hunting scenario?), you would probably never notice any difference.

In comparison: An unregulated gun would probably drop 2 bar between each shot (depending on the size of air reservoir). And all depending how you tuned it, you would maybe have 50 bar difference in pressure from the first shot, till the last:)


 
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A question: I am guessing when you had 127 bar in your bottle, you had shot the gun just below regpressure? And when you filled the gun the reg setled at 132 bar? If that is the case it all looks normal to me. The 1 bar difference in bottle and regpressure at 127 bar is probably just the two gauges reading 1 bar difference.
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I am thinking the regulator is set at 125-130 area my concern is more that I have had readings from 125-145 and thats without me touching the actual regulator settings.
 
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Well I am not an expert, but if you do shoot you gun below reg pressure, and refill it, the reg pressure might be a litle higher just after the refill, but will be stable after a dryfire shot or two. Maybe you should try to not fire the gun lower than 140-135 bar bottle pressure before refiling, and see if that helps? If the gun shoot with stable velocity over a chronograph, and is tuned good, I would not bother with it. 
 
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Scott is right, the seat has a flaw. The how/when/why is a separate question, but the seat has a defect that is allowing air to slowly seep from the reservoir into the plenum.
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So what is the remedy for this i know like tor47 said it may not be noticeable while shooting but after spending this much I want everything as good as I can get it.
 
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I have both an impact, and a wildcat with an edgun digital gauge on the reg side. I know my impact can also have a reg pressure increase 5-8 bar while storing it away. But it is back to normal after 2-3 shots dryfire. What is more important for me is that the pressure doeas not change that much while I am sitting at the bench shooting. My wildcat might have a lilte less pressure increase while storing. But both my guns usually stays within 3-4 bar from a full fill, and down to where I am refilling, while shooting. I usually do not shoot them below reg pressure before refilling.
 
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My statement made was a question of previous interaction you may had with regulator prior to this current creep situation ... nothing more.

Yup the seat and surfaces that mate creating the seal must be dead nuts clean and flat or they will leak and reg will shift set point / creep.
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I know I recently picked it up and it was Ernest Rowe's impact so I am sure he messed with it a lot. Is there a video out there on what I should do? Also where would we think the regulator is so when I put it back together I know where to set it.
 
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Unscrew the bottle when stored then no reg creep. Don't need to totally unscrew the bottle just 5-6 turns or so however much it takes to remove the constant air pressure and enough so the bottle valve closes by itself. Screw it in only when ready to shoot again no wasted dry fire shots that way.

I noticed Earnest fills his own Impact less than 200bar max there must be a reason for that.
 
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Unscrew the bottle when stored then no reg creep. Don't need to totally unscrew the bottle just 5-6 turns or so however much it takes to remove the constant air pressure and enough so the bottle valve closes by itself. Screw it in only when ready to shoot again no wasted dry fire shots that way.

I noticed Earnest fills his own Impact less than 200bar max there must be a reason for that.
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If I do that and let it settle would that than give me the true regulator pressure?
 
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