Gas spring: design features, installation, advantages

The gas spring is an excellent tool for increasing the capacity of low-cost entry-level air rifles. However, the choice of a quality system for the modernization of weapons is only half the case. The gas spring still needs to be installed correctly, which directly affects its functionality and service life limit.

What is a gas spring?

The mechanism is in the form of a cylinder filled with compressed gas. On the one hand there is a plunger rod that extends in the longitudinal direction. In the course of the shot, the energy generated by pneumatics tends to push the rod outward, which facilitates the creation of effort. When the trigger is cocked, the plunger automatically returns to its original position.

A short excursion into the history

For the first time the gas spring was used as a standard in the manufacture of rifles in the mid 80s of the last century by the American company Theoben Engineering. A real boom for the use of such mechanisms was observed a decade later, when folk craftsmen adapted the pneumatic stops of cars to upgrade weapons. The technology was extremely affordable and did not force masters to resort to the use of expensive, specialized equipment.

Today, a number of authoritative manufacturers of piston pneumatics produce their variants of gas springs. The most popular products are brands: Crosman, Gamo, Norica, Hatsan.

Benefits

What are the advantages of the gas spring on the background of a standard twisted mechanism? Here it is worth highlighting the following:

1. Absence of vibration, annoying sounds, minimal return and as a result - the possibility of more accurate shooting.
2. The gas spring has a uniform platoon, which does not force the shooter to exert considerable effort during recharging of the rifle.
3. Increased power reserve - the implementation of individual adjustment opens the possibility to adjust the mechanism of the gas spring in accordance with the quality of the weapon used.
4. Durability - the maximum service life of gas springs exceeds the similar index of twisted mechanisms by approximately 5-7 times.
5. The possibility of long-term maintenance of weapons in the cocked position. When storing pneumatics with coil springs, it is highly discouraged to do so.
6. Effective use of optics - low vibration and minimal return during the operation of the gas spring in the most positive way affects the accuracy of shooting using optical sights.

Installing the gas spring

Let's consider the order of installation of the pneumatic mechanism. An example is a gas spring on Hatsan.

Work is carried out in the following order. To begin with, the rifle bed is separated, with the help of pliers, the fuse spring is released. The pin of the sear is removed. A bolt is twisted that holds the bed in the back position. After this, you can remove the factory twisted spring.

Further, the barrel is removed with the clutch, the piston is extracted. Now you can proceed to install the gas spring. The center washer is put on the ledge of the backside and the pneumatic device is fixed. The fuses and the trigger are assembled in the reverse order.

Finally, the owner of the rifle can only install the bed in place. Next, check the reliability of all fasteners. When using fasteners of low quality, there is a high probability of a jamming mechanism. Therefore, their selection should be approached carefully. In conclusion, it is worthwhile to test the operation of the installed gas spring in practice.