TargetTalk

I've started working w/ my 10 year old son shooting 3 Position Air Rifle using an Avanti 853 Legend rifle.

Does anyone know of any YouTube videos that show a reasonably good way to pump the rifle while prone with a sling? What he is doing now is awkward for him, and I can't envision any other methods that would work. I'm hoping to see something that I'm currently not thinking of.

I've searched YouTube but have found little.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Lee

Your son is going to struggle with the 853's pump lever, but here's a video produced for air/army/sea cadets in Canada on how to load the 853 rifle:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-4fHKR3tbw

It's one video in a series of 22 produced for cadet marksmanship up here.

Jason

Thanks Jason,

That technique pulling the butt back and holding w/ the knee might help. It will definitely be better than what he is doing now! His arms are not quite long enough to do it in the first example the video shows.

I did find this video series, but only watched a few and missed the one you pointed out. Thank you for putting me onto the correct one.

Lee

There's another technique that we sometimes use where we flip the rifle over, hold the butt down with the knee and pump it vertically (instead of sideways like in the video). I don't like this method because if the shooter's hand slips they'll catch the lever in the face -- ouch.

To make the first technique work, it's really important that he keep his wrists locked as straight as possible -- if you bend them you lose the bone-to-bone leverage and it comes down to wrist strength rather than biceps to close the lever.

That said, it is possible to shoot 97+ prone on ISSF targets with these rifles. The trigger pull is long and mushy but once you get used to it they're okay. Good luck!

Jason

Jason,

Thanks for the link, the under knee method is working for my boy quite nicely. He needs a few more inches of reach to do the first method shown on the video.

I agree on the accuracy of these guns ... pretty amazing for their cost. I also don't mind the triggers, if a shooter can learn to successfully pull through these triggers how much better will there hold and control be once they get to a better one.

That's based on the four or five Avanti's I've handled, they all had pretty much the same triggers ... poor of course, but not so awful that you need to develop bad mechanics to make them go off.

Thanks again,

Lee

Have you looked the the trigger mod posted on our host's website?

http://www.pilkguns.com/daisy853tm.shtml

Thanks for the tip! I have looked at this mod and have considered it.

I don't have a tap so I've not done more than think about it, but perhaps I should do this.

Is there a good pictorial showing how to take the gun down to component parts that you could point me to?

Thanks,

Lee

I had Scott work over the trigger on an 887 that I bought from him last year and it's light years better than the triggers on any of the 853Cs that my cadets use. I just wish I could modify the issued rifles!

Jason

Hi Jason,

Thanks again for the video tip, my son is doing much better pumping the gun now, so he is having more fun and that, of course, will lend itself to higher levels of interest / practice!

I have a question if I may, it seems you have seen this rifle use a great deal with the cadet program.

When shooting standing, my son places his support hand directly in front of the trigger guard and under the pump lever handle. He stated that the "gun moves when it shoots" this way causing him to question his shot call.

I've shot it a bit too with this hold and the gun does move over the handle after the trigger break.

Has this caused your shooters any problems? Does the movement occur after the pellet has left the barrel? It does mess with the shot call, but on this rifle is the best position to place the hand while standing, I'd hate to have to modify an otherwise good position.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,

Lee

Lee,

We're only now starting to focus on shooting standing in cadets. It's been part of the training program for a few years, and shot at the provincial and national level, but only the most dedicated units have been training standing for more than a year or two.

As far as the rifle moving on shot release, just keep in mind what it is -- it's not going to perform like an Anschutz/FWB/Walther. Encourage your son to experiment with different hand positions until he finds one that works best and then train to accept the movement.

None of my cadets have mentioned excessive movement after firing when prone, but they're all very much novices when it comes to standing and have enough other issues to focus on. :)

Jason

Hi,
I redid several triggers and photographed up the entire process with step by step pictures (200+).
It's located on my shared dropbox folder here:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/9z8sm46vu3x7hzr/T0JVXczWsI

The folder also has several other resources and manuals, to include other people's write-ups (done very well with both pictures and words!) of their rifle tuning.

When you see the pictures, you'll see that the rifle is very easy to work on.

When you access my dropbox folder, look in the following sub-folder:
Airgun Manuals\Daisy 753 853 953

Hope this helps
Chris

PS:
One tricky part when working on the airgun:
To remove the action from the stock, push the safety button halfway between safe and fire.
Then, while looking at the safety mechanism, push it to SAFE, but do it VERY carefully under observation. There is a TINY steel ball bearing there that will bounce out and disappear on you if you are not very careful.
See this hide and seek playing steel ball in the photos below:





For the Trigger Mod, see here (very easy to do)
http://www.pilkguns.com/tenp/spd753.htm
http://www.pilkguns.com/tenp/d853tm.htm
http://www.pilkguns.com/daisy853tm.shtml
Alternative trigger mod technique:
http://www.network54.com/Forum/79537/th ... eaking+Air
Small bolt and nut (or tapped tube) soldered to the sear as shown below:


To increase power (well worth it)
1. Fill in the piston face
The piston has a recess or void in front approximately 5/8" diam x 1/8" deep.
This is unnecessary and wasted air volume. Fill it in for a slight power increase.
I filled the hole in the piston with JB IndustroWELD to increase the FPS some. I imagine any two component epoxy would work. Be sure to properly clean the site before adding the epoxy.
2. Replace the two O-Rings on the Piston with fresh ones.

All the above files, references and pictures are in my shared dropbox folder.

DLS wrote:I have a question if I may, it seems you have seen this rifle use a great deal with the cadet program.

When shooting standing, my son places his support hand directly in front of the trigger guard and under the pump lever handle. He stated that the "gun moves when it shoots" this way causing him to question his shot call.

I've shot it a bit too with this hold and the gun does move over the handle after the trigger break.

I know that this is a three year old post. But recently I got a CMP 853 and had exactly the same problem. I also put a 4x15 scope and I can see the target in the scope "sink down" for about 1 mil dot, which would mean that the scope mount "rising up" upon firing. I also fee the lever shift at the same time.

However, it does not seem to affect the accuracy. I still got 1-hole group @ 10 m with RWS superdome. I would appreciate if anyone can share what was the cause and if there is cure. I have tighten the screws on the forearm and after trigger guard with no effect.

As far as the movement, I too experienced this and found it very disconcerting. Looking into it a little, I believe the movement is caused by the relaxing of the piston and cylinder when the pressure is released. There is a natural flexing of the thin cylinder wall when put under pressure (stress). As the shot breaks that pressure is released and the cylinder shrinks back to its relaxed state. The lever rests pretty much on the bottom of the cylinder, so it also moves. There is not any adjustment to the gun that can be made, short of going to a thick wall steel for the cylinder to minimize the stretch. but that would require the stock to be modified to fit.

My opinion is that it is best not to rest the lever on the hand, but to put support on the wood. I have long fingers so I can easily support the gun between by thumb and forefinger without actually touching the cocking lever.

Good luck, and I hope this helps a little bit.

Thanks for the reply and help. Sorry for the late notice.

I also got reply from other forum mentioning the same thing. Funny thing is that in my case I found that support gun on the lever actually reduce the grouping to a single hole. If I hold the wood forearm, the barrel will shift in the bad case and enlarge the grouping. By supporting the gun via the lever, the grouping reduced.

Later I put 4 washers on the pair of long screws locking on the forearm wood stock. That removes quite a bit wiggling of the inner gun and wood stock. This helps the situation so that now it does not matter too much where I hold the gun.

[quote="dukja"] I know that this is a three year old post. [quote]

Hello dukja,

It's been almost three years since I've been to this site. I log in on a whim and see a thread I started up front and center! Pretty strange I would think.

We are still shooting that 853 and enjoying it immensely. It's now in the hands of an 11 year old daughter ... so it's on the third kid. Quite a value for a low cost rifle.

DLS wrote:

dukja wrote: I know that this is a three year old post.

Hello dukja,

It's been almost three years since I've been to this site. I log in on a whim and see a thread I started up front and center! Pretty strange I would think.

We are still shooting that 853 and enjoying it immensely. It's now in the hands of an 11 year old daughter ... so it's on the third kid. Quite a value for a low cost rifle.

Thanks for your reply. It is great to hear that the 835 still serve your family well! :)