Derrick's Crosman 180 Repair Part 3

One thing that bothers me while shooting many of the vintage Crosman rifles is the protruding nut that holds the action to the stock. It seems like it's right where I want to rest my support hand.

I cut a piece of 7/16" drill rod to make a new locating stud.

Chucked it into the Taig 3-jaw and faced off. Turned down about a half inch of the end to 0.188" diameter.

Done.

Need a shoulder att the base of the 0.188" section to recess into the wall of the gas tube and anchor the valve. The shoulder was cut to 0.2675" diameter and is 0.062" long.

Threaded the 0.188" portion #10-32 with a thread cutting die.

Cut a relief groove at the base of the thread to allow the thread to bottom against the valve.

Threaded into the valve.

Since I've moved the valve forward by 0.088" in the gas tube, I must also make a new exhaust port in the valve and seal off the old.

A transfer punch provides the mark for the new port location.

Gutted the valve and ready for drilling. You know what's next... Spotted and drilled.

I matched the original hole diameter with a #21 drill bit. I didn't look up the actual diameter. The bit simply fit nicely into the old exhaust port. A drill bit chart says the #21 is 0.1517".

Need to seal off the original exhaust port hole. Just tapped the old hole to #10-32. Catch what Crosman did? They uses the tapping drill for both the exhaust post hole and the #10-32 stud thread. One bit for 2 jobs on the valve.

A short #10-32 setscrew and some permanent thread locking compound should seal the old exhaust port hole.

Installed the setscrew flush with the bottom of the hole inside the valve. This should keep the volume inside the valve the same as before. Again, reassembled and pressure tested the valve. The exhaust port lined up correctly in the gas tube and the valve went "bang".

Back to that new locating stud.

The 180 stock had a 7/16" diameter hole already in place.

Intentionally left the stud long to allow for sizing. Ideally, I want the end about half an inch from the bottom edge of the stock.

Cut the stud off and faced what will be the bottom end.

Nick shows edge finders, I show center drill bits. We cover all the bases that way.

Drilled an inch deep with a #7 bit.

Tapped 1/4" x 20 using a Jacob's chuck held in the lathe's tailstock.

Several months ago, I made a similar recessed nut for a Crosman 147 BP that was never blogged. It worked so well I won't mess with success. What is this? This is the upper pivot bolt from a Shimano rear derailleur. This one is stainless steel and has a very thin, wide head with a 5mm allen key broaching. Gotta have one? Go make friends at the local bike shop. (take good beer!) They'll likely give you a couple scavenged from broken derailleurs from the scrap parts bin. Tell them I sent you. (--only if you take the beer)

The head recesses into the Crosman stock(s) perfectly. The bolt is also made from top quality steel--which, of course, works against the ease of machining.

Grabbed the threaded end in the 4-jaw and trued. Turned the body of the bolt down to 0.250".

Parted off at the threaded end. Not shown: Cut 1/4" X 20 male threads on the Shimano bolt.

Looks promising.

The new locating stud.

Threaded into the valve.

Valve body tightened. Gun was reassembled--see Part #1 and do in reverse.

Insert action into stock.

Remember the bolt uses a 5mm allen wrench.

Hey! a smooth spot to rest the hand. I tend to shoot these guns from a 10-meter type position. When I set the forend on top of my fist, the old nut was in exactly the wrong place. The gun can still be converted back to original in a few minutes if so desired.


Snugged up. I'll paint the head black to match.

And a few more details to handle: The trigger could stand a tune up/adjustment, and uh, well, there's no rear sight on the gun--just a couple threaded holes. When James dropped off the gun, it had a broken Weaver scope attached with an odd mount clamped to the receiver. I'm not into point or instinct shooting, so I'll have to do something about that. Maybe I should mount a tactical quad rail and a bayonet and call it good? I'll probably just install a nice vintage open sight that Nick sent me in a care package a while back. Wait, what about a laser?

Still more to come in a few more days.

Derrick's Crosman 180 Repair Part 2

First, a quick detour from the valve problem.
The end cap serrations were chewed up from pliers.
Note #1: Hey, don't use pliers.

I think every old CO2 gun I've seen has a chewed up cap. See note #1 above.

Long-time friend, Chuck, owner of Precision Airgun in Maple Heights, Ohio, mentioned that he cleans up cap serrations with a small diamond shaped needle file. Others (Mac1) use thread restoring files with success.

I'll go with Chuck's technique. I used the straight section of a riffler file and I tried a couple needle files. They worked just fine.

Cut and rotate. Cut and rotate. Tedious. Not the most exciting half hour.

The wire wheel finished the clean up.

The majority of the gouges are gone and the serrations look substantially better. Great. Now I've got to do all my old caps. Thanks for that, Chuck!

An out of sequence image. Reblued with Formula 44/40. All that work and now I'll probably use a bulk-fill cap.

OK, back to the valve problem that gave me fits.

Reassembly with a spanking new valve body o-ring was a complete failure. The CO2 was very rapidly leaking past the o-ring. (Remember, when the 2 brass valve halves are tightened together, the body o-ring expands outward against the ID of the gas tube forming the seal.) At first, I tried several different sizes of o-rings, thinking I was using the wrong size. No dice.

Then, I started paying more attention to exactly where the leak was coming from. Under pressurization, the valve was being pushed backwards in the gas tube very slightly. (--And yes, I did remember to tighten the locating lug. The valve was moving back a small amount, but it was enough that the o-ring didn't have full wall support of the gas tube at the front of the transfer port hole. I tried making a quick and dirty new locating lug from an allen bolt that was a tighter fit in the gas tube hole. Nope. The valve still moved back and leaked under pressure.

Depressurized the tube, disassembled the valve and took a hard look at the valve threads.



The threaded hole is stretched backward allowing the valve to push backward under gas pressure causing the leak at the transfer port.
To fix the gun, there appear to be but 2 choices. I can buy a new valve from Archer Airguns or I can attempt a repair on the existing valve. As it stands, this valve is useless, so I'll attempt to fix it.

I gutted the valve body of all internal parts, turned the threaded lug hole / exhaust vent hole 90 degrees from vertical and centered it up on the drill press. I don't want a repeat of the stretched hole scenario, so I located the new lug hole 0.0885" further back. I spotted the hole then drilled with a #21. Changed bits and flattened the bottom of the hole. Didn't drill completely through the valve wall and into the stem hole through the center of the valve. Though, no real problem if I had; the stud would have sealed the hole once installed.

Another view.

Here's a good shot showing how much further back I located the lug hole. New hole is up top on the right.
Yeah, I know that moving the valve forward in the gas tube will cause a drop in velocity. The hammer won't hit the valve stem as hard or move it as far forward. Either way, the valve will be open for less time and the gun will lose some power. I'll deal with that if I can first make the gun go "bang".

Tapped the hole #10-32. Finished the thread with a bottoming tap. (Actually I reground a bottoming tap and really took the thread to the bottom of the hole.)

Reassembled and ready to test.

This is where a bulk-fill cap can earn it's keep. Once the valve is inside the gas tube, the stud can be threaded into the valve to anchor it in place. Use the valve wrench, tighten the front of the valve to expand the body o-ring and thread down the bulk-fill cap. Now a very tiny amount of CO2 can be bled from the paintball tank to check for leaks.

By the way, failing to adequately tighten the locating stud could/will cause the valve to exit the end of the gas tube like a missile and lodge in your skull. --Uh, there's your warning. Remember, that stud is the ONLY thing holding the valve in place. There's no hammer assembly and end-cap to slow it down or stop it as in an assembled gun.

The pressure held. I used a piece of 1/2" aluminum rod about a foot long to tap the exhaust valve pin and the valve functioned. I checked it again at 24, then 48, hours later. Still holding gas. I initially added about 1 or 2 grams of CO2 using the bulk-fill cap. If I only had a standard cap and 12 gram cartridges, well, that's a lot more CO2 to pressure test with.

More to come...

Derrick's Crosman 180 Repair Part 1

One of my customers, James, came in last week and gave me an old rifle: a .22 caliber Crosman 180 CO2 gun. He said it worked just fine the last time he'd shot it--back in 1978! He remembered the burglary I went through last year and wanted to help rebuild my airgun collection.

The gun is in exceptional cosmetic condition. The bluing is about 90+% I think we figured the gun was from around 1962--mainly by dating the second variant trigger as well as James' recollection.

The Crosman 180 is essentially a shorter and lighter version of the 160. The 160 rifle uses two 12gm CO2 cartridges, the 180 gets by with just one.

A generous amount of Crosman Pellgun oil and about $5.00 in CO2 cartridges proved that the gun leaked like a true champ.

Disassembly time.

Remove the CO2 end cap, the safety and the nut/washer from the locating stud.

Action lifts right out of the stock.

Remove the trigger housing bolts.

A threaded bushing comes out next.

Remove the rear breech bolt.

The hammer assembly slides out. Note the mushroom shaped breech cap.

The hammer plug slides right out.

Inside the rear of the breech, the bolt handle is held in by a screw. Loosen it a couple turns and the bolt handle pulls right out.

Just for the record, this is not the stock bolt handle. I turned this one on the lathe to replace the damaged original. The ball end was gone from the original handle. Initially I was going to make an exact copy, but then decided to add some heft.

Loosen the barrel band and it slides forward off the gas tube.

Remove the front breech screw.

The barrel, spacer, breech seal and gas tube can now be separated.

From the front end of the gas tube, the face of the valve is slotted for a special tool.

I made this from a piece of 3/4" diameter tool steel. A similar tool is currently available from Bryan and Associates. It's their tool #T-9 "valve body disassembly tool".

This is out of sequence, but it shows how the tool fits into the end of the valve face. Here's the important stuff: The valve is made of 2 pieces of brass threaded together at the o-ring. In the gun, the rear of the valve is held fast by the locating stud. The valve tool is then used to tighten the front of the valve--this expands the o-ring outward sealing off the gas tube. In the older Crosman CO2 guns, the valve does NOT seal on the end of the 12 gram cartridge. Because of this, a bulk fill cap can be used with an adapter to charge the gun from a paintball tank--eliminating the need for 12 gram cartridges altogether.

Back to the task at hand. Use the valve tool to loosen the valve a couple turns. This takes the pressure off the o-ring.

Now the locating stud can be removed. I grabbed the stud in a padded vise and turned the gas tube to unthread. The stud thread is #10-32.

Valve can now be slid out of the gas tube.

Old seal on the left. It looks and feels like a nylon washer. It's rock hard and has perfectly square sides. A new o-ring seal is on the right.

Time and pressure. Had to crack the old seal to get it off the valve thread.

Here's the old standard Crosman valve. They used this in many CO2 guns. I didn't pull the felt from the inside front of the valve. It was in great shape and I didn't want to tear it getting it out for a picture.
Spoiler: Replacing the valve o-ring and reassembling was a complete bust. The gun had a weird, semi-serious valve problem that took several days to work out.

More to come in a few days.

Resealing a Crosman 101, valve body gasket

I had resealed the valve body against the receiver with a piece of gasket. I had been warned that it would probably leak if I didn't add an o-ring groove. Well it started leaking past the valve when I was pumping, reducing efficiency. I still didn't want to add an o-ring groove so I thought that a thin teflon gasket would do the trick.

A large piece of teflon, turned down to diameter and drilled to be a slip fit on the valve body.

Parted off, with a lot of flash around the end...

Deburred and mounted on the valve body.
I put it all back together and the annoying leak was gone. Not period authentic but better than making the groove.