Love my New LV Class Air Rifle!

M

ModelA

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Got my New LV Class Thomas. What a pleasure to load and shoot. I have a tough time loading .177 pellets but with the wide open swing breech. I put a AA 8.4 on my foot long pellet seating probe. Slide it into Dan Brown LW slow twist and seat the pellet. I didn't drop one pellet!!

Mike Thomas Niksch for his first Air Rifle raised the bar a few feet !!! Several people shot it Fri during practice and Mike explained the guts.

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Steve George, Mike Niksch, Chip Smith, Gert from S.A.
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Mike if you ever get a chance it would be great to see a YouTube video showing the gun in operation and full overview. Or if you want to send one to me to evaluate I'd be happy to put together said video ;)

Really cool work. Saving more shekels in case I can buy one some day.

-Casey
 
Thomas open breech

Open breech
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Closed Breech
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Mike shot a 750 57x with JSB 8.4 unsorted from tin with my barrel at sub 12 fpe.
 
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I see what you mean Paul, I think even I could get a pellet in there.

Very interesting air rifle Mike, I have absolutely no idea how it works, but it certainly seems to shoot well enough.

Brian
 
Thanks guys!

Casey, if you've seen any of my other few YouTube videos, its clear that the only camera that I have is the one on my antique iPhone.:D They are pretty poor.

Anyway, as you can see from Pauls pictures......the first step is swinging the transfer port thingie to the side......then you load your pellet and close.....then pull the trigger when ready. There is nothing to pull back or cock between shots.

A 9v batteries' power is amplified and regulated to a voltage that is user adjustable via a pot in the forend of the gun. This voltage adjustment is what is used to control the force of the strike. The circuitry will maintain the exact output voltage no matter what the charge condition of the 9v battery is. The amplified voltage is used to charge a pair of capacitors. The trigger has two functions. When relaxed.....it is forming the circuit to charge the caps. When pulled, it dumps the caps into the solenoid in the rear of the gun. Once released.....charging resumes to ready the next shot. A fully charged battery will charge the caps in a second or two, and a nearly dead (6v or so) 9v will take 5 seconds or so to fully charge the caps. That is the only difference between a fresh battery and a dead one. Either way......it's faster than a person could load a pellet. Early testing got over 5000 shots on one 9v. There is a switch in the front of the gun to turn on and off the charge circuit.

Once the caps dump into the solenoid......the solenoid core jumps forward and strikes the valve stem like a conventional gun. There is no heavy spring propelling the "hammer", so the return of the core is very quick. There is actually a spring that assists return on the rear of the core.

The quick opening and closing of the valve would look like a short square wave pulse, rather than a drawn out sine wave like a conventional gun. There is no possibility of hammer bounce......no matter how low the pressure is.

The gun was much quieter than any unsilenced gun on the line at the Nats. It also has a very, very smooth shot cycle compared to conventional guns. Every person that shot it at practice made the same comment. They said that they would not have known that it fired if they didn't see the hole it made in the paper.

The gun can be de-gassed with your finger. Unscrew the rear cap, push the core into the valve stem and hold until it empty. No tools needed.

Typical spreads are maybe 3-5 FPS. I have been able to adjust the strike to work together with the valve on every gun that I have built to hold 1-2 FPS spreads......but the gun is slightly less accurate in that condition (maybe 3-5 x's on an indoor card). I believe it is due to the extra air after the pellet exits......which must disrupt the pellets flight a bit.

I'm sure most people have thought my indoor scores were BS.....and I don't blame them. I'm happy to have guns in Paul and Mark's hands, now. I think they will easily reproduce or surpass my own results in a short time.

We'll see.

Mike



That's about all I can think of for a description.
 
Ya Mike, but now the question becomes: just how many of these guns can you produce, and how fast? Between Paul's results, pictures, then your spec list I'm sure the line has already begun to form. Man, you are going to be getting orders from all over the World. That gun is absoultely awesome!

Congratulations on joining DanB with thinking so far outside of the box. And, of course, then to combine your concept gun with one of his barrel didn't hurt any. Which leads me to my next question: how large an order will you be placing with Dan for more barrels?

I'm impressed and can't wait for my turn at the bench with either Paul's or Mark's new gun sometime soon.

Oh, and by the way, thanks for the breakdown of what makes the Thomas tick. That cleared everything up?

Dave Shattuck
 
Well, Thanks Dave.

The short answer to you first questions are:

No too many, and not very fast......lol.

As far as Dan's barrels go.....I'd love to have a few of the slow twist standard rifling barrels like the one Paul has, and maybe some slow twist poly's. If he can get Woody to get some made up....I would be happy to relieve him of a few. :D

I'm considering making the trip up for the regionals. The trip down to Phoenix was really nice for me. I seldom take time to do anything but work, and the break was great for my wife and I. I am normally unable to relax and enjoy a vacation because all I can think about the whole time is work, all the hours that I will have to make up when I return. That didn't happen this last time.....and it made things much more enjoyable.

One of my daughters has been learning about personality types in her psychology class. She was happy to report to me that I am a classic Type A. lol

Mike
 
michaelthomas said:
One of my daughters has been learning about personality types in her psychology class. She was happy to report to me that I am a classic Type A. lol

Mike
Click to expand...

"Type A personalities experience a constant sense of urgency: Type A people seem to be in a constant struggle against the clock. Often, they quickly become impatient with delays and unproductive time, schedule commitments too tightly, and try to do more than one thing at a time, such as reading while eating or watching television."

Sounds like your daughter has you nailed Mike ;)

Brian
 
That would be fantastic for those of us who had to miss the Nationals: to have a chance to break bread with you while sharing more than a few good stories.

See you in seven weeks my friend.

And Cudos to your daughter, although who better is there on analyzing their dad than the daughter? I know I've got one who has me nailed. Funny thing though, it's the granddaughters who have me wrapped around their little fingers.

Dave Shattuck
 
Shhhh.......quiet guys. She already thinks she knows everything.....don't reinforce that belief. ;)

I asked my wife if she wanted to go.....and she said no. But then I caught her looking up things to do around Salem. The seed has been planted. :D

Mike
 
First Time's A Charm

I've not had the chance to shoot my Thomas at a competition yet but can tell by the little shooting I have managed to do that it will be competitive from the start! Well made, easy to work on, very soft shooting ( sometimes the hole on the card is the only way to tell it actually shot) great trigger and easy to load. I just hope I can find a barrel as good as Paul's! lol

"Great Job Mike"

MarkN:cool:
 
Mike, I'm sure by now she's discovered there's absolutely NOTHING to do around Salem except count cows and your trip is in jeopardy! Have her look up Manchester, VT, Saratoga Springs and Lake George in NY. They're all between 30-35 miles of Salem and have a lot more to offer.
Hope this helps!
Todd
 
Thomas Air Rifles

What Thomas air rifles were used the the World Championships recently?
 
The rifles used were mechanical strike....but otherwise similar to the electronic guns that were only around for a short time. About the same time I came out with the electronic guns.....the WRABF rules were updated and disallowed any use of electronics.

They have been evolving as I go. New guns have larger volume air tubes (250cc), side lever cocking, new reg housing that allows fast changes, and just now an externally adjustable jetting system for the transfer port that allows switching from one class to the other to be done in a few minutes without dumping the air.
I'll be final testing it at Open Grove next week.

Mike
 

Attachments

  • Thomas BR.jpg
    Thomas BR.jpg
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Hello...I built that rest. Only one of them in existence. It was just for myself, and I’m not looking to make any more.

Mike
 
michaelthomas said:
Thanks guys!

Casey, if you've seen any of my other few YouTube videos, its clear that the only camera that I have is the one on my antique iPhone.:D They are pretty poor.

Anyway, as you can see from Pauls pictures......the first step is swinging the transfer port thingie to the side......then you load your pellet and close.....then pull the trigger when ready. There is nothing to pull back or cock between shots.

A 9v batteries' power is amplified and regulated to a voltage that is user adjustable via a pot in the forend of the gun. This voltage adjustment is what is used to control the force of the strike. The circuitry will maintain the exact output voltage no matter what the charge condition of the 9v battery is. The amplified voltage is used to charge a pair of capacitors. The trigger has two functions. When relaxed.....it is forming the circuit to charge the caps. When pulled, it dumps the caps into the solenoid in the rear of the gun. Once released.....charging resumes to ready the next shot. A fully charged battery will charge the caps in a second or two, and a nearly dead (6v or so) 9v will take 5 seconds or so to fully charge the caps. That is the only difference between a fresh battery and a dead one. Either way......it's faster than a person could load a pellet. Early testing got over 5000 shots on one 9v. There is a switch in the front of the gun to turn on and off the charge circuit.

Once the caps dump into the solenoid......the solenoid core jumps forward and strikes the valve stem like a conventional gun. There is no heavy spring propelling the "hammer", so the return of the core is very quick. There is actually a spring that assists return on the rear of the core.

The quick opening and closing of the valve would look like a short square wave pulse, rather than a drawn out sine wave like a conventional gun. There is no possibility of hammer bounce......no matter how low the pressure is.

The gun was much quieter than any unsilenced gun on the line at the Nats. It also has a very, very smooth shot cycle compared to conventional guns. Every person that shot it at practice made the same comment. They said that they would not have known that it fired if they didn't see the hole it made in the paper.

The gun can be de-gassed with your finger. Unscrew the rear cap, push the core into the valve stem and hold until it empty. No tools needed.

Typical spreads are maybe 3-5 FPS. I have been able to adjust the strike to work together with the valve on every gun that I have built to hold 1-2 FPS spreads......but the gun is slightly less accurate in that condition (maybe 3-5 x's on an indoor card). I believe it is due to the extra air after the pellet exits......which must disrupt the pellets flight a bit.

I'm sure most people have thought my indoor scores were BS.....and I don't blame them. I'm happy to have guns in Paul and Mark's hands, now. I think they will easily reproduce or surpass my own results in a short time.

We'll see.

Mike



That's about all I can think of for a description.
Click to expand...

That's fascinating - thank you for sharing. To what do you attribute the lower noise? Is it the abrupt closing of the valve?

Regards,
GsT
 
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