Premier v Premier Mk2

A place to discuss all things Webley. As this is probably the most collected airgun maker we felt it deserved a section of its own.
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zooma
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Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Wed Aug 21, 2013 11:09 pm

Another head to head is brewing methinks. :pray:

I finally got a .177 barrel for my Premier Mk 2 today, and so now it will be possible to put it directly against my .177 Premier . :dance:

If the Senior starts to beahve itself we may let that one join in as well :naughty:
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by Tank » Thu Aug 22, 2013 9:13 am

Bob, I am today off to collect just the thing to fix the Webley.
Upon my return I shall post a picture but until then it is going to be a guessing game!

:D
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Thu Aug 22, 2013 9:53 am

Tank wrote:Bob, I am today off to collect just the thing to fix the Webley.
Upon my return I shall post a picture but until then it is going to be a guessing game!

:D

If it was IJ saying that I would be expecting to see a picture of a large lump hammer - but your rather more refined taste and appreciation of Webley air pistols gives me a little more hope! :think:
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Fri Aug 23, 2013 8:01 am

Last night the "Three Musketeers" started the ball rolling by taking a first look at the proposed Premier v Premier Mk2 comparison test using a good example of two .177 models.

Both pistols are in very good condition, but as is so often the case with air pistols that are no longer in their "first flush of life", neither of the two test pistols that we shot were in the best possible working condition, and to make an absolutely fair comparison both of our examples need a little "tweak" to put that right.

The Premier we used is a good example of an "E" series cosmetically that has a really nice trigger and shoots very well, but it feels like it has a very dry spring noticed most as the pistol is being cocked. I will take it apart, clean the internals and lube the spring between now and next week. This pistol was also recently bought as a .22 but with a spare .177 barrel, and when the spare barrel was fitted it was a little stiff during the cocking stroke until it "bedded in" but this part of the action is now nice and smooth.

The Mk2 is another nice condition pistol that has always been a .22 until "bellringer" sold me a spare Mk2 barrel with the smaller sized hole down the middle. This is a very tight fit at the pivot joint and so it stiff to cock, but that will either "run in" or will receive a little attention to "ease" the tang area depending how much spare time I get between now and next weeks session.

The Mk 2 shot with an impressive cloud of white smoke that did not reduce at all during the evening. Strangely enough this did not smell at all like "dieseling" and looked more like a cloud of dry chalky smoke rather than the more typical oily looking smoke dieseling would produce - not sure what this is yet !

The main performance difference between these two pistols was in the very important trigger area. The Premier has a lovely trigger, but the Mk2 trigger is very heavy and needs some attention before we can make any final test conclusions. Both pistols shoot well with plenty of power and whacked the bell target face with some impressive conviction.

We fitted target cards over the redbob bell target and each shot 5 rounds on the same card using the currently available Wasp .177 pellets with each pistol. Both pistols gave a reasonably good group, but the superior trigger on the "E" series helped it to produce the tighter group. A second series of similar tests with .177 Hobby pellets saw the groups spread a lot wider with both pistols - something of a surprise !

The next time we test these two Premier pistols I hope we will have both of them in a fully serviced condition with attention given to the detail areas they both need to enable them to perform at their best and to make a direct comparison between the two types a little easier to detect the actual performance differences between the two types rather than the differences between two air pistols that can both benefit from "a good coat of looking at".

Anybody have any good tips about how to improve the heavy Mk 2 trigger?
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2. UPDATE 1.

Post by zooma » Wed Aug 28, 2013 9:04 pm

The "E" series Premier has now been stripped and lubed and after being re-assembled it now feels much smoother and had a few shots put through it at RMTC last night after which it had settled-in and feels really good.

The shots taken at 10 meters were not that well grouped and the pistol was difficult to adjust the sights to the target - but given that it was so good at 6 yards last week I am thinking that with everything being taken apart the sights will need re-setting again in any case, so maybe the 3 Musketeers can dial it back in tomorrow night.

Ian Jones ( yes the anti-christ of all Webley spring powered air pistols) took some shots with it and noticed that the trigger was very stiff and heavy compared to the very light trigger Paul has on his Premier ( the one used to stuff IJ with his FWB 65 in this months MPL competition :dance: ) and as this Premier trigger was already lighter than the Mk2 Premier there is obvioulsy some more work needed here on both pistols to get the best target results out of them both.
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2. Update 1A.

Post by zooma » Wed Aug 28, 2013 11:13 pm

I attempted to strip the Mk2 Premier but failed at the first hurdle to unscrew the front end cap - it just would not budge! :hand:

As soon as I can get the end cap off I can clean and lube it the same as the "E" series Premier and then take a look at that very stiff trigger. My suspicion is that something may be amiss here as there is quite a gap between the end of the trigger adjusting screw and the end of the sear and is is still very heavy so it needs a good coat of looking at.

I may well consult Graham about a couple of these concerns and with Phil maybe we can work out how to remove the front door ( a little heat perhaps?) Using a spare .22 barrel as the key ( in the normal way) to unwind the end cap most definitely did not work :naughty: - but fortunately I have managed to straighten the barrel back into shape again ! :doh:

I also think we need to remove and inspect the trigger and sear to see why it is so heavy and why the adjustment screw does not even reach the sear face and is why it has absolutely no effect on the trigger weight.

Lastly ( and assuming there is no new pope to be announced) I am hoping when we can get to look inside we can find out why this Mk2 bungs out so much impressive white smoke with every shot - no dieseling smell and not the usual blue/oil smoke - just a lot of white smoke ! Maybe a little rust inside perhaps?

Whilst it may seem like there are a lot of problems with these two pistols it should be remembered that both are in very good condition but we are trying to get the best possible result from each of them and compare what each can achieve.

The bar has been raised by a certain MPL competitior from Rivvy who obviously has found a way to extract far more out of his Premier than we have done so far so it is up to us now to raise to the challenge to see what we can do......and the key after a good clean and lube looks like the answer lies with the trigger :ugeek:
Last edited by zooma on Thu Aug 29, 2013 11:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by I.J. » Thu Aug 29, 2013 9:41 am

zooma wrote:
Tank wrote:Bob, I am today off to collect just the thing to fix the Webley.
Upon my return I shall post a picture but until then it is going to be a guessing game!

:D

If it was IJ saying that I would be expecting to see a picture of a large lump hammer - but your rather more refined taste and appreciation of Webley air pistols gives me a little more hope! :think:
PLEASE let it be an angle grinder then. :pray:
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Thu Aug 29, 2013 12:17 pm

I was pleased to see a contribution to this thread from IJ (short for Idio Jit) the anti-Christ of Webley spring powered air pistols as I was beginning to fear that some permanent harm had become him.

Looks like we need to take care of that ourselves then :naughty:
Last edited by zooma on Thu Aug 29, 2013 3:30 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by Certus » Thu Aug 29, 2013 1:11 pm

Hi Guys,

Please keep up the very interesting comparisons which can only add to our knowledge of these iconic pistols.

I own quite a few 'all steel' Premiers and at least five 'Seniors in both pre-war and post-war formats.

All the 'Premier's' came with nice triggers, but the pre-war 'Seniors' definitely have better triggers than the post-war models.

I guess it's OK to lubricate and clean the pistols before any comparisons but much more re-work might possibly distort the results.

I only use H&N Match or RWS Hobby pellets in all my older spring pistols with the more expensive H&N pellets unsurprisingly providing slightly better results. Although I prefer the appearance of the pre-war 'Straight Grip' Seniors the 'Slant Grip' models sit better in the hand and are consequently a bit more comfortable to shoot.

Regards

Brian

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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Thu Aug 29, 2013 10:59 pm

Well my "improvements" to the Premier have worked in the sense that it does now feel a lot smoother and that 'dry and scratchy" feel when cocking the pistol has now gone completely.

Also gone completely is the super grouping we achieved with the same pistol before I "improved" it so I am guessing that it just needs to settle down again and forgive me for tampering with it. :doh:

We attempted to adjust the trigger to give a lower pull weight by screwing in the adjusting screw a little at a time until it refused to cock, and then backed it off until it worked again. The trigger is a little lighter - but nowhere near as light as the one reported to us on the MPL top scoring Premier that resides in the Rivvy Club so that may be something else we look at sometime in the future.

Phil is writing a report about our tests concerning the different "hold" techniques that we tested on the Premier tonight so I will leave that part of the report for him to illuminate so you can see how we got on with that.

The Mk 2 Premier continues to signal and report that a new pope has been chosen with a steady flow of white smoke and still has a horrible and heavy trigger so Graham has run off with it muttering something about a hot air gun and seems to think that he can remove the end cap that defeated my efforts to get inside it to clean and lube it and to try and find the source of the white smoke.

I also think the trigger annoys him as much as it does me so the poor thing might get a bit of a thumping between now and next week - lets hope when we see Graham again he is smiling with success and not growling with failure :pray:

I was going to mention that the disgraced Senior made a fleeting appearance and shot very nicely (with a superb trigger that the Premier can only dream of) until it blotted its copy book yet again by refusing to cock - so I decided not to talk about it at all. :shhh:

Maybe I need to buy some more Webley Premiers as I never seem to be able to take as many as two of them home with me after each "test" as one of them always heads off in the Saddleworth direction in for urgent surgery. My theory is that I can outnumber the gun vet and take more of them home with me each week than he does :drool:

Until next week that's it from me and the Premier testing - lets see what next week brings to the table.
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by pmh » Fri Aug 30, 2013 6:42 pm

I finally got around to scanning the targets, and here they are:-

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

I would've used a more contrasting background in the scans, but the Hobby is still quite clearly the best group.

Kind regards,



Phil
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Re: Premier v Premier Mk2

Post by zooma » Tue Sep 24, 2013 12:27 am

My Premier Mk 2 returned from Grahams cave last week and had been given a dose of grease and lube and it did feel much better - but it came with a health warning that (as suspected) it showed some signs of rust - especially the main spring - but all is well now!

This Mk 2 Premier came to me from Scotland with an unknown history some time ago and maybe it had been left somewhere damp and unused for a few years and the lack of too much in the way of grease on the spring allowed it to rust. Good job the Mk 2 premier has an non-rusting alloy body!

The spring and everything else inside was given a clean prior to the fresh grease and lube and it did feel very much smoother but it still insisted on announcing that a new pope had been chosen - so maybe it knows something that we don't!

The trigger is still very heavy and stiff and the adjusting screw stops inside the main frame in open space, so at some point we will get brave and take a squint inside to see what is going on ( or not in this case) as I have always suspected that all is not well in there as it looks like a something (or a part of something) is not there as it should be.

This assumption is based on the suspicion that the trigger between the Premier and the Mk 2 Premier has the same parts - but they don't look the same as each other as the Premier has a lump of metal ( technical term) that touches the end of the adjusting screw - but the Mk 2 doe's not have anything for this screw to push against as it is suspended in space - so maybe a part of it has broken off and is missing?

One day all will be revealed and maybe we will discover exactly why this trigger on our Mk2 is so heavy.

.........meanwhile we will continue to shoot it and enjoy the white smoke display!
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