I just don’t understand why self appointed masters of the universe feel the need to lambast anyone who mods M-Rods.
I bought a new 25 cal back in 2015 or 2016. It was great out of the box. I sold it about 3 years ago while going through chemo/cancer crap. Well I missed that rifle so I bought one used about 6 months ago. It needed new o-rings and was good to go. I had bought a JSAR breech from Dave Ezman about 4 years ago, so it now is very nice. I like it.
Hunter
I think for many it is because they themselves chase the newest and latest, so they have to bash others to accept/justify what they think and do in their own lives . . .
I know a few probably legitimately think that all manually cocked airguns should be sidelevers by now, and I don't really understand why Crosman did not come out with a Gen 3 with a sidelever breech (given the massive shift in the industry), but the "rest" of the gun is certainly not old tech in any way - most still function exactly the same way the Marauder does. For the money, the triggers can't be beat (especially the Gen I triggers, which I found to be a bit better than Gen 2 due to the internal geometry changes).
For me, I stuck with Gen I Marauders, at least in that platform, in large part for the better triggers. I also have a Daystate, a Huben, and a Western Sidewinder, but the Marauders (three of them, 2 in .22 and one in .25) probably aren't going anywhere.
I too built a bottle gun out of Gen 1 parts, a lot like Scott's gun, and it was my third Gen I Marauder completed in 2020 or 2021. And it is an amazing bench gun - kind of long and heavy for field carry. It is double regulated (Ninja first and Huma second) and uses a War valve, which I personally thought were the best ever made for the platform. It also has a sidelever breech, uses a 30 gram nylon hammer with a PEEK striker and a JSAR TSS/SSG assembly, a drilled out Rowan Engineering trigger for a Rapid trigger group (which feels awesome!) and has a fat LW Poly barrel in it. I get a true max ES of no more than 15 fps (typically lower of course, but could be that high in the worst case) putting out 44 FPE as tuned, over a massive load of shots (I have not run that many over the chrony at once, but a full fill calculates out at a bit over 100 shots on a full fill of the bottle). I think the extra work I put into modding the stock to work around drop block / regualtor and dual gauges was worth it, at least to me . . . there is a third gauge in the traditional location to show final regulated pressure. It does use a burst disc on the Ninja regulator to safely allow a full 4500 psi of the bottle, but I rarely fill that high anyways as I get 6 magazines out of a 3500 psi fill, and as a bench gun the big tank is always handy.
It's a fun gun, if heavy . . . and as others have indicated I won't get out the cost of the parts I put into it, but I knew that going in. But it is all mine, built by me (with help from others on parts), and if I were to sell it I'd probably get more parting it out . . .
