Power Plenum ~ Taipan Veteran

Looky here, looky here! The LW on my Veteran wasn’t getting it done. Testing to come.......

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Looky here, looky here! The LW on my Veteran wasn’t getting it done. Testing to come.......

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Nice! I want to see the breech end up close 🤔

Man so after 3+ weeks of playing around with this Vet, I actually had an opportunity finally to shoot it at 100m (98.3m to be exact). No fog in the mountains today, just cold, drizzle, and very gusty / variable winds. I tested 20.2, 24.8, 27.5, and 28.5gr NSAs along with the Monsters and the FX Hybrids.

My results were a mixed bag, however - I forgot to pack one if my DonnyFL moderators and just had the 1/2-20 adapter with its thread protector on there. I am certain that between having my airtube forward of the muzzle, the wind, and the thread protector were causing flyers / POI shifts. The longer Nielsens were affected the most, but I was also seeing POI shift with 24.8's when I was testing with and without the thread protector installed. It was reproducible almost 100% of the time.

The 20.2 and 24.8's did very well for the windy conditions today. I spent a few minutes dialing in the HST for the 24.8's for accuracy and had them shooting 1/4-1/2". Didn't have a lot of time to play with the 20.2's, but they seemed happy at 944fps (shot them while I was tuned for the 24.8's). I was surprised at how well the bucked the wind, being so light and without much sectional density.

Anyways, I really learned to appreciate the quality of Veteran today. Towards the end if the day, I spent time with it shooting off of tree stumps and off-hand, trying to get a sense of how I would like it hunting. The precision mechanical properties really stood out to me during that exercise, it almost reminded me of a very high-end Japanese made 35mm camera lol, where nothing felt rough and nothing was binding up. Hard to explain, but I'm sure that anyone that has shot a Vet would be able to relate.
 
Did you get a chance to check the BC of the NSA 20.2s and 24.8s?

Not today, it was too wet to setup the LR. Tomorrow is supposed to be a LOT drier than it was today though, so I'm most definitely planning to gather BC data when I roll back out there in the morning 😎

I'm also removing my plenum extension from my 22 while I have the Standard 460mm barrel installed. The power gains are only 7fps (less than 1FPE with the 24.8gr), and shot count can be slightly higher. That extra couple of inches isn't really worth it for my setup now, but for those that have a 25 cal or a 22/25 with a longer barrel - it definitely makes more sense to run it. Swapping springs and light valve work seem to be the most bang for the buck for 22 Standards 👍
 
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I finally got around to installing Ernest's Power Plenum on my .22 Long. It far exceeded my expectations. Max power jumped from 45 FPE to 50 FPE (25.43 grain Monsters from around 890 to 940 fps). A 10% increase without changing the reg setting or any transfer port modifications. I do have a stronger hammer spring installed, though.

Installation was easier than I thought. For some reason I was expecting to need to remove the regulator. Nope. Just screw on the plenum into the breech and screw the cylinder into the plenum. Simple.

I did slightly mar up my air cylinder while attempting to unscrew the barrel. The shroud grub screw was loosened and slightly extruding from the hole and scraped the cylinder as it rotated around. ARRRRGHHHHH! If I'd bought the gun with the blemish I wouldn't mind at all. The fact that I did it burns my butt.
 
My factory barrel on the Veteran hasn’t been stellar with heavy pellets. In fact, I would say this LW’s performance has been below average. I know there are many who have great factory LW barrels on their Vets, unfortunately, mine isn’t one of them. It performed okay with the 33.95 JSBs at 50 yards and in but when I stretched it out to 100 yards, it got fairly sloppy. 

Now, with that said, I’ve never lowered power to shoot the 25.39gr Kings at 45 FPE or so. That may be exactly what this barrel would like but that hasn’t been in my plans for this Taipan. 

With Ernest’s help, I’ve integrated the FX liner system into my Veteran. I have the Veteran shooting the 33.95s at 915 fps with the 700mm barrel. I was only able to shoot at 40 yards today but I knew immediately that things are vastly improved. I’ll try to get out to 100 yards soon. Both the original King Heavy and the MK2s shot well. Here are some 5-shot groups at 40 yards.

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Whats the OAL of that sucker now? Looks to be a shooter!

I had 2 .25s my first one was an absolute laser and would put it up against every other .25 out there. My 2nd one was pellet picky and very speed picky. 930fps with the 25.39gr no more no less. Heavys were no good. Polymags at 930fps was actually a laser and would out shoot the king's which I was happy about
 
My factory barrel on the Veteran hasn’t been stellar with heavy pellets. In fact, I would say this LW’s performance has been below average. I know there are many who have great factory LW barrels on there Vets, unfortunately, mine isn’t one of them. It performed okay with the 33.95 JSBs at 50 yards and in but when I stretched it out to 100 yards, it got fairly sloppy. 



With Ernest’s help, I’ve integrated the FX liner system into my Veteran. I have the Veteran shooting the 33.95s at 915 fps with the 700mm barrel. I was only able to shoot at 40 yards today but I knew immediately that things are vastly improved. I’ll try to get out to 100 yards soon. Both the original King Heavy and the MK2s shot well. Here are some 5-shot groups at 40 yards.


1579491850_13951625375e25220a2d8596.01994645_CD59A6A0-DDB2-4C8D-9805-EB1987D50A66.jpeg

Details please. Was it complicated to adapt the barrels? Does it require permanent changes to the gun or just the barrels?
 
I finally got around to installing Ernest's Power Plenum on my .22 Long. It far exceeded my expectations. Max power jumped from 45 FPE to 50 FPE (25.43 grain Monsters from around 890 to 940 fps). A 10% increase without changing the reg setting or any transfer port modifications. I do have a stronger hammer spring installed, though.

Installation was easier than I thought. For some reason I was expecting to need to remove the regulator. Nope. Just screw on the plenum into the breech and screw the cylinder into the plenum. Simple.

I did slightly mar up my air cylinder while attempting to unscrew the barrel. The shroud grub screw was loosened and slightly extruding from the hole and scraped the cylinder as it rotated around. ARRRRGHHHHH! If I'd bought the gun with the blemish I wouldn't mind at all. The fact that I did it burns my butt.

1- Do you have 0.22 standard or long ??

2- what was the factory reg pressure !!!

3- how many shots before and after power plenum installed ??

Good job and Thx alot
 
My factory barrel on the Veteran hasn’t been stellar with heavy pellets. In fact, I would say this LW’s performance has been below average. I know there are many who have great factory LW barrels on there Vets, unfortunately, mine isn’t one of them. It performed okay with the 33.95 JSBs at 50 yards and in but when I stretched it out to 100 yards, it got fairly sloppy. 



With Ernest’s help, I’ve integrated the FX liner system into my Veteran. I have the Veteran shooting the 33.95s at 915 fps with the 700mm barrel. I was only able to shoot at 40 yards today but I knew immediately that things are vastly improved. I’ll try to get out to 100 yards soon. Both the original King Heavy and the MK2s shot well. Here are some 5-shot groups at 40 yards.


1579491850_13951625375e25220a2d8596.01994645_CD59A6A0-DDB2-4C8D-9805-EB1987D50A66.jpeg

Details please. Was it complicated to adapt the barrels? Does it require permanent changes to the gun or just the barrels?

If it's using the brass side to mate, then Ernest might have just chopped off the transfer port side of a brass inlet and threaded it to fit. Then again, it's easy to make FX style inlets and thread them. There's also the problem of pellet pin / seating, the throat has to be right for the pin to push them in.

There's been zero photos if the breech end posted, but several of his Taipan with an FX barre sleeve. Doesn't add up, but maybe it wasn't pretty 🤷‍♂️
 
Whats the OAL of that sucker now? Looks to be a shooter!

I had 2 .25s my first one was an absolute laser and would put it up against every other .25 out there. My 2nd one was pellet picky and very speed picky. 930fps with the 25.39gr no more no less. Heavys were no good. Polymags at 930fps was actually a laser and would out shoot the king's which I was happy about

I’m currently out of town now. I’ll be home this weekend and will share OAL and such. 
 
@m.elserafy1975

1) My gun is the .22 LONG.

2) The factory reg pressure is set for about 120 BAR. I haven't hooked it up to a reg tester (I don't own one), but the gun seems to consistently go off the regulator at approximately that point.

3) Shot count is so dependent on the power output that this question is difficult to answer. I have been doing tons of slug testing though the gun and slugs shoot slower than the pellets do to further muck up the data. I looked back at some old data and see that I recorded the gun shooting the 25.43 gr JSB Monsters an average 867 fps (42.5 FPE) from a 250 BAR fill down to 120 BAR. It managed 60 shots at 2.2 BAR per shot.

I seldom fill past 220 BAR now. The gun is less efficient shooting at 250 BAR to about 230 BAR. I'm not sure of the science behind this phenomenon, but have seen in consistently enough to know it is real.

I didn't install the new plenum to up the shot count. I installed it to test shoot slugs at a faster velocity. I have been shooting it tethered since the install because my fill tank is running low. It currently only has 200 BAR of air in it. I suspect that the shot count would also rise about 10%, though. Maybe more if you kept the power the same and adjusted the regulator down to 110 BAR. In the data I posted above where the gun shot at 42.5 FPE at 2.2 BAR per shot, the lower reg pressure itself would yield 4-5 more shots.
 
Did you get a chance to check the BC of the NSA 20.2s and 24.8s?

I finally got out there again today to do more testing. Here's what I was seeing with my Vet Standard (900' ASL / 46F / 1008mbar / 6-10mph crosswind from my 10 o'clock)

  • 20.2gr BC: 0.674 (@930fps 0-10 meters)
  • 24.8gr BC: 0.764 (@891fps 0-10 meters)

I spent most of my afternoon testing these today at 116.6 meters, and I also shot 27.5, 28.5 NSAs again along with some of the 25gr H&N's. While the 24.8's and 20.2's were tighter than the others, I could not get them to print better than 1.5" CTC across 10 shot groups. The majority of the 24.8 groups were 1.9-2.2" and the 20.2's were anywhere from just under 2" to 2.5" (they shot best around 930 and 944).

That said, I'm really starting to despise this barrel. I have already given it two 10-step polishing sessions down to a 1/4 micron. When I got the rifle, I pulled around 50 patches through and saw what looked like rust, but it shot the Monsters well with the factory setup at 40m. After polishing each time, I still saw rust coloration and could never seem to get my patches perfectly clean. The lead buildup is less substantial, but this is as clean as I can pull patches though:

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Now the weird part of all this - when I clean the outer portion of the barrel, that same coloration appears! So I'm now like WTF is the deal with this thing?! 😬 Never had an "LW" stain up patches like that, I pulled around 100 patches through it the other night, and they all came out like that. I suspect the materials used in the barrel are to blame. My barrel is essentially a giant f'ing brown colored pencil 👎👎👎👎
 
Sounds like a great excuse to try fitting a FX barrel. I'm curious as to the machining process necessary to get it done. I would like to see someone successfully convert a .25 Long with LW barrel into a .30 cal with a FX barrel and detail the process.

I ordered a 22 cal 500mm barrel kit and slug liner from PBA today to replace this problematic barrel in my Vet. The kit is from a Dreamline, so it'll be an interesting little project for me to get working this week.

I've also thought about setting up one of my .30 TJ blanks for this Vet, but I didn't even get as far as measuring the breech and pellet probe diameter to see if it would support a larger pin. There's probably too much restriction in the block anyway to get the most out of it, so if I changed calibers I would probably try and use either the .25 TJ blank or just make another threaded adapter like I'm going to do for this FX to use a .25 kit (most likely a SuperLight).

In any case, Joel is overnighting the 500mm parts to me and I should have something working before the end of the week 😎