Tuning Seeking Spring Guide Guidance

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Airman-of-the-Board

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Jun 4, 2021
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Hello Airgun Nation

I hope you all can help me learn about making custom spring guides for spring piston air rifles. I thought I could reduce my learning curve before the chips start to fly by tapping into the collective knowledge of members here who have made custom spring guides. I would greatly appreciate it if they would share some of their hard earned wisdom born of experience. I will list some of the questions I have been considering, but would welcome any empirically derived advice.

I will begin by making a set of guides to fit the OEM spring in my TX200, but hope to move on to making improved guides for some HW rifles and perhaps others.

I know this subjects gets pretty deep in terms of really tuning a shot cycle, and I would welcome some suggestions about how to think in that regard, but my initial goal is just to dampen all spring vibration and get consistency in the rifle, I guess as measured by the chronograph.

I am thinking of starting with a guide made of acetal, for ease of machining. Is there a significant difference between the acetal homopolymer Delrin and generic acetal copolymer material? Have you had more spring guide failures with the generic copolymer material? Is there a compelling reason to use another guide material?

I am hoping some of you can share your “order of operations” for making spring guides?

I would love to know your reasons for doing certain steps before others.

Do you bore out the interior of the guide for the piston latch rod before sizing the outside diameter of the guide to the inside of the spring? Perhaps, even with a tailstock center this would make the guide flex too much and complicate turning to a precise diameter? I have never worked with acetal on a lathe.

Does anybody bore the interior then mount the guide on a mandrel for turning the outside diameter?

Do you use a slip washer in front of the top hat?

Are you using a two piece rear guide and leaving a loose fit between the part of the guide that goes into the spring, and the washer-like spring seat that slips on to that longer part of the guide? I have read this can keep the guide from failing in the area where the longer part of the spring guide transitions to the flange that holds this slip on washer/ spring seat. This loose fit can potentially also help with both spring torque and latch rod misalignment on the piston. What type of clearance or “slop” are you allowing between these parts?

Do you have any details to mention that you think are important. Places to chamfer or radius the guide parts for durability or performance?

If you read this far, and want to help an amateur who is about to start making his own spring guides, Thank you!
 
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Heres my process. I face the acetal which will give you an exact center and then use your live center to center punch it. From there bore it with a drill, slowly going up in size. I usually do this in 3 steps. Make sure to back the bit out every inch and a half or so to get the material out of the bit so it doesn't friction weld itself inside there.

After thats done I like to have just a hair extra than my total length, not counting the base and relief for the tooling sticking out of the chuck. I cut a relief for my cutting tool down very close to my end diameter so I can cut fast without measuring until I get close to that diameter.

Then I wrap the guide in something to protect it, snip off some excess from the base side of the guide so I have pretty close to the full length left (plus a little), reface it, center punch and drill again (if you couldn't get it all from the other angle), and then make the final cuts on the base.

For the TX200 I like to open up the factory washer with a dremel to accept a bigger guide and use that as my base. Instead of cutting out a round base, I match the taper of the washer to the guide, install the washer onto the guide, install it all the way into the chuck until the washer is firmly against the chuck, and then face the excess acetal until its flush with the washer. That system works on the HWs as well.

Edit: Forgot an important step. When the guide is finished put it back into the chuck, spring side out, and round off the leading edge where the spring goes on. A Dremel and a sanding disk will do it in seconds.
 
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Airman-of-the-Board said:
Hello Airgun Nation

I hope you all can help me learn about making custom spring guides for spring piston air rifles. I thought I could reduce my learning curve before the chips start to fly by tapping into the collective knowledge of members here who have made custom spring guides. I would greatly appreciate it if they would share some of their hard earned wisdom born of experience. I will list some of the questions I have been considering, but would welcome any empirically derived advice.

I will begin by making a set of guides to fit the OEM spring in my TX200, but hope to move on to making improved guides for some HW rifles and perhaps others.

I know this subjects gets pretty deep in terms of really tuning a shot cycle, and I would welcome some suggestions about how to think in that regard, but my initial goal is just to dampen all spring vibration and get consistency in the rifle, I guess as measured by the chronograph.

I am thinking of starting with a guide made of acetal, for ease of machining. Is there a significant difference between the acetal homopolymer Delrin and generic acetal copolymer material? Have you had more spring guide failures with the generic copolymer material? Is there a compelling reason to use another guide material?

I am hoping some of you can share your “order of operations” for making spring guides?

I would love to know your reasons for doing certain steps before others.

Do you bore out the interior of the guide for the piston latch rod before sizing the outside diameter of the guide to the inside of the spring? Perhaps, even with a tailstock center this would make the guide flex too much and complicate turning to a precise diameter? I have never worked with acetal on a lathe.

Does anybody bore the interior then mount the guide on a mandrel for turning the outside diameter?

Do you use a slip washer in front of the top hat?

Are you using a two piece rear guide and leaving a loose fit between the part of the guide that goes into the spring, and the washer-like spring seat that slips on to that longer part of the guide? I have read this can keep the guide from failing in the area where the longer part of the spring guide transitions to the flange that holds this slip on washer/ spring seat. This loose fit can potentially also help with both spring torque and latch rod misalignment on the piston. What type of clearance or “slop” are you allowing between these parts?

Do you have any details to mention that you think are important. Places to chamfer or radius the guide parts for durability or performance?

If you read this far, and want to help an amateur who is about to start making his own spring guides, Thank you!
Click to expand...
There’s several ways to go about it depending on whether you’re going to make a one piece or two piece guide, the top hat is pretty easy. I’ve made guides for my 97K and 77K but it’s been years ago so I don’t recall everything I did exactly…lol.
I made one piece guides, so your stock diam will have to be a little bigger that the guide base diam. And that means you’ll have to turn a lot of material off.
Depending on your lathe size, I’m thinking it would be best to turn and drill, ream complete in one set up and part it off a little long then flip and finish to length, but that might not be possible depending on your lathe.
I think I started with the material in the chuck as close to flush with the jaws as possible, ( my lathe has a 1.0” spindle bore) then faced it and spotted it, then drill just past the finished length with two different size drills close to finish diam.
I reamed mine with a 10mm reamer after all the turning was complete.
Next I pulled the stock out long enough to turn and part off. I might have used a live center here for the turning, don’t really remember. Then I turned It all down leaving about .02 on all diameters. Then let it cool and stabilize for a bit.
Then I came back and finished all outside diameters to size. I also put a 10deg angle on the front to help it going into the spring. I then parted it off a little long. Then I wrapped the guide in thin aluminum to protect the OD, and flipped it around into the chuck, don’t remember if I used my 3 jaw or 4 jaw. So now nothing is showing but the back side of the guide base, checked it with a indicator for runout, then faced it to length and reamed thru with a 10mm reamer and it’s done.
Like I said there are several ways to do it, best to just get some delrin (which is what I used) and practice different methods and order of operations until you find one that works best for your lathe size and what you want to accomplish.
I trashed a couple before I figured out how I wanted to do it. Anyway delrin is pretty cheap so practice, and use very sharp tools. Work safe, wear glasses.
 
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Sqwirl57 said:
Same. The timing of this post is perfect. I'm actually doing @oaks1450 TX200 tomorrow morning and looking forwarding to trying some new techniques
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Thanks for your reply above, Sqwirl57. I will have to read it a few more times and may come back with some questions.

Fortuitous indeed that you will be doing this very job tomorrow! Perhaps you would be willing to take some pictures of the work and your set-ups while making the guides for the TX200, in order to provide us all a bit of a tutorial on the subject?

You are a generous fount of knowledge about springers on this forum, and I know it takes a lot of time to clearly present this type of information, but I, and I am sure others, would find it of great use if you want to show your work.

Thank you for freely sharing your knowledge about this stuff

-Airman
 
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Airman-of-the-Board said:
Thanks for your reply above, Sqwirl57. I will have to read it a few more times and may come back with some questions.

Fortuitous indeed that you will be doing this very job tomorrow! Perhaps you would be willing to take some pictures of the work and your set-ups while making the guides for the TX200, in order to provide us all a bit of a tutorial on the subject?

You are a generous fount of knowledge about springers on this forum, and I know it takes a lot of time to clearly present this type of information, but I, and I am sure others, would find it of great use if you want to show your work.

Thank you for freely sharing your knowledge about this stuff

-Airman
Click to expand...
Any time man. I'll definitely add some pictures tomorrow to really spell out how I go about it so its easier to follow.
 
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bustachip said:
There’s several ways to go about it depending on whether you’re going to make a one piece or two piece guide, the top hat is pretty easy. I’ve made guides for my 97K and 77K but it’s been years ago so I don’t recall everything I did exactly…lol.
I made one piece guides, so your stock diam will have to be a little bigger that the guide base diam. And that means you’ll have to turn a lot of material off.
Depending on your lathe size, I’m thinking it would be best to turn and drill, ream complete in one set up and part it off a little long then flip and finish to length, but that might not be possible depending on your lathe.
I think I started with the material in the chuck as close to flush with the jaws as possible, ( my lathe has a 1.0” spindle bore) then faced it and spotted it, then drill just past the finished length with two different size drills close to finish diam.
I reamed mine with a 10mm reamer after all the turning was complete.
Next I pulled the stock out long enough to turn and part off. I might have used a live center here for the turning, don’t really remember. Then I turned It all down leaving about .02 on all diameters. Then let it cool and stabilize for a bit.
Then I came back and finished all outside diameters to size. I also put a 10deg angle on the front to help it going into the spring. I then parted it off a little long. Then I wrapped the guide in thin aluminum to protect the OD, and flipped it around into the chuck, don’t remember if I used my 3 jaw or 4 jaw. So now nothing is showing but the back side of the guide base, checked it with a indicator for runout, then faced it to length and reamed thru with a 10mm reamer and it’s done.
Like I said there are several ways to do it, best to just get some delrin (which is what I used) and practice different methods and order of operations until you find one that works best for your lathe size and what you want to accomplish.
I trashed a couple before I figured out how I wanted to do it. Anyway delrin is pretty cheap so practice, and use very sharp tools. Work safe, wear glasses.
Click to expand...
Thanks Bustachip, for weighing in and sharing your experience.

I like the tip about keeping the guide material supported in the chuck and extending into the spindle while drilling the interior. I will have to measure the piston latch rod and see if I can get a reamer to match.

Should the fit of the spring guide interior bore be as tight to the piston latch rod as its outside diameter is to the interior of the spring?

Letting the material cool and forming an angle on the muzzle end of the rear guide also seem like good ideas.

Thanks again for sharing your ideas and encouraging my experimentation and safe tool use.

Regards,
Airman
 
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I use hardened steel and make one piece guides that counter seat into the rear plug. 4140 polished to mirror finish after hardening..
B41BAE6D-1DE1-40C4-AA47-CCCE8C6DB5D7.jpeg
They never move as it’s a slip fit and you will never get spring twist with one piece guides. Steel is difficult as it’s a distinct shot cycle. I only use delrin for solid guides and latch triggers. Center rod like Air Arms ,and HW , or Diana delrin is to thinned wall after your done..
Those are right off the lathe each for different pre load on the bottom.
 
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Sorry for the hold up guys. I decided to make a full video and between shooting, editing, rendering, and uploading to YouTube I am about 10hrs into this process already. Its currently processing on YouTube which says 3 more hours or so before its ready to be viewed. Once it is I'll link it for you. Probably first thing in the morning.
 
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Sqwirl57 said:
Sorry for the hold up guys. I decided to make a full video and between shooting, editing, rendering, and uploading to YouTube I am about 10hrs into this process already. Its currently processing on YouTube which says 3 more hours or so before its ready to be viewed. Once it is I'll link it for you. Probably first thing in the morning.
Click to expand...
Wow! That is awesome, Sqwirl57.

I am certain we are all eager to see the video and learn what you have to teach us about making spring guides. Your willingness to put in all that work to make a video shows what an asset you are to this community.

I have had a hard time finding videos on youtube about this subject, so I am sure your's will help a lot of people.

Well done.
 
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Well prepare yourself for a bit of disappointment. It's about half of a video but still almost 25 minutes long. I got to the editing stage and realized that about halfway through recording that the battery in my microphone had died and I had zero audio on the rest of the source material. The first half covers almost all of the basics though so I feel like it wasn't time completely wasted. The second half was mostly flipping the guide and doing the exact same thing but on a smaller scale any way so no big deal.

The guide turned out great though and all you hear when the gun is fired is a quick "TKKK!" of the piston firing. Not even a hair of spring noise and the spring was installed basically dry. It will get a light lube later on but first the gun needs to come back apart to adjust the latch rod so I'll lube it then. No reason to get my hands greasy twice haha
 
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A.G.R said:
I use hardened steel and make one piece guides that counter seat into the rear plug. 4140 polished to mirror finish after hardening.. View attachment 403013They never move as it’s a slip fit and you will never get spring twist with one piece guides. Steel is difficult as it’s a distinct shot cycle. I only use delrin for solid guides and latch triggers. Center rod like Air Arms ,and HW , or Diana delrin is to thinned wall after your done..
Those are right off the lathe each for different pre load on the bottom.
Click to expand...
Hardened chrome moly, you ain't playing. Plenty stable in variable temperatures I'd say as well.
I was thinking about using 1018 and case hardening it with Kasenit
 
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Airman-of-the-Board said:
Wow! That is awesome, Sqwirl57.

I am certain we are all eager to see the video and learn what you have to teach us about making spring guides. Your willingness to put in all that work to make a video shows what an asset you are to this community.

I have had a hard time finding videos on youtube about this subject, so I am sure your's will help a lot of people.

Well done.
Click to expand...

Ok so I uploaded the video into a seperate thread just so that it shows up if someone else is looking for it later. YouTube isn't completely done doing its thing yet so it isn't viewable in the highest quality but should be soon. Here's a link to the new thread. I'm open to any questions, comments, judgements, etc so let me know your thoughts.

N/A - Guide Making on a Lathe For Beginners by a Beginner

So my goal for today was to make a video detailing how I make a TX200 guide out of acetal on a mini lathe. I spent the better part of the afternoon making this video only to discover during editing that all of my source material for the second half had no audio. Why you ask? Because I am dumb...
www.airgunnation.com www.airgunnation.com
 
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I'm doing more easily. In case of the Weihrauchs I keep the washer base. but that sort of base can easily made for any dia.
and the guide itself I'm just looking for proper steel tubes, no matter if stainless or not for the outside diam (which shall fit the spring). Depending on the inner diam I choose the correct inlet tube which fits the piston rod, usually from brass. All you need is a collection of steel and brass tubes instead of an exagerous machinging park with lathe.
This avoids the huge machining effort.
Nowadays, what about 3d-printing?
 
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bustachip said:
I just made some delrin guides for the Prosport and used a 5c collet bored to size to finish the OD’s on the top hat and the ID in the main guide. It worked great .0005 runout. I still have to finish the back of the main guide, but I’ll be using this method in the future.
View attachment 407172
View attachment 407173
Click to expand...
Looks great. What lathe are you using?
 
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