RWS/Diana Model 6 Air Pistol
I never listen to my best advice. At a gun auction last Friday I started bidding on an air pistol. My brain said don’t bid over 75 dollars on a pistol that may or not work. There was no way to test the various air pistols before buying. They had a couple Webly Tempests, a variety of CO2 pistols including a couple modern ones, and a few BB guns. I bid on a Webly and got out early enough that Natch jumped in and got it for $140.
The pistol that really caught my eye was an RSW Model 6, made in Germany. Looked to be in great shape. A big gun. Probably 16 inches long. It has two pistons that expand 180 degrees from each other to exhaust air, with this result – it has no recoil. Ahead of it’s time. This one was made in 1980.
I bid, I won, I got it home, cocked it, put in a pellet, pulled the trigger, and the pellet got stuck in the barrel. The seals were toast. I paid about what Natch paid for his Webly.
This is interesting. The general consensus online is Model 6’s are expensive to have repaired and the project is so daunting that most people stick them in a drawer and forget about them.
So that is the pistol, in pieces, on the tabletop in the main photo. I stripped it down far enough to get the pistons out. The rear one looked good, the seal on the front piston had disintegrated. New seals are on their way from Air Rifle Headquarters (.com). I found some pretty good instructions online but the real test is reassembly. How to get the pistons, springs, and pinion gears back into the cylinder. I’ll post a photo after I get it back together and have it working.
The painting was done for the fichigan “white chair” art challenge back in 2020.
Natch bought two pistols and they both worked.
So it’s back together. A very tricky project adding new seals. I fired it a few times and it shoots but I have no way of knowing how many feet per second. Natch bought a chronograph and will bring it to trout camp in early May. If it is shooting in the 350 range I will be very happy. If it is 200 fps I will need to rethink some of my decisions during the rebuild. I had to take a little off the leading edge of the front piston seal to get it in the cylinder. The reassembly of the springs went well with the caveat that the rear piston may engage the rear cap before the front piston (which propels the pellet) smacks the front wall of the cylinder. I know that may not make sense but it is key to the recoilless feature of the gun. That said, I don’t feel recoil… so I may be okay. Here is a cut-away screen capture from a YouTube video available online if you search for “How it works Diana Model 6 Giss.” You can see how the front piston and seal drive air to the barrel. The rear piston is basically a dummy piston to make the gun recoilless.
Spring trout camp coming soon. Lots of vintage pistols, a trout stream that produces nice size browns, and a special art challenge that I better get started on.
Quick update: Taking a little off the front edge of the piston seal was a problem – It only shot 225 fps (feet per second) which is not good. I ordered more seals and installed them without modification. Now the pistol is shooting 275 fps, still not good. I expect the seals to break in but this pistol should be shooting 100 fps faster. I used Super Lube silicone oil, 5000 cSt, on the seals and piston body and suspect a lower viscosity oil like Pellgun oil may have worked better. I’ll run a couple hundred pellets through it and re-check with a chronograph. Fingers crossed.
Fichigan 