AZ Gunner's Take on the Vortek DYI Kit

Vortek PG2 DYI

Tune Kit with Dampening Guides

Review by Arizona Air Gunner

“I am not a representative of Vortek, just thought I would get that out of the way first!

  A little about myself first; I have been machinist and gunsmith for over 15 years. I started with building .45 ACP match guns and moved on to building target rifles and have since retired.  

  My hobby and passion has always been airguns, making them all they can and should be.  

  In the last several years I have been sharing my skills with other airgun enthusiast and now custom tune airguns full-time.

  I recently got an airgun in my shop to be tuned and upon tearing it down I found a Vortek kit installed and became curious about the company. After a little Goggling I found Vortek’s website and I also found an updated version that claimed to also dampen the shot cycle. 

  This really intrigued me because it claimed to do so without heavy spring tars and messy magical lubes.

  To me the old school approach of lube tunes is really nothing more than a Band-Aid and does nothing to fix the underlying problem. 

If this DYI kit lived up to its promise’s it is a major breakthrough in my book.

RWS 34 Guiney Pig!

  This will be an in depth exhaustive test of the Vortek DYI Kit under real field conditions.

The following aspects will be covered.

   Shooting characteristics under different temperatures and FPS.

     Shot cycle comparisons.

   Factory specs vs. Vortek specs.

   Spring force retention after 1000 shots and fps variations.

  Cocking effort.

    Ease of installation.

   Vortek’s service.

   Field performance test under hunting conditions.

   Kit quality

   Overall value “Is it worth $80 plus shipping or is it snake oil?”

Ease of Installation

  With my years of experience rebuilding airguns it would not be fair for me to be the judge of "ease of installation", so I recruited my neighbor to install the Vortek DYI Kit in the RWS 34. This would be a good test because he is your average Joe.
I supervised for safety purposes and made notes of difficulties and questions.

First thing is the lack of instructions for newbies!

Here is some of the Q/A that arose.

   1.   How do I take the old seal off?

   Pry off.

   2.    How do I get the new seal on without damaging it?

   Place in hot water and quickly slip on.

   3.   How much lube do I put on the spring?

   A very light stringy coat.

   4.   Does the seal need lubed and how do I lube the seal?

   A thin coat on the sides of the seal, keeping it off the front.

   5.   Do I lube the receiver walls before installation.

   Yes, use a very thin layer of the grease and wipe out all the excess. This will     leave a microscopic layer for installation.

Note,

  I thought I would include these questions by the installer because they are legitimate questions the newbie will ask and will affect the performance and liability.

  I also want to include a small summary from my observations during the installation.

1.   NO MESSY LUBES or TARS!

2.   No experimenting getting that sweet spot of just the right amount of lube. Eliminating multiple tears downs to achieve the desired results.

3.   It required substantially more force in the spring compressor going back together.

4.   With a thorough de-burring from a Dremel and a Cratex bit, it only took 2 hours by the newbie!

5.   The spring and seal look to be top quality with excellent tolerances!

Initial FPS and shot cycle results.

I will not include the first 100 shots in the data; I will record data after it stabilizes from any possible lubes in front of the piston.

Note,

I requested a spring with 2 coils removed; I do not need magnum performance since it only needs to fill the role of a porch gun. 

I am not going to do the typical data prints outs but rather I want to see how it will preform in the field.

After the first 100 shots she settled into the numbers below. Included are the results for environment temps this will become clear later. All shot strings were 10 shots.

Pellet	Low FPS	High FPS	Temp
7.0	868	896	33f
7.0	894	908	70f
7.9	833	857	34f
7.9	865	871	72f

So why did I include temp variation? 

  It’s because old school lube tunes really suffer in cooler conditions. When the lubes are cold and stiff velocities vary wildly until warmed up. This dramatically affects POI “point of impact”.

  In the field, Dusk and Dawn are when the skillet fixings are most active. This means if you sighted your gun on a nice fuzzy warm afternoon, you will most likely shoot low. 

  These were the average velocities after 3 strings with 10 shots each. I even changed chronographs to verify the numbers.

  This is phenomenal in the field. We don’t have to be chained to temperature sensitive tars and greases anymore! It also eliminates lubing for different seasons. 
  Here in Arizona were we can go from freezing nights to scorching days this is a real blessing.

  

  Since the Vortek DYI Kit addresses the mechanical problem of vibration at its source, it’s a real fix and not merely a Band-Aid.

  The Vortek Kit does require some lube and it is supplied. But only a small amount is used as it should be for lubrication and not for dampening.

Shot Cycle Impressions

  "WOW", is a good place to start! The shot shot cycle is fast with a very solid THWACK using 7.0gn pellets and a swift solid THUMP with 7.9gn pellets. I believe if I had went with a their standard spring, shooting 7.0gn pellets might not be the best idea!

  I believe the very quick lock up time is because of their use of “HiY valve quality spring”.

  In case you’re wondering what this means? It is the same quality spring that’s used in car engines.

Why is that such a big deal?

   Well car engines operate under high heat and high rpm’s for years! Also when the engine is not running some of the engines valves are held open until the engine is started again and again this happens for the life of the engine. 

  So when the valves are being held open in a non-running state the spring is nearly fully compressed. So over the life of these springs, they spend a great deal of time compressed and must still be able to perform.

  In short HiY springs are used in applications that see hard use.  

  Using this quality of spring in an airgun has huge benefits.

1.   Being able to carry your pellet rifle in the field cocked while stalking game without loss of FPS, 

2. More importantly, your POI does not change!

  To test this, I left the gun cocked with the following results. In one hour the FPS only dropped 18 fps and only lost 6 fps over the next 4 hours. This tells me it had and larger initial drop but stabilized quickly. 

The best part is I had no discernible change in my POI!

 There factory spring doesn't even come close in this respect. The factory spring dropped 38 fps in the first hour and dropped another 51 fps over the next four hour and then stabilized for a total of 89 fps. This had a noticeable change in my POI. 

  Since I limit myself to a 2” kill zone, this would bring my 45 yard hunting range down to 35. Totally unacceptable!

Is the gun more accurate?

  This particular gun shoots average for an RWS 34. Between 50 and 90 degrees, the extreme spread was 78 fps.

  

  With the Vortek DYI kit the gun grouped more uniformly not showing any signs of velocity variations in the POI.

 Keep in mind it's 20% gun and 80% shooter.

 With that said, I believe with the very quick shot cycle and the absence of the twang and vibration it becomes a more shoot-able gun. This makes the potential for the whole package, gun and shooter to be more accurate.

  I had the neighbor shoot the gun before and after the tune, eliminating my seasoned hands. He shot freehand and bagged at 10, 25 and 40 yards, 5 shots with 7.9 CHP’s. I gave some basic instruction for the artillery hold basics and he got 25 warm up shots.

Before tune

Yards	Bagged	Freehand
10	.75”	1.2”
25	1.6”	2.5”
40	3.5”	4.5”

After Tune

Yards	Bagged	Freehand
10	.3”	1”
25	.8”	1.8”
40	2”	3.1

  The data says “Yes” the package is more accurate. His effective hunting range has increased. With some practice he could easily go from 25 to 40 yards using a 2” kill zone!

Does the gun shoot faster?

YES!

  The factory advertises a 1000 fps, in reality it shot 721 for the low and 805 for the high with 7.0gn at the 5000’ in elevation I live at. 

The Vortek DYI Kit smoked these numbers! 

  I believe if I had not had had the extra coils taken off the spring I would have seen the factory advertised specs and that’s with a lead pellet.

After 1000 shots!

  To my amazement, the gun settled down to 849 fps average across 10 shoots with only a 9 fps deviation, simply outstanding. 

VERY impressive spring indeed!  

  I also tore down the gun to do an inspection of the internal parts. I found nothing out of order. I also tested the seal for pliability, it passed with only a slight burnish. I credit the burnish to the newbies lubing, but in no way affected the performance.

This is phenomenal in my opinion!

In summary, is it worth $80 plus shipping?

  As an airgun tuner this is really a double edged sword situation for me.

  On one hand, it really brings out the full potential of the gun while making it into a reliable hard hitting hunting machine in varying conditions. 

  I am sure it would greatly extend the guns service life.

  On the other hand I cannot honestly look a customer in the eye and say my old school lube tune is better.

I believe this is the best DYI drop in solution out there, bar-none!

Final thoughts...

  Well, considering you won’t have to pay shipping your gun back and forth to a tuner and worse, getting locked into their tars and lubes. 

  Some of the things this kit brings to the table are the things that cannot be measured. Like taking pride in the DYI aspect or the shit eating grin the first time you pull the trigger. 

  Maybe it’s what the old boys felt when they flint knapped an arrow head and brought home the meat…

 One more benefit, this gun used to eat scopes for breakfast. The Vortek kit has definitely put this beast on a scope diet!

What does this mean for me as an airgun tuner?

  Well, I will be installing Vortek DYI Kits when possible. It will definitely free my time up for barrel re-crowning, piston buttoning, cylinder honing, trigger work, rebuilding out of production guns and so on.

I believe this kit is a steal at $80!

Coming soon will be all the pics on the installation of the kit in the this airgun project!

The step by step series is still to come!

By Arizona Air Gunner