What you're looking at is a Diana P5 Magnum air pistol (550 fps / 8 ft. lbs., break-barrel, single shot, .177 cal.) which has been modified with a welded picatinny rail. (Originally, this gun had no way to add lensed optics; from the factory, they come with open sights only. My gunsmith removed the rear sight and welded the scope rail on.)
Now, I want to put some sort of short pistol scope on it.
Can anyone offer any suggestions or recommendations?
Thanks in advance.
P.S. I don't really want to put a Red Dot on it, unless I can find one with at least x4 mag that won't break the bank (read: less than $100)
i 4 power scope at least for at or under 100 bucks well i would look the BSA Edge 2-7 -28
https://www.bsaoptics.com/scope.aspx?productID=316
of course you could try to find something off Ebay
i have many 2 to 2.5 power scopes but also some with more power
nice idea about the scope rail seeing that the old Diana mount are almost impossible to find and a piece of junk if you can, too short for anything other than a Williams rear sight
i did find these mounts on Ebay and they need some mods to fit an a bunch of cleaning up so you can reblue them but will work but that another story
That gun will eventually destroy any kind of cheap optic you put on it. Its a magnum springer, just in a pistol. Look for a pistol scope that is approved for a spring gun. UTG might make one. If you can find one, buy it and save yourself the aggravation and wasted pellets of trying to figure out why your gun quit grouping. In the 1980's I had a BSA Scorpion or something, it was a break barrel cannon. It ate Leupold scopes every couple months. Had a red dot on it when I sold it that was holding up. But it wasn't a cheap red dot.
Is that 8 Ft. Lb figure for real? With a .177 7.9 grain pellet at 550 FPS I get ~5.3 Ft. Lbs.
Not too many pistol scope choices out there rated for springer's that I know of. HW makes
one but it's only 2X and runs $150. Also keeping the cross hairs on target at 4X hand
holding a pistol can be a bit of a challenge.
well lets see what we have here
1. you put a mount on the pistol that is there to stay and i don't know if the rear sight still works
2. you what a scope of at least 4 power from what i read and a 4 power red dot might be able to be found but not cheap
3. the price range of 100 bucks and below gives you a small window to find what you want
4. the pistol is a heavy recoiling pistol
5. now there is very little if anything written about scoping the p5 and that leaves you nothing to go by
so if the rear sights still work put them back on and quit your scoping endeavor or find a scope that fits your parameters and mount it up and if it breaks well that is just one of those things
you had the idea of scoping the pistol and welded a weaver mount on the tube, so what are you waiting for us, find a scope and test the idea
you have a 50/50 chance, this hobby has as many failures as successes when it come to ideas to improve or something else
good luck and tell us how your test goes and i know how the p5 shoots i have 2 and alway thought they were harsh
You are right, my memory was rusty. My Hatsan Supercharger is the 8 ft. lb. gun.
My Diana is the 5 ft. lb. gun.
I had to dig up my notes. I actually did some pellet comparisons a few years ago:
So, that comes to...
The 411 fps pellet = 3.96 FPE
The 450 fps pellet = 4.32 FPE
The 507 fps pellet = 4.68 FPE
The 522 fps pellet = 4.72 FPE
The 669 fps pellet = 5.17 FPE
The total combined average of these results = 4.57 FPE
So for all practical purposes, the Diana P5 is a 5 FPE gun, which makes it powerful, as pistols go, but kind of weak compared to most air rifles.
Also, I had a red dot (1x) on it before, and I did not find that it moved at all; the picatinny rail, because of how much grip it allows the mounting clamp, held just fine. I had many thousands of shots through it with the red dot, with no complaints.
However, I found that the dot obscured the target, so I took it off, and started looking for different options.
I tried the "See All" open sight, but I encountered the same problem as the 1x red dot; I just couldn't see the target clearly enough.
I have had problems in the past with magnum airguns shaking the tar out of scopes and loosening the mounts, but all of those occurred on dovetail mounts. I have never had a scope move since I started using picatinny.
I have a picatinny mount on my Crosman Titan GP (.22 cal, avg, 690 fps) and the scope never moves. (It's a Centerpoint, so it's rated for airguns.)
I have a picatinny mount on my Ruger Airhawk (.177 cal, avg. 850 fps) and the scope never moves (it's the scope that came with it, so it's airgun rated too)
My son and I got Diana magnums for Christmas (His = Model 34, mine = Model 350 Magnum) and both of those were "Stryker Combos" from PA, and so far, neither scope has moved.
I found that you were right about 4x red dots not being within a reasonable price range. They aren't. And it's not that 100 bucks is all I can afford, but I hate to spend more than that on a scope, when I picked up the gun itself for 96 bucks + tax, lol.
I went ahead and bought a cheap, 2.5x pistol scope for the P5, and an offset mount, in case I need to fine-tune the scope positioning. It's an NC-Star Pistolero 2.5 x 30mm. Found it on Optics Planet. I will let you know how it turns out.
Cheers, and thanks for all the comments!
MY CROSMAN TITAN:
MY RUGER AIRHAWK:
Ok, so I have received tracking info on the scope I ordered; it said to expect delivery on Monday April 1st by 8 pm. When it gets here, I will mount it, photograph it, and post it here. Then I will run some tests and see how it holds up. Stay tuned.