That's great news mate... I'll try that on mime, though I don't have problem with the cocking piece.
Wolf
Wolf
The truth about the G&G Steel Cocking Piece
I am writing this thread as - in my opinion - this is a subject with some confusion and little factual information about this upgrade.
What does it do and how does it work?
The cocking piece is part of the bolt. It holds the back end of the striker arm and gets pulled it back by the rotation of the cocking handle. When being pulled back (aka "cocking"), the cocking piece pushes the cocking arm back. The front part of the cocking arm has a retention ring that pushes against the striker spring, effectively compressing it. When reaching the final cocking position the cocking piece is held in place by a small half-moon dent in the cocking handle. Pulling the trigger releases the entire bolt and therefore the striker spring energy. This results in a forward-propelling energy of the arm that hits the impact plate on the magazine, causing a serie of events that result in the magazine gas valve to open and release a certain amount of gas into the bolt itself, through the nozzle, behind the BB and finally causing the BB to shoot.
Possible reasons to replace it?
G&G and other brands like Falcon provide a steel equivalent of the cocking piece since the small frontal, round tooth you see in the above picture (facing approximately the bottom-left corner of the picture) might wear or break with use, rendering the entire cocking mechanism in the bolt impossible.
In my specific case, the original cocking piece developed some weakness at the very start of the metal round tooth, which resulted in the entire protrunding part to break.
The objective of this thread
When I searched around the internet for upgrade/replacements of this cocking piece, I immediately found these steel alternatives.
The one you will find easily is the above, made by G&G Armament, for around 35 euros. Falcon makes an equivalent but it costs up to 80 euros.
The good thing about the G&G Steel Cocking piece is that it is also present in what G&G calls the "Power Pack", which costs around 50 euros and features a reinforced striker spring and two magazine upgrades (they reinforce and improve the impact plate mechanism in the magazine).
Because of the above, I was almost 100% sure to go for the G&G Power Pack.
The problem arises from the fact that there are a number of threads on the internet where Tanaka users state that the G&G steel cocking piece is out of spec and not working correctly. There was not enough information to back this up but most of the contents where scary enough to let me question my purchase. I did not want to end up with a 50 euros upgrade that did not put my bolt back into action (..after all, it is a bolt action rifle
).
At the end, I decided to purchase the G&G Power Pack anyway and share my experience.
The results:
1. The G&G Steel Cocking Piece looks exactly like the original. It is a little longer in its rear side but this does not change the proportions of the areas where friction and relations with other pieces occur.
2. The original cocking piece has a very small nub screw used to tighten the end of the striker arm the cocking piece. Remember to get it out of the original cocking piece to put it in the G&G Steel version because this upgrade does not come with a similar screw.
3. The rear part of the bolt has a small metal nub, with a tiny spring, that locks into the cocking handle. Make sure you do not loose this piece when disassembling the bolt!
4. I understand why some people say "it is out of spec, my bolt was not cocking when I installed this upgrade". This is the crucial part of the thread:
The cocking handle has a diagonal groove that, by rotation during the cocking movement, pushes the cocking piece back by applying pressure to its round metal tooth (again: pictured above facing the bottom-left corner of the image).
The friction of the cocking piece against the groove in the cocking handle will generate, with time, small "grooves/dents" in the cocking handle. This is perfectly normal as the cocking piece "finds its way" against the cocking handle.
The problem comes when you change the cocking piece: the new, upgraded part will probably not be tolerant as the older one, with the small grooves in the cocking handle.
After replacing the cocking piece with the G&G steel upgrade part, my bolt was NOT cocking. There was basically no way for me to turn the cocking handle and get the cocking piece to .. cock.
What I did was:
1. Use sanding paper to finely work the entire groove in the cocking handle, making it as smooth and flat as possible. While I was at it, I used the sanding paper to make the entire groove more "fluid", trying to even some of the corners. Make sure you don't go hard on it because small changes in this part might break the entire mechanism. Just make sure you clean and smooth up any previous dent or sign of wearing the stock cocking piece had generated on the cocking handle diagonal groove.
2. Install the original striker spring if you have a reinforced one. I have a King Arms Reinforced Striker Spring and it is known to be the toughest spring available. We are going to install the ugpraded spring later on, for now let's use the original one because it alleviates some of the tension. The task here is to get the bolt cocking movement back and keep doing it until the parts find their "clockwork behavior".
3. Lube the heck out of the entire rear part of the bolt..this was key to me as the new steel cocking piece finds itself into a bolt that was scratched and "weared" by another cocking piece..tiny discrepancies between the two cocking pieces will make it very hard for the bolt to cock.
4. Assemble the bolt back and carefully put it into the receiver. Do not push it all the way inside, because if the bolt does not cock correctly, you will have to disassemble the entire rifle up to the trigger mechanism to get the bolt out (I did and then had to..trust me on this one, it is a pain in the back). Just put the front part of the bolt into the receiver to hold it firmly and allow you to start a cocking movement by rotating the handle as you would do normally.
If you feel the cocking movement does not occur (aka "the bolt is stuck with the handle facing down"), try a little harder but do not over-do it.
Get the bolt out and disassemble it, look at where the steel cocking piece touched against the groove in the cocking handle, use dusting paper to smooth it out even more and, lube the heck out of it again and assemble the bolt back. Put the front part of the bolt into the receiver, try cocking the bolt.
Eventually, if you followed this guide to the letter, the bolt will cycle perfectly. Do it over and over to let the steel cocking piece make room for itself around the handle groove and in the back part of the bolt.
Your rifle is back! Get the bolt out, install any reinforced spring if you have one (and/or want to) and you are all set.
I hope this clears out some of the dark areas of knowledge in this matter. I am trying to divulgate this thread as much as possible because in all truth, if your bolt is ever going to have one problem, it is going to be the cocking piece breaking on you.
It is not out of spec, it works. It just needs some love
For those who know it and for those who don't, the G&G Steel Cocking Piece is this one:
![]()
and you can compare it to the original stock piece by looking at this picture
and you can compare it to the original stock piece by looking at this picture
What does it do and how does it work?
The cocking piece is part of the bolt. It holds the back end of the striker arm and gets pulled it back by the rotation of the cocking handle. When being pulled back (aka "cocking"), the cocking piece pushes the cocking arm back. The front part of the cocking arm has a retention ring that pushes against the striker spring, effectively compressing it. When reaching the final cocking position the cocking piece is held in place by a small half-moon dent in the cocking handle. Pulling the trigger releases the entire bolt and therefore the striker spring energy. This results in a forward-propelling energy of the arm that hits the impact plate on the magazine, causing a serie of events that result in the magazine gas valve to open and release a certain amount of gas into the bolt itself, through the nozzle, behind the BB and finally causing the BB to shoot.
Possible reasons to replace it?
G&G and other brands like Falcon provide a steel equivalent of the cocking piece since the small frontal, round tooth you see in the above picture (facing approximately the bottom-left corner of the picture) might wear or break with use, rendering the entire cocking mechanism in the bolt impossible.
In my specific case, the original cocking piece developed some weakness at the very start of the metal round tooth, which resulted in the entire protrunding part to break.
The objective of this thread
When I searched around the internet for upgrade/replacements of this cocking piece, I immediately found these steel alternatives.
The one you will find easily is the above, made by G&G Armament, for around 35 euros. Falcon makes an equivalent but it costs up to 80 euros.
The good thing about the G&G Steel Cocking piece is that it is also present in what G&G calls the "Power Pack", which costs around 50 euros and features a reinforced striker spring and two magazine upgrades (they reinforce and improve the impact plate mechanism in the magazine).
Because of the above, I was almost 100% sure to go for the G&G Power Pack.
The problem arises from the fact that there are a number of threads on the internet where Tanaka users state that the G&G steel cocking piece is out of spec and not working correctly. There was not enough information to back this up but most of the contents where scary enough to let me question my purchase. I did not want to end up with a 50 euros upgrade that did not put my bolt back into action (..after all, it is a bolt action rifle
).At the end, I decided to purchase the G&G Power Pack anyway and share my experience.
The results:
1. The G&G Steel Cocking Piece looks exactly like the original. It is a little longer in its rear side but this does not change the proportions of the areas where friction and relations with other pieces occur.
2. The original cocking piece has a very small nub screw used to tighten the end of the striker arm the cocking piece. Remember to get it out of the original cocking piece to put it in the G&G Steel version because this upgrade does not come with a similar screw.
3. The rear part of the bolt has a small metal nub, with a tiny spring, that locks into the cocking handle. Make sure you do not loose this piece when disassembling the bolt!
At this point you will probably just assemble the bolt back and everything will work normally. If your bolt does not cock, do not panic and continue reading:
4. I understand why some people say "it is out of spec, my bolt was not cocking when I installed this upgrade". This is the crucial part of the thread:
The cocking handle has a diagonal groove that, by rotation during the cocking movement, pushes the cocking piece back by applying pressure to its round metal tooth (again: pictured above facing the bottom-left corner of the image).
The friction of the cocking piece against the groove in the cocking handle will generate, with time, small "grooves/dents" in the cocking handle. This is perfectly normal as the cocking piece "finds its way" against the cocking handle.
The problem comes when you change the cocking piece: the new, upgraded part will probably not be tolerant as the older one, with the small grooves in the cocking handle.
After replacing the cocking piece with the G&G steel upgrade part, my bolt was NOT cocking. There was basically no way for me to turn the cocking handle and get the cocking piece to .. cock.
What I did was:
1. Use sanding paper to finely work the entire groove in the cocking handle, making it as smooth and flat as possible. While I was at it, I used the sanding paper to make the entire groove more "fluid", trying to even some of the corners. Make sure you don't go hard on it because small changes in this part might break the entire mechanism. Just make sure you clean and smooth up any previous dent or sign of wearing the stock cocking piece had generated on the cocking handle diagonal groove.
2. Install the original striker spring if you have a reinforced one. I have a King Arms Reinforced Striker Spring and it is known to be the toughest spring available. We are going to install the ugpraded spring later on, for now let's use the original one because it alleviates some of the tension. The task here is to get the bolt cocking movement back and keep doing it until the parts find their "clockwork behavior".
3. Lube the heck out of the entire rear part of the bolt..this was key to me as the new steel cocking piece finds itself into a bolt that was scratched and "weared" by another cocking piece..tiny discrepancies between the two cocking pieces will make it very hard for the bolt to cock.
4. Assemble the bolt back and carefully put it into the receiver. Do not push it all the way inside, because if the bolt does not cock correctly, you will have to disassemble the entire rifle up to the trigger mechanism to get the bolt out (I did and then had to..trust me on this one, it is a pain in the back). Just put the front part of the bolt into the receiver to hold it firmly and allow you to start a cocking movement by rotating the handle as you would do normally.
If you feel the cocking movement does not occur (aka "the bolt is stuck with the handle facing down"), try a little harder but do not over-do it.
Get the bolt out and disassemble it, look at where the steel cocking piece touched against the groove in the cocking handle, use dusting paper to smooth it out even more and, lube the heck out of it again and assemble the bolt back. Put the front part of the bolt into the receiver, try cocking the bolt.
Eventually, if you followed this guide to the letter, the bolt will cycle perfectly. Do it over and over to let the steel cocking piece make room for itself around the handle groove and in the back part of the bolt.
Your rifle is back!
Get the bolt out, install any reinforced spring if you have one (and/or want to) and you are all set.I hope this clears out some of the dark areas of knowledge in this matter. I am trying to divulgate this thread as much as possible because in all truth, if your bolt is ever going to have one problem, it is going to be the cocking piece breaking on you.
It is not out of spec, it works. It just needs some love
1 - 6 of 6 Posts
True. Modified post
1 - 6 of 6 Posts
