It's a Daisy!

Back when I was a kid, a multi-pump air rifle was a cool thing to own. I had a Daisy Red Ryder first, and then a Daisy Model 25. But I never got the 880...

So I just bought one.

A Daisy 880 Power King! Mine is a very early model, manufactured in October 1973. Cobalt357 from the forum.daisymuseum.com was a great help identifying this rifle's age and with other details. I was lucky enough to find a matching early model manual on eBay. Here are some scans, click to see full size or download. 

full size page 1 click here

full size page 2 click here

Of course, it arrived with some problems. Sadly, the bolt handle had broken during shipping. Arg.

I took the rifle apart and drilled the broken pieces. I used a piece of an old 1/16" drill bit shaft to reinforce the joint and then JB Weld to epoxy the pieces together.

And the various air seals on this nearly 50 year old rifle are shot and so I replaced those with a kit made by ronno6. Ron was a great help.

All apart:

Various new seal assemblies:

And now it works great! One of the cool features of the earliest models is that they have more metal parts and that they don't have any warnings on them. By the late 1980s these rifles started having string warnings cast into them and many more plastic pieces. You can still buy one today, 48 years later, but it is mostly plastic! Daisy 880 on Amazon

This rifle still has its original stickers on it.

And the early models had a non removable butt plate with fake screws and a Daisy plate on the end of the pistol-grip.

It also has the all metal pump handle.

And check out the ridges on the bolt handle. Those rare ridges made repairing the bolt handle worth the effort.

A great .177 pellet and BB air rifle.