Healthways Plainsman .177

[P71Cemoto]

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How many of you had one of these?

I was looking for something in my five drawer file cabinet the other day and found my brothers old Plainsman from back in the mid-'60's tucked way in the back.

Healthways would advertise these in comic books, etc. Back then and you could cut out the ad and mail it in with cash and in a few weeks this BB gun would come in the mail.
My brother passed many years ago and finding this tickled some old long forgotten memories of him and when he got it. I was 8 years old at the time and he was 15 when it came in the mail to his friend's house (they were a hunter and fisherman family) as my mom and dad would not have allowed it. So here we were in the back yard at 15 and 8 respectively, plinking away while dad was at work and mom was shopping. I remember him being so excited and I'm not sure if it was because he had his first 'pistol' or that he had pulled one over on mom and dad. Quickly hidden under the mattress of course, along with a Playboy magazine or 2 keeping it company.

One time I remember him telling me to rest the barrel on my left arm as I squeezed the trigger, it would be more accurate that way. Well, a couple of weeks went by and he came home with a bloodied left arm. He had shot himself with it as the barrel was too low and a BB punctured his arm. He washed the wound out and told me to back up his story that we were walking in the woods and a dead pine branch stuck him.

It was a nice find for me as other than memories, I do not have much to remember him by. When he passed, his wife gave everything he had away - including my fishing tackle - she was kind of kooky to say the least.

So I took it into the shop did some disassembly and light lube. The seals still looked ok. So I ordered up a few cartridges on Ebay and will see if it works. These take the 8 gram CO2 cartridges and not the common 12gram.

Hope it tickles a few memories for you as well . . .

 

[wheelgun1958]

https://www.pyramydair.com/blog/2009/10/healthways-plainsman-bb-gun-part-1/

 

[Johnnu2]

I think I may still have one that my uncle gave me many years ago.

J.

 

[Danjet500]

Pistols and Playboy magazines. I think I would have liked your brother.
I have an old Slavia ZVP in .177 from the sixties. Fun little shooter.

 

[XUSNORDIE]

Wow! I remember these. My Brothers friend had one. That guy seemed to have everything cool. This brings back memories of running through the woods trying not to get tagged with a BB. He also had a mini bike.....thankfully he wasn't left handed. This was probably 1972ish.

 

[needsmostuff]

I swapped a pocketknife for one then found out it had an issue. Something was blocking the magazine in the back where you dumped the bbs in and it would not feed. Probably some simple way to clean out but I was about 10 and had no skills.
So I shot it by pointing it up, dropping in 1 (sometimes more) bb. I kept it pointing up till a target appeared then leveled and shot very fast before it rolled out.
Now the story.
I am out behind the house shooting away at an ant hill sniping ant soldiers and what not. Basically paying no attention where the ricochets are going.
A huge shadow looms over me and a loud HEY!!!!
I turn around and it is the "big kid" from across the street. Dang, I have never even made eye contact with this guy before, (think Fonzieish 50's greaser about 19 years old),,,,,,,Dang, this is bad!
You're shooting my car he says, (think pride and joy salmon and grey 55 chevy). I sense the inevitable doom.
He stares at me, he stares at the gun, time gets slow. Finally he says, Cool gun, why do you shoot it like that. I explained.
Cool, don't shoot my car anymore. Then he turned and walked away.
I was done for the day, and those ants were forever safe after that.
O yeah, he never talked to me again.

 

[blume357]

the odd thing is that pistol does not look like what you would expect from the name Plainsman.

Mine back in the 70's was a Crossman 454. My best friend and I both bought one and loved them.... my grandmother gave a group of us an old tenant house on the farm to hang out in on the weekends so we would stay out of trouble.. we were to best describe it red neck nerds... there were 6 of us in the 'Sacred Five'. Think "He Man Woman Haters Club". One day we are hanging out and I can see my buddy through a crack in the wall talking to one of the other sacred five and I decide since the cartridge is low in my Crossman to shoot him in the butt. Seems it had a little more power than I thought and he got mad and we ended up in a gun (CO2 pistol) fight. It ended with him not only shooting me in the back of the head, which knocked me flat down on the ground (yes I know it can't do that but is how I remember it) but also putting two holes in the rear quarter panel of my father's car all from about 50 feet away. He had put a new cartridge in. I was so mad at him shooting the car that I just jumped in it and left... when I got home my head still hurt and I started to rub it and could feel a lump. I ended up pushing the BB back out of the hole. It had gone in from the side and along about an inch or more beside my scull before stopping...

Crossman 454:

 

[XUSNORDIE]

"He Man Woman Haters Club"

Sounds like the name of a gay bar........ definitely a club my friends and I wouldn't think of joining

Always know what you are walking into. When I first got to NAS Miramar I went out bar hopping with a couple friends from AO "A" School who also got assigned to various commands at Miramar. We didn't know the place and wanted to check out the bars. We found a strip of bars on Clairmont Mesa Blvd and parked. We bounced from bar to bar. We walked into one, sat down, one buddy put quarters on the pool table, another went up to get a couple pitchers of beer. He came back to the table with a bad look, and said we needed to get out. He said "look around, you see any women?" Nope. Then he told me "look at the calendar behind the bar when we walk out".....Yup. It's a gay bar......we didn't pay attention to the signs/names of the bars we just walked in. When we left we saw the name of this club..."COLD BEER & WARM FRIENDS"...

 

[wproct]

I swapped a pocketknife for one then found out it had an issue. Something was blocking the magazine in the back where you dumped the bbs in and it would not feed. Probably some simple way to clean out but I was about 10 and had no skills.
So I shot it by pointing it up, dropping in 1 (sometimes more) bb. I kept it pointing up till a target appeared then leveled and shot very fast before it rolled out.
Now the story.
I am out behind the house shooting away at an ant hill sniping ant soldiers and what not. Basically paying no attention where the ricochets are going.
A huge shadow looms over me and a loud HEY!!!!
I turn around and it is the "big kid" from across the street. Dang, I have never even made eye contact with this guy before, (think Fonzieish 50's greaser about 19 years old),,,,,,,Dang, this is bad!
You're shooting my car he says, (think pride and joy salmon and grey 55 chevy). I sense the inevitable doom.
He stares at me, he stares at the gun, time gets slow. Finally he says, Cool gun, why do you shoot it like that. I explained.
Cool, don't shoot my car anymore. Then he turned and walked away.
I was done for the day, and those ants were forever safe after that.
O yeah, he never talked to me again.

Wow, your post took me back in time. "salmon and grey 55 chevy". When I was a senior in high school my best friend had that exact car, two door hardtop. My car was a 56 Ford four door hardtop. My Ford had quite a few less miles than his Chevy, but God I loved that Chevy, probably my favorite of all of the years of Chevy's up until 1962.

 

[P71Cemoto]

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The Ebay 8gr co2 cartridges showed today and the gun still works great! I got lucky, keeping it in the file drawer for the last 40 years in my boiler room I was unsure if it would work. Oiling the seals while apart was probably a good plan.

Glad for all your comments!

Thank you.

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