(tried to flag down a mod to move my GD thread, but to no avail, so I copy/pasted it here for better traction)

picked up a RWS 54 .22 pellet gun at a garage sale for a few hundred dollars. Didn't really expect to buy any air guns, but this thing seemed interesting. That said, I'm so outside of my league here it's unreal. I figured they kinda sorta would be like a normal firearm, but its beyond the scope of what I'm used to.

cleaning? no idea what I'm doing. "tuning" or whatever it's called? lol. air rifles of this sorcery are well outside of my expertise... the last air rifle I had was a crossman something or other that shot BBs when I was a kid.

Ideally, I'd like to get it cleaned up and tuned, but seeing as how I have no idea what I'm doing I may need to send it out to have it done professionally. was thinking of ditching the sights and getting a fiber optic front with aperture rear mounted on the dovetail for a longer sight radius.

who should I send it out to? what needs to be done for a tune up? how do I find the best load? help me, arfcom, you're my only hope!

I have one, got it used, didnt do a thing to it beside shoot it with the iron sights, I actually prefer the 54 with irons. If there is nothing wrong with yours...I'd just shoot it.

I have a dozen-ish German air rifles, most are scoped.

I ended up with a pair of FWB 124's both of which had bad seals. I looked at sending them off to get repaired, but decided to watch a few vids, got a spring compressor,  some new parts and torn them down and rebuilt,  way easier than I expected. Compressor was $70, parts were about(seals and spring)$60 for each, look me about an hour for each.

Don't lubricate it more than a drop of airgun oil every thousand rounds or so.

A tune and trigger job will run you $300 or so, and it's absolutely worth it.

Internally, when you need it, you want to use a silicone based oil instead of petroleum based to mitigate dieseling.  Use even that sparingly and only occasionally.  RWS sells a nice little bottle of it that will last a realllly long time but any pure silicone oil should do.  Externally, treat it as a normal rifle.

This will answer some of your questions from the other thread and this thread:

@desertmoon

I appreciate all the responses, you seem to be our resident airgun guru haha, hope you don't mind if I pick your brain from time to time

Actually, I am a super novice and I've been a bit out of the loop for a bit....but I do love my 54!!!!

Yeah don't dry fire it
If you do, the piston will slam all the way forward in the air chamber with no resistance from a pellet to stop that from happening.
I'm not a fan of the front sight on those (same as 48, 52), but I don't think the shorter sight radius will hurt accuracy, it's long enough.

Like the comments above.....
With Springer airguns... Rule #1 Dry-Firing is a Big No-No!!!
With normal use.... No Lube to the piston is needed...Actually it is more harmful than Good!....
Only places that needs to be lubed are the pivot points on the cocking lever and trigger!

Also if you are serious about a tune/maintenance/rebuild.
The guy to talk to is David Slade@ Airgunwerks.
British born airgun specialist. Used to be in Ca. but now in Tn.
Here is a link to his site:
AirgunWerks

Good Luck,
Ca_Longshot