seal type

Doug,
I've never tried the test with moving the chamber around. The original seal that I started with was the white colored one with the groove in it. I noticed mine was getting smashed and small bits of it, in the form of a thin ring shape, were kind of hanging at the edges. I was experiencing some poi shifts so I decided to change it. It just didn't look right to me. I replaced it with the "o-ring" type without the groove and a more clear milky color. I chronied it after and found that it was shooting almost exactly what it was before, 866fps with cpl's. Found out later that my poi was do to a bad scope mount. When you replaced yours was it with a grooved type. I was under the impression that the new seal, "o-ring" type is the only replacement one available from Beeman. Did you do this awhile ago? I also noticed on the gun diagram on the Chamber's site that older 97's use a different seal than the newer ones. My 97 is about 3 years old. The seal that I replace it with has only been in the gun about a month so I cannot comment on how well its doing other than the initial chrony numbers after replacement. I would be interested if there was a better seal available too, but for now I'll have to give the "new" Beeman seal a try. I would try to use one of the non grooved seals. It can't hurt too much if the grooved seals are getting smashed up anyway.
Jeff P