High Quality Air Rifle?

That rifle looks like it will get the job done I've been looking at getting the Benjamin Marauder in 22 or 25 cal just weighting on the new synthetic stock to come out . P.S. can you ever have enough scope " I say no ".
foxyrick said:
This thread needs more pictures!

Here is my main bunny-bashing rifle, an Air Arms S410 in .22. It has a few added extras including a nicer stock and more effective sound moderator. It's almost silent to shoot; hitting the target 25 yards away is louder!

The S410 is a PCP and I have a dive bottle to fill it with, plus a stirrup pump for when the world ends and the local dive shop closes. I find the stirrup pump quite effective; it doesn't take all that long to fill the rifle's tank, just a bit of effort. The rifle has a ten shot magazine and fires around a hundred good shots before needing charging again.

Oh, and it also has a Harris bipod added on since those photos were taken.

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Agreed, you can never have too much 'scope. This huge objective is great at dawn and dusk - typical rabbiting times around here.

.25 supposedly has considerably better ballistic potential than .22, from what I've researched. If I had the choice I would go for .25 with a fair bit of power behind it, but with the low legal power limit in the UK, .25 is a little heavy.
 
Well in the UK with the fps laws I would imagine at .25 going under 700 fps all the accuracy is gone when shooting at 50 yards or so . Just picked this on up a month ago from my next door neighbor it's the SS2 the Japanese version of the Feinwerkbau model 65 what a sweet gun to shoot , from what I've read on it people in the UK really like this one .
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Can PCP Rifles remained charged for a period of time or do they need to be discharged?
 
Benjamin actually still makes air rifles, and they're still pretty good. The 397 should be exactly what you're looking for.
 
Driggert, that is a beautiful gun!

Yes, .25 would fly too slowly to be of much use here, unless one is fortunate enough to hold a firearms certificate and be allowed to use higher power. I am not, and likely never will be.

Quirt said:
Can PCP Rifles remained charged for a period of time or do they need to be discharged?
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Mine has held air with no discernible loss for at least six months unused. It has a pressure gauge under the stock. Provided the air reservoir's seals are in good condition, I see no reason why any good rifle should lose air. Also, as a side note, there is no harm in discharging a PCP rifle with no pellet chambered, unlike a springer which can be damaged.

CO2 guns running from those small, piercable metal bulbs are a different matter. I have a rat catcher rifle for plinking and the seals in that can (and will) be damaged if left with a partly used CO2 bulb in. I do not know if that is common to all such rifles, or just to the rat catcher but it is a known issue with them.
 
I think Beeman and RWS springers are good guns for casual shooting. I have a BSA and it is even pretty good. Gamo is you are wanting something cheap to start out with.

When I was younger I had a Crossman pump, then a Benjamin pump, then last a Sheridan pump. I liked them but it took long enough to load and pump them that they aren't as much fun for plinking. The springer is more fun because you can cock and load them faster. I have a couple of CO2 guns that I like but I'm hesitant to shoot them because I don't know if I want to shoot the exact number of shots per CO2 cartridge. The downsides of springers are that they can have horrible triggers and they are really hard on scopes. My springer has a receiver sight on it now. If you are interested in hunting then precharged pneumatics are the way to go because they have the most power in larger calibers.

And be careful because you can spend an incredible amount on airguns.
 
My brother and I both had Crossmans growing up, and we used the hell out of em' towards the end of my teens my father who lived in the city got into air guns for taking some shots in city limits. He went with one of those single cock barrel break type. I never really used it too much, but I was just using it in the back yard with open sites, and not using it to its potential. what I did use a lot was a pump pellet pistol. We bought this pellet trap that we could set up across the living room and pass the gun back and forth while drinking a cold one. That really helped with my real pistol aim (not the beer) lol.

That trap was cool though, it had metal targets that would fall onto magnets, then the center target would self right the other targets when hit.
 
I have a Gamo break-barrel in .177, also two Benjamin 22 pumps; one is a rifle with a Williams peep sight and the other is a pistol. I like them all but my favorite is the pistol. All work fine shooting targets or coke cans, but the 22s are significantly better at killing things - no comparison.

For some reason I hit better with the pistol and Crow Magnum pellets.
 
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foxyrick said:
This thread needs more pictures!

Here is my main bunny-bashing rifle, an Air Arms S410 in .22. It has a few added extras including a nicer stock and more effective sound moderator. It's almost silent to shoot; hitting the target 25 yards away is louder!

The S410 is a PCP and I have a dive bottle to fill it with, plus a stirrup pump for when the world ends and the local dive shop closes. I find the stirrup pump quite effective; it doesn't take all that long to fill the rifle's tank, just a bit of effort. The rifle has a ten shot magazine and fires around a hundred good shots before needing charging again.

Oh, and it also has a Harris bipod added on since those photos were taken.

410001.jpg


410002.jpg
Click to expand...

Pics?...here ya go...



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Don't forget you can also use darts out of break barrel rifle. They can penetrate deep and be deadly. Think of a blow gun on steroids
 
sasha said:
Don't forget you can also use darts out of break barrel rifle. They can penetrate deep and be deadly. Think of a blow gun on steroids
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I don't think that's a very good idea Sasha. As I see it the single redeeming feature of darts is when you're really small and get your first air pistol, a GAT gun, one up from a spud gun, and you want to cycle the ammo round and round. Get a bit older and home brewed darts can be fun. I made one with a cocktail still and Blu-Tack that went very nicely through a quilt and into my cringing mates' knee when I was about 10, but that's all they are good for................. We aren't talking about a projectile a foot long with cotton wool wrapped round and dipped in frog poison that has to hit a kill area the size of a dinner plate at 40 paces, followed by a waiting game. Aside from whatever darts are going to do to your barrel there's going to be awful accuracy because of a terrible trajectory curve. My personal ethics force me to only shoot at stuff I pretty darn positive I can kill instantly in one hit every time. With an air rifle for me that meant ping pong ball size groups at 40 paces. Even with our puny 12ft/lbs limit we have here that's a kill. No darts are going to be able to group like that. In fact, I remember having a go on quite a few using the classic Eley Wasps that couldn't do that from a bench [China has come a long way, instanced by Driggert's SS2 above for one, but it wasn't always that way].............What you have proposed is a potential increase in penetration at the cost of accuracy. If you recall, there's two factors we need to consider, penetration and shock. My contention is that even at a humble 12 ft/lbs you will have all the penetration and shock you need at the range you can consistently shoot humane groups at.
 
baldtaco-II said:
I don't think that's a very good idea Sasha. As I see it the single redeeming feature of darts is when you're really small and get your first air pistol, a GAT gun, one up from a spud gun, and you want to cycle the ammo round and round. Get a bit older and home brewed darts can be fun. I made one with a cocktail still and Blu-Tack that went very nicely through a quilt and into my cringing mates' knee when I was about 10, but that's all they are good for................. We aren't talking about a projectile a foot long with cotton wool wrapped round and dipped in frog poison that has to hit a kill area the size of a dinner plate at 40 paces, followed by a waiting game. Aside from whatever darts are going to do to your barrel there's going to be awful accuracy because of a terrible trajectory curve. My personal ethics force me to only shoot at stuff I pretty darn positive I can kill instantly in one hit every time. With an air rifle for me that meant ping pong ball size groups at 40 paces. Even with our puny 12ft/lbs limit we have here that's a kill. No darts are going to be able to group like that. In fact, I remember having a go on quite a few using the classic Eley Wasps that couldn't do that from a bench [China has come a long way, instanced by Driggert's SS2 above for one, but it wasn't always that way].............What you have proposed is a potential increase in penetration at the cost of accuracy. If you recall, there's two factors we need to consider, penetration and shock. My contention is that even at a humble 12 ft/lbs you will have all the penetration and shock you need at the range you can consistently shoot humane groups at.
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This.
 
Absolutely spot-on Baldtaco-II.

...

Pellet choice is a critical factor in getting an air gun to work well, especially at lower powers, to the point that just because my S410 likes Defiant 5.50mm doesn't mean that someone's S410 will be as good with the same pellet. This is an area where one needs to take advice on the likely best pellets for a gun, then buy them all and experiment.

From doing that, I know that my S410 gives good groups, acceptable trajectory and efficient power transfer with Defiant 5.50mm pellets.

Defiant .22" can be bought in 5.48mm, 5.50mm and 5.52mm. All classed as .22" and it makes a big difference. At higher power (like 20ft.lbs or more) the friction in the barrel with a slightly-too-wide pellet is easily overcome, but at 12ft.lbs having just the right size pellet is important.

An initial guideline is to buy European-made pellets for a European-made gun (or rather barrel), and USA-made pellets for a USA gun. Just the difference between working with imperial and making .22" pellets, or metric and 5.5?mm pellets makes a difference to the gun.
 
I would recommend some Weihrauch. It' very reliable and unlike many other manufacturers, all the parts of the mechanism are made of metal as opposite to brands like Gamo or Diana... I own a long version of HW77 and it's just great. It's a long term proven classic with iron sights.
 
oldrich said:
I would recommend some Weihrauch. It' very reliable and unlike many other manufacturers, all the parts of the mechanism are made of metal as opposite to brands like Gamo or Diana... I own a long version of HW77 and it's just great. It's a long term proven classic with iron sights.
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Reliability is central to the whole family. Even if one found an old HW35, barring that tell tale bit of wood around the barrel release catch that got dinged on so many of those it's such a simple solid bit of engineering it would be hard not to tune it to be something pretty decent. Stick a nice PTFE piston head in there and a good spring and so on, read up on how to tweak the superb Rekord trigger unit and off you toddle.
 
BaldTaco, You are right it was hard to hit a small target past10 meters. Used to have a BSA Meteor as a kid I think I even sleeped with that rifle lol.. I were a damn good shoot if I may say so my self.
 
Sasha, ha, only you could have made me think of an all hail zombie air rifle with bayonet lugs brazed on. ;-)
 
I bought a new HW (Weihrauch) 30S Deluxe in .177 because I felt it was the current closest match to my all-time favorite air gun: an early-production Beeman R7. Light springer "recoil," good accuracy, simple to use/maintain and made of good materials... all it lacks is high power, but I have alternatives for whenever I need more punch or range. It will reliably and humanely take sparrows, starlings, rabbits and squirrels within reasonable range while still having a very low cocking effort.

A "fun" gun that will last seemingly indefinitely with a little care.
 
"I bought a new HW (Weihrauch) 30S Deluxe in .177 "- I am truly jealous. I had been setting aside funds for this very purchase- but our laptop suffered a fatal blow last night and my fund just went to buy a replacement.

I have yet to hear a bad word on the 30S.

Bill
 
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