yansica1
28-10-2009, 12:52 PM
I bought one of these after having had a BSA S10 FAC for a long time, just fancied something
a bit more wieldy and light.
The first impression in the gunshop was that it was well made for the money and light enough
without being too light as to make accurate off hand shooting difficult. Remember I had
ordered this without actually handling it so was delighted to find the lever cocking very nearly
as slick as my sub 12 ft lbs HW100. It comes to the shoulder nicely enough but there is still
that hint of nose heavy feel to it. Next I proceeded to fix my Simmons 6-24 x 50 on top only to
find that the mounts would not give the required clearence. Luckily as I was still in the
gunshop this was soon fixed with a pair of high Sportsmatch mounts which now have the
scope some 8mm away from the barrel. Obviously the handling changes dramatically with
such a heavy scope on top but it still feels a bit nose heavy.
Having bought a tin of AirArms 16.1 grain pellets I filled up the magazine easily enough and
went to zero the outfit. Surprisingly the 1st pellet landed on the A4 size cardboard I set up at
40 yards (about 8" low and some 4" right) - it is always nice when quick, rough turns of the
dials bring about a real POI difference. I would say I got the pellets on to the intended mark
within the first clip and thereafter was able to get a 5 shot group that could be covered with a
10p piece. Pretty good I think bearing in mind my rest was far from ideal and it being a brand
new rifle. The strange thing was that the first shot of the 3rd clip went massively low
indicating that the rifle had dropped well below its operating band so I spent the last few shots
blowing away spent plastic wads on the ground hardly missing anything off hand at around
20 yards.
Confession time now, I had yet to read any of the instructions as such but having had quite
a few rifles before this isn`t usually a problem. The air in the reservoir was what the gun had
arrived in. Once I got it home I put it away until such time as I could test the velocity etc,
over my chrono. The chance came soon enough and one day I spent a good couple of
hours indoors firing lots of shots and noting the FPS / ft lbs. There is a knurled ring on the right
hand side which alters the power; what I found rather odd is how easily this ring turns which
does not bode well for it staying put and not altering accidentally through rubbing against the
inside of the gunslip for example. Anyway I found that on the lowest setting the rifle gave
a near miraculous fps variation of just 3 fps (501 fps with 16.1 grain AiArms) or just under
9 ft lbs. The imprecise nature of the ring makes graduated clicks impossible but roughly
deviding the complete adjustment from lock to lock into 4, I found that on position 2 it gave
a ft lbs return of 24.5 ftlbs, 3/4 of the way it settled on just under 30 ft lbs and position 4
returned just over 34 ft lbs. My intention is to use the rifle at 30 ft lbs or position 3.
Other interesting observations were that on the low setting the rifle is extremely quiet,
perhaps not even needing a silencer, but on the higher setting it most definately could do
with a can of sorts. The so called in-built baffle is in my opinion just a nuisance as it has
rendered the rifle rather difficult to match up to the vast majority of silencers available. An
adapor is of course obtainable that would cure this but .....................................
I am currently awaiting the arrival of this adaptor and intend to test my rimfire unit on it.
This is a very short, yet highly effective unit I`ve had on my bolt action Brno for years, it
is also barely thicker than the thickish barrel on the AirArms so it`s looks should not be too
badly affected.
Another point worth mentioning is the trigger; this is very good indeed with 3 allen key
holes allowing pretty impressive alterations but what is annoying is that the un-cocked
action leaves the trigger in a state of floppy movement which is off putting on such a classy
outfit. Incidentally you can de-cock the action by holding the lever at it`s widest open point
and pulling the trigger but of course you must make sure that there is not already a pellet
in the chamber or you could risk doubling up next time you cock the rifle.
One thing I have yet to figure out is the +.......-- screw on the left of the rifle, I really can`t
see it`s purpose yet although I am sure someone will soon tell us.
The rifle is very easy to charge and despite the manual suggesting the accuracy of the
gauge should not be compared to that of the bottle, I found them to be identical in readout.
In terms of shots per fill obviously this will vary but I believe at 30 ft lbs you can get up to 30
good shots with a 20 fps variation from first to last. This is not brilliant in the context of a
tuned or top end regulated rifle but you have to remember this is much cheaper than the best
out there. One thing I did find was that as one noticed the fall off in velocity it is possible to
get a bit more oomph by turning the power ring back to it`s highest setting where perhaps
another 5-10 or so shots could be had close enough to the 30 ft lbs. I am looking forward to
a lot of rabbit and pigeon shooting with this outfit. :):D
a bit more wieldy and light.
The first impression in the gunshop was that it was well made for the money and light enough
without being too light as to make accurate off hand shooting difficult. Remember I had
ordered this without actually handling it so was delighted to find the lever cocking very nearly
as slick as my sub 12 ft lbs HW100. It comes to the shoulder nicely enough but there is still
that hint of nose heavy feel to it. Next I proceeded to fix my Simmons 6-24 x 50 on top only to
find that the mounts would not give the required clearence. Luckily as I was still in the
gunshop this was soon fixed with a pair of high Sportsmatch mounts which now have the
scope some 8mm away from the barrel. Obviously the handling changes dramatically with
such a heavy scope on top but it still feels a bit nose heavy.
Having bought a tin of AirArms 16.1 grain pellets I filled up the magazine easily enough and
went to zero the outfit. Surprisingly the 1st pellet landed on the A4 size cardboard I set up at
40 yards (about 8" low and some 4" right) - it is always nice when quick, rough turns of the
dials bring about a real POI difference. I would say I got the pellets on to the intended mark
within the first clip and thereafter was able to get a 5 shot group that could be covered with a
10p piece. Pretty good I think bearing in mind my rest was far from ideal and it being a brand
new rifle. The strange thing was that the first shot of the 3rd clip went massively low
indicating that the rifle had dropped well below its operating band so I spent the last few shots
blowing away spent plastic wads on the ground hardly missing anything off hand at around
20 yards.
Confession time now, I had yet to read any of the instructions as such but having had quite
a few rifles before this isn`t usually a problem. The air in the reservoir was what the gun had
arrived in. Once I got it home I put it away until such time as I could test the velocity etc,
over my chrono. The chance came soon enough and one day I spent a good couple of
hours indoors firing lots of shots and noting the FPS / ft lbs. There is a knurled ring on the right
hand side which alters the power; what I found rather odd is how easily this ring turns which
does not bode well for it staying put and not altering accidentally through rubbing against the
inside of the gunslip for example. Anyway I found that on the lowest setting the rifle gave
a near miraculous fps variation of just 3 fps (501 fps with 16.1 grain AiArms) or just under
9 ft lbs. The imprecise nature of the ring makes graduated clicks impossible but roughly
deviding the complete adjustment from lock to lock into 4, I found that on position 2 it gave
a ft lbs return of 24.5 ftlbs, 3/4 of the way it settled on just under 30 ft lbs and position 4
returned just over 34 ft lbs. My intention is to use the rifle at 30 ft lbs or position 3.
Other interesting observations were that on the low setting the rifle is extremely quiet,
perhaps not even needing a silencer, but on the higher setting it most definately could do
with a can of sorts. The so called in-built baffle is in my opinion just a nuisance as it has
rendered the rifle rather difficult to match up to the vast majority of silencers available. An
adapor is of course obtainable that would cure this but .....................................
I am currently awaiting the arrival of this adaptor and intend to test my rimfire unit on it.
This is a very short, yet highly effective unit I`ve had on my bolt action Brno for years, it
is also barely thicker than the thickish barrel on the AirArms so it`s looks should not be too
badly affected.
Another point worth mentioning is the trigger; this is very good indeed with 3 allen key
holes allowing pretty impressive alterations but what is annoying is that the un-cocked
action leaves the trigger in a state of floppy movement which is off putting on such a classy
outfit. Incidentally you can de-cock the action by holding the lever at it`s widest open point
and pulling the trigger but of course you must make sure that there is not already a pellet
in the chamber or you could risk doubling up next time you cock the rifle.
One thing I have yet to figure out is the +.......-- screw on the left of the rifle, I really can`t
see it`s purpose yet although I am sure someone will soon tell us.
The rifle is very easy to charge and despite the manual suggesting the accuracy of the
gauge should not be compared to that of the bottle, I found them to be identical in readout.
In terms of shots per fill obviously this will vary but I believe at 30 ft lbs you can get up to 30
good shots with a 20 fps variation from first to last. This is not brilliant in the context of a
tuned or top end regulated rifle but you have to remember this is much cheaper than the best
out there. One thing I did find was that as one noticed the fall off in velocity it is possible to
get a bit more oomph by turning the power ring back to it`s highest setting where perhaps
another 5-10 or so shots could be had close enough to the 30 ft lbs. I am looking forward to
a lot of rabbit and pigeon shooting with this outfit. :):D