Just looked at the title of this thread and remembered a 'Guns and Ammo' US Magazine (still going) article from about 1977 with the airgun as a home defence weapon !!!!!

seemed to remember the BSA Scorpion and Webley Premier were the favoured tools.

Strange really as the Americans, even then, were in .44 magnum ' make my day' territory whilst us over the pond were struggling to reach 12ft /lbs with German technology .

My Airsporter of the day ( Mk4 or Mk5 .22 was 10 ft/lbs on a ballistic pendulum) until I bought a S/H BSF B55 .177 from MAG and put an export spring in .

No matter how much money you had in 1977 ( I was 15) the top of the range was a FWB 124 / 127 ( £86) plus an Apel OPM and a Tasco 2-7 x 32 about £30.

How times have changed