FX wildcat/impact - disapointments.

[p.j.]

Thinking of getting one of the two.

Good chance at the Midland to try both on the range - seemed the sensible thing to do.
First up the Impact, poor chap couldnt fill the mag, said it was a old worn one. Got the new one out, which filled up OK, but needed a huge amount of pressure to fit into the gun. Next the shooting, it would fire a couple of pellets then the trigger would lock up because my finger seemed to brush against the safety catch. I must confess I didnt feel it brush but that was the explanation.
Next the Wildcat. The magazine would not index after each shot, it would cock but then the bolt wouldnt close, the mag needed to be indexed manually which needed a fair bit of pressure.
The point here is that these guns were provided by ASI next door to the range,and was meant to show case the product, no one would buy one of these based on the examples provided for use. Im hoping these were the exception, but fear it may be the rule.
With these facts in mind, my wallet will held securely in my pocket, Was tempted by the Steyr hunting 5A though

[clunge]

As a Wildcat mag is first inserted, it needs to be clicked to the next slot.

In a demo rifle, if the supervisor omits to tell the punters to do this (it takes about 0.1 seconds), then the probe and/or indexing arm is likely to eventually get bent or blunted, causing the failures you described.

Also the mag doesn't like taking or feeding flathead (eg RWS Hobby) pellets.

[p.j.]

In this case the supervisor was doing all the loading/inserting. Maybe bent by someone else, but still sort it out before it goes out for public use.

[clunge]

If the mag needed a fair bit of pressure to manually index, then there was, indeed, something wrong with the rifle. EDIT: Unless the pellets were not seated properly, which is another possibility.

[junglie]

If the mag needed a fair bit of pressure to manually index, then there was, indeed, something wrong with the rifle.

Oh dear, not good in guns costing that much to buy, maybe we could excuse it in cheap £300 chinese pcp's but remember the slating the bsa R10's got for early reliability issuse(I was one of the critics too!) Why isn't there more threads about fx problems? (probably because there isn't as many buyers because of the price is my theory)

[Bunny Reaper]

I was looking at one of these, but was put off by the info from several rfd's. I'm glad I asked them, as the youtube vids I watched don't really cover any of the issues. I even asked fx if they would supply one with a left side lever on the right-hand frame, but so far no positive response. Really think I'll stay away for the time being. Shame, as they look a nice rifle once sorted. Just can't justify spending all that money to spend even more to get it right

[where's it gone]

I've never had any problem what so ever with my Bobcat mk2. Ok, the mag is a bit fiddly, compared with other makes of guns, but you soon get the hang of it.

[Rich]

Steyr Hunting 5 SA mag, no moving parts. It just works.

Give in to the temptation, you will not be disappointed.

[Brooksy]

If you look at the Blackpool Air Rifles website, they're just about sick of problems with the FX range.

[artschool]

I desperately wanted to buy a FAC impact.

I even had a variation to my certificate in readiness.

all the bad press and reviews stopped my plans.

[MartynB]

Just can't justify spending all that money to spend even more to get it right

Spend that sort of money and you would rightly expect it to work !

[riku]

Spend that sort of money and you would rightly expect it to work !

Some tuners in US are very busy with this gun. Why you'd have to send that expensive gun to a tuner is beyond me.