I bought this rifle on a bit of a whim off of a mate, who'd bought it brand new and put maybe 50 pellets through it before his wife had insisted that she didn't like him shooting. The price was right, c/w a 3-9x40 Richter scope, bag and a couple of tins of pellets. I was instantly taken with the looks and the way it handled. It's light, comes nicely to the shoulder with an attractive beech stock.
I was initially very taken with the very fast lock of the ram, and despite the fairly heavy but smooth cocking stroke it handled really nicely. First impressions are of a sharp and fairly violent recoil which seems to make it somewhat hold sensitive, and accuracy was a little disappointing, but I put this down to me being rusty having only recently returned to shooting.
However, by the time I'd put a few hundred pellets through it, the accuracy wasn't improving and the recoil was becoming literally tiresome. This is not a relaxing rifle to shoot! I was also finding the trigger hard to adjust and to adjust too. The first stage is very light, with the second stage requiring about 5lb of pull and the release being somewhat vague. Also the SE has a very straight trigger blade that combined with the weight of the pull left me feeling uncomfortable and not fully in control. Attempts to adjust the trigger resulted in a slightly lighter pull, but at the expense of making the trigger border on unsafe. Others seem to have no trouble with the trigger on these rifles so maybe it's just me, be I couldn't get on with it.
I made the decision to pull the rifle down to see if anything could be done (I know, it was still under warranty but I can't help fiddling!), and a number of issues were found.
The trigger uses a version of the new Gamo SAT unit, which is not surprising as these rifles are made for BSA by Gamo. However the trigger blade is different to accommodate the BSA safety up on the side of the action, rather than the Gamo type which uses a small lever in front of the trigger within the trigger guard. The Gamo trigger pivots on a separate steel pin whereas the BSA item has the pivots moulded in plastic integral with the trigger blade. These are showing signs of wear and distortion after only a few hundred shots. Revised blades which improve the pull weight and feel of the unit are available for the Gamo SAT, but the changes on the BSA version make these tricky, but not impossible, to fit.
The rifle was assembled with virtually no lubrication other than a film of light oil on the ram and the piston surfaces. Wear is already apparent on the inside of the body and the rear of the piston where the two bear together during the cocking stroke. Worse were the two small fragments of swarf that were embedded in the sides of the piston seal. These have caused scoring of the cylinder. I also noticed that the leading edge of the seal was damaged, presumably during assembly at the factory.
The barrel exhibits one of the faults that others have noticed, namely it is tight at the breech and the muzzle with virtually no effort being required to push a pellet down the majority of the rifling. Not good for accuracy!
I won't go into some of the design elements that make the rifle unpleasant to shoot, suffice to say there are some!
I really want to like this rifle, but until BSA address some of the issues, particularly with regards to manufacturing and quality control I think I'd have to conclude that your money may be better spent elsewhere.