El-cheapo Artemis PR-900 - the mule

[Racing]

On the contrary, i find it real interesting to notice the differences, and i bet we can all learn from comparing notes.
I´ll update on the PR-900 soon enough, and in turn there will shortly be posts on that P15 and on the Hatsan BT-65 of mine too.

To go hunt here all you do is pass a "hunters exam". This is handled by authorized examinators and with such a paper/exam in hand you get to apply for a permit for any hunting rifle. This permit is for life. This has been handled by our police, but ppl in general are starting to get REAL tired of their crap as far as permits, where a permit can take three months to get approved for no apparent reason what so ever. Just pure simple obstruction, in direct contrast vs what the law says. Quid pro quo i guess.
(Me i´ve just put in for a permit on an old blackpowder repeater.. since november, not a word yet. This for competition/target use only though as black powder is prohibited for use when hunting. TBH i don´t expect to hear one yota til february..)

As far as i´ve understood (?) in contrast to you guys in turn we still can own full caliber handguns, as well as full auto rifles for competition too. There´s approx 10 million of us and approx 2 million guns. Gone down quite a bit since the early 90´s when the same number was approx 4,5 million guns on permit.

Sweden is a vast country, and so is thus our outdoors. Hunting IS allowed on public land, it comes down to who gets the lease. In my case my former mother in law keep rather large areas so.. not an issue.
In turn i´ve got a piece of land for free to hunt boar not far from the shop and them critters have become a nuisance to the point where the residents just about pulls out the red carpet for hunters that show up.
Hunting is part of the Swedish essence however, so politicians and what have you not would 100% quickly be out of office for whoever dares even touching that.. Kind of like, "everyone" has had moose meat on the plate.. just take my word for it. Hunter or no, no matter.

I live on the southern west coast and around here the two species that form an "issue" is indeed wild boar and rough deer. They not only infest ppls gardens and what not (not to speak of farmers), they are WAY WAY over represented in traffic issues and what not too.

Sweden is a rather large country, as far as area, while there´s only 10mill of us. Up north you to this day can take a walk and walk for days without running into a living soul. That said go figure on wildlife



As for PCP i for one believe we´re just at the threshold of using them for hunting. Albeit we by tradition see most "air guns" as small caliber low on power guns/toys that IS changing and we see the advent of guns we´d never believe like just 10yrs ago. Very very exciting to be around to experience that! FX, to us, of course a big part of that. In country though there´s other rather known PCP builders/developers more than just Mr Axelsson and crew.

Here an example of that. To large part a rip off of the FX 2000 way back. Beautiful piece of kit though. It is an "AirGuns of Sweden". Aka AGoS short eight.





As far as i recall only 200 were made. That there No 19 and TBH i regret selling it.

As it looks right now however there´s a German fellow you might be aware of by the name of Jörgen Sprave. He runs the "Slingshot channel" on YT. In an effort to round German law (their firearms law are rather strict since WWII) he´s currently trying to get the Chinese made AEA Challenger bullpup 50 approved by German authorities as sub 7,5 Joule gun. This by the implement of a physical restriction by the air tank AND getting it approved to fire rubber balls!
I´m on that mailing list and the day it gets approved.. TAKE MY MONEY!
In "full steam spacemachine" mode that thing has been tuned beyond 1000J.. AEA at the moment spitting out new models like they were going out of style..
So yeah. I truly believe that PCP guns will become an ALTERNATIVE to powder burners in the near future. Around here you already can get a permit for one completely unrestricted, but as stated most simply don´t bother..
These guns are of course not abused, hence no issue. Regard them as "garden guns" of old times if you wish.

Ditto. As i wrote elsewhere my real pinpoint is blackpowder arms, and i compete with them and what not.
Britain. Again. What can i say? LOL
Don´t know how many of you that are that into your own firearms history, but suffice it to say that with the Whitworth rifle (and in fact a few Purdeys at the time) the schedule was redrawn. In one blow there in the mid/late 1850 you guys changed how we manufacture small arms for all time.
Went from being able to hit stuff at say 250 meters to be able to do it at 2000 yards. With a muzzle loader. So yes. I´m a lucky enough sod to own and campaign several such so called "451 era" rifles, the Whitworth being the crown of them i guess.

Well. Me blabbering amidst night!
So next Q i guess is self explainatory. What prey IS there in the UK as a whole?

[Shed tuner]

really interesting thread - also the laws and hunting stuff is very interesting too. One of my nephews lives in sweden, but he's not the hunting type, so all news to me.

In uK, rabbit is the bigest thing you'll shoot with an airgun. Going > 12 ft-lb doesn't change this, it just means you can shoot them from further away, and with more margin for error.

[MrGreengrass]

On the contrary, i find it real interesting to notice the differences, and i bet we can all learn from comparing notes.
I´ll update on the PR-900 soon enough, and in turn there will shortly be posts on that P15 and on the Hatsan BT-65 of mine too.

To go hunt here all you do is pass a "hunters exam". This is handled by authorized examinators and with such a paper/exam in hand you get to apply for a permit for any hunting rifle. This permit is for life. This has been handled by our police, but ppl in general are starting to get REAL tired of their crap as far as permits, where a permit can take three months to get approved for no apparent reason what so ever. Just pure simple obstruction, in direct contrast vs what the law says. Quid pro quo i guess.
(Me i´ve just put in for a permit on an old blackpowder repeater.. since november, not a word yet. This for competition/target use only though as black powder is prohibited for use when hunting. TBH i don´t expect to hear one yota til february..)

As far as i´ve understood (?) in contrast to you guys in turn we still can own full caliber handguns, as well as full auto rifles for competition too. There´s approx 10 million of us and approx 2 million guns. Gone down quite a bit since the early 90´s when the same number was approx 4,5 million guns on permit.

Sweden is a vast country, and so is thus our outdoors. Hunting IS allowed on public land, it comes down to who gets the lease. In my case my former mother in law keep rather large areas so.. not an issue.
In turn i´ve got a piece of land for free to hunt boar not far from the shop and them critters have become a nuisance to the point where the residents just about pulls out the red carpet for hunters that show up.
Hunting is part of the Swedish essence however, so politicians and what have you not would 100% quickly be out of office for whoever dares even touching that.. Kind of like, "everyone" has had moose meat on the plate.. just take my word for it. Hunter or no, no matter.

I live on the southern west coast and around here the two species that form an "issue" is indeed wild boar and rough deer. They not only infest ppls gardens and what not (not to speak of farmers), they are WAY WAY over represented in traffic issues and what not too.

Sweden is a rather large country, as far as area, while there´s only 10mill of us. Up north you to this day can take a walk and walk for days without running into a living soul. That said go figure on wildlife



As for PCP i for one believe we´re just at the threshold of using them for hunting. Albeit we by tradition see most "air guns" as small caliber low on power guns/toys that IS changing and we see the advent of guns we´d never believe like just 10yrs ago. Very very exciting to be around to experience that! FX, to us, of course a big part of that. In country though there´s other rather known PCP builders/developers more than just Mr Axelsson and crew.

Here an example of that. To large part a rip off of the FX 2000 way back. Beautiful piece of kit though. It is an "AirGuns of Sweden". Aka AGoS short eight.





As far as i recall only 200 were made. That there No 19 and TBH i regret selling it.

As it looks right now however there´s a German fellow you might be aware of by the name of Jörgen Sprave. He runs the "Slingshot channel" on YT. In an effort to round German law (their firearms law are rather strict since WWII) he´s currently trying to get the Chinese made AEA Challenger bullpup 50 approved by German authorities as sub 7,5 Joule gun. This by the implement of a physical restriction by the air tank AND getting it approved to fire rubber balls!
I´m on that mailing list and the day it gets approved.. TAKE MY MONEY!
In "full steam spacemachine" mode that thing has been tuned beyond 1000J.. AEA at the moment spitting out new models like they were going out of style..
So yeah. I truly believe that PCP guns will become an ALTERNATIVE to powder burners in the near future. Around here you already can get a permit for one completely unrestricted, but as stated most simply don´t bother..
These guns are of course not abused, hence no issue. Regard them as "garden guns" of old times if you wish.

Ditto. As i wrote elsewhere my real pinpoint is blackpowder arms, and i compete with them and what not.
Britain. Again. What can i say? LOL
Don´t know how many of you that are that into your own firearms history, but suffice it to say that with the Whitworth rifle (and in fact a few Purdeys at the time) the schedule was redrawn. In one blow there in the mid/late 1850 you guys changed how we manufacture small arms for all time.
Went from being able to hit stuff at say 250 meters to be able to do it at 2000 yards. With a muzzle loader. So yes. I´m a lucky enough sod to own and campaign several such so called "451 era" rifles, the Whitworth being the crown of them i guess.

Well. Me blabbering amidst night!
So next Q i guess is self explainatory. What prey IS there in the UK as a whole?

The BT65 is a really nice rifle , most underestimated here and one of my favourite guns.
As for the P900, i have one as well , used as a barn gun..pretty accurate as well and plenty of shots for a nights ratting.
The wife uses it for shooting rats in the garden.

[eyebull]

As for PCP i for one believe we´re just at the threshold of using them for hunting. Albeit we by tradition see most "air guns" as small caliber low on power guns/toys that IS changing and we see the advent of guns we´d never believe like just 10yrs ago. Very very exciting to be around to experience that! FX, to us, of course a big part of that. In country though there´s other rather known PCP builders/developers more than just Mr Axelsson and crew.

I've been surprised by how enthusiastically the Americans have taken to big bore airguns for hunting in the last decade - probably because they aren't considered 'firearms' under their law - and a lot of the development in this field seems to come from that direction these days.

So next Q i guess is self explainatory. What prey IS there in the UK as a whole?

As well as rabbits, pigeons, ducks, geese and farmed game animals such as pheasant and partridge, You have six species of deer; red, roe, fallow, sika, muntjac and chinese water deer. Wild boar are also increasingly on the menu.
Plenty to eat here

[Racing]

To me the Hatsans in general are rather "coarse" builds.
Built like tanks, and put together the same way.

That BT of mine sports a Lothar Walter barrel and there´s absolutely nothing at fault with the barrel. The install however.. so help me..
That barrel too handed a little TLC though has turned into a tac driver as well. No argument on that one, and a regulator has come to tame the gun down partly.
But.. in a separate post as mentioned. We´ll get there.

Airguns and hunting big game.
I could do that. I could certainly do that. Going after larger game with an airgun (read - PCP) with enough muzzle flip, sure. I for one believe that the current "king of the hill", the AEA Zeus in 72cal, is just the first of many to come.
As i shoot blackpowder arms as well i´m familiar with sending REAL heavy pills downrange and know fully what they can do. Here part of our law states that you can NOT use any form of full metal jacket (or similar), boolits has to be expanding for hunting purposes.

Then. I guess we don´t get "all american" about "dangerous game". Sure. Ppl get attacked by boars on occasion and especially the dogs used for boar hunting do, why more and more send their dogs into "combat" wearing bullet proof vests.
Some areas see more wolf than others, same deal. Kevlar vests for the mut does it. Then, the "limited" capacity of a PCP rifle in massive caliber.. yeah. Might be, but those that believe they need a 30 shot clip to go hunting never has.
Often times one hit is all it takes.

Ditto i wouldn´t mind blackpowder season either. To me it´s just a matter of putting up demands for the hunter to fulfill. That simple really, and could these blackpowder firearms be used to get prey times past they sure can today too.
An old muzzle loader might be just one shot.. all good, but then bring a modern day rifle as backup. Simple. A rather common such rifle around here is the "Wrede" (after Fabian Wrede - an officer with our armed forces at the time). A 50 cal gun that these days mostly get shot with minie style bullets out of pure lead. An approx 500 grain boolit that exits around 1300-1400fps when loaded up easy.

Anyways.
PR-900. Buddy bottle.
Have checked around a bit and the hard parts here are two fold. As is, at the power level it is now, i get 5 maybe 6 shots out of it in full power mode. For plinking that gets old fast, for ratting.. not so much and i DO love the sleek lines of that little rifle as it stands now believing that putting a buddy bottle on there of any sorts would ruin the lines of the thing.
Second up is what buddy bottle to get. The adapter is the easy part as i regard it. What i "see" is that parts of the stock tube is kept. The part with the valve more specifically.
After that though diameter, and thus volume, can be increased as far as i´m concerned and this mainly to add plenum volume. Guess 50cc´s would do it.
Then the adapter for the buddy bottle but.. most such with any appreciable volume seems to come in around 60mm diameter. That no small diameter thingy in my book.
Undecided on this, i really am. It´s a nice little rifle already where it is, it shoots very well (and hard) what´s more there to ask? In all honesty.

Would you guys ruin the lines of it for more air capacity seeing the level we´re at here or no?

[Shed tuner]

to suggest the really obvious... back off the hammer spring, choke down the port, get it down from 80J to 60J, you will probably double your shot count... unless you have 200kg rats, they will still be just as dead... down to 40J and you will double shot count again. For me, that energy level is the sweet spot for .22 PCP - around 30 FP.

Another option.. make a longer cylinder same diameter as the current one... even an extra 30mm will gain a few shots.

[Racing]

There you go how we differ.
My Impact at 100 is a downright extremely silent pussy cat. Seeing the onboard tube it gets shotstrings large enough no doubt no matter.
Hence the buddy bottle idea for the PR.

[Racing]

Yeah yeah, i know. Not a sub 12 gun.
Worth mentioning though is that today that PR-900 really blew a new hole as far as what gives.

I pulled a number of small jobs and if it´s one thing i´ve learned with PCP´s it is that attention to detail pays off. Ergo...

Since last i got me an FX radar too as you can see, and for the most part the FX jobbie and the LabRadar is about on par (always good to know i guess).
So.
Loaded the clip up with 25,4 grain ,217" JSB Knockouts and fired away.

First shot was 1072fps. Left me looking like damn fool!
So.. full of disbelief second round..
1078fps.
Say WUT?
Third round.
1080 fps... and from thereon just plummet down of course, seeing the limited tube volume. About LICKING "the wall". From an approx 220 bar fill.

1080fps with 25,4 grain pills out of the stock 460mm barrel. Yeah. I´m done. That simple, i´m done.

What very well might happen though is a larger tank. Gun really screams for it. Checked the dimensions involved and i BELIEVE i can get away with a scarf joint heading into a 32*2mm steel piece of pressure tubing..
That would render an approx 350cc tank, which i guess would be more appropriate seeing what this gun´s made of.

[Shed tuner]

do you reckon it'll be enough for the rats ?