Quote Originally Posted by ballisticboy View Post
The effects of winds and the longer range problems with spiral flight etc. were not considered.
But the working assumption would be that those issues are likely to be worse with tin, zinc, etc, compared with lead?

Not to mention the challenge in a - hopefully long? - transition period in the U.K. in which unlicensed guns must stay below the 12/6 limit with the most efficient lead ammunition, and would therefore be carrying less energy (or shedding it more quickly over distance) with non-lead, affecting effective hunting ranges.

And, setting accuracy aside, this would be with a less deformable projectile. Personally, I think projectile deformation at, at least, subsonic velocities without complex design (eg Hydra-Shocks and other clever pistol-range JHPs) is often over-estimated as a factor across small arms, and is largely irrelevant to head shots on typical airgun quarry, because they are head shots, but others differ.

So, sub-12, and at “normal” distances, you appear to be looking at less precision, lower impact energy, and lower potential wound ballistics. And use of a larger calibre, reducing effective range, both by loopier trajectory and reduced precision.

A sensible approach would be to consider the impacts on public health, safety, animal welfare etc of less effective airguns versus more poison, trapping, shotguns, rimfire and so on.