Anyone else got a Gamo Shadowmatic?

[capt hindsight]

Had my .177 for years, its not had that much use but I've revisited it recently and finally fitted a lightweight low magnification scope.

I generally loaded pellets into the barrel directly but now want to start using the tube magazine alongside flathead pellets as a short range garden gun, zeroed at 18 yards.

These rifles are very pellet fussy with domed pellets tending to jam into the skirt of the pellet in front and most non flathead pellets pick up damage as they cycle into the pop up breach.

I have RWS Hobby pellets that cycle through the magazine ok but are very slightly too long for the breach but to be fair they don't get squashed or chopped as the break barrel action is cycled to automatically reload the next pellet.

But the barrel doesn't like the Hobbys and they don't group that well. So I'm after trying an alternative flat head pellet, preferably slightly shorter than the Hobby and still cycle through the action without getting chopped.

Anyone still got any experience of these guns, if so which pellets did you find worked nicely?

Cheers Ed

[max29aug]

I managed to buy a new gamo shadowmatic about 5 years ago ,new old stock ,somewhere in Sheffield I think ,I did sell it onto Relum off here and from memory was not a bad bit of kit.

[capt hindsight]

Finally found some pellets that it likes; Rws R10 match. Cycles great and nice tight groups at 20 yards, which is the distance that seems to suit this lightweight rifle. Thank you to Geoff Wilsons in Carlisle for kindly giving me a half used box of R10's to try out. Just in case anyone ever searches out the same problem; Bisley Practice are a close second. Interestingly the Bisley produced 9.4 ft/lbs and the R10's only 8.5 ft/lbs, but the latter definitely gave a tighter group.