My purpose in starting this thread is that it may become an inclusive/informative thread regarding pellet rifles. There is sure to have been one in the past, but i say lets get another one going. If you feel so inclined, please post your pellet rifle experiences, uses, and opinions. I hope to learn as much as i can with everyone else regarding this subject.

What do you use? What have you used in the past? Why have you gone with certain makes and models? Have you put any makes up never to use again? What pellets do you use? Scopes, accuracy issues, durability, and so on.

My current rifle is a Gamo Silent Stalker Whisper. When i first got my Gamo rifle i shot the pba platinum gamo pellets that came with it and were recommended. I really didn't like the high speed of the pellet. Long story short, three scopes and 3 pellet brands later i was freaking sick of the grapefruit sized groupings i always got at 25 yards. I also spent quite a bit of time stickly using the pos open sights that came on it. The open sight/scope option was why i chose the silent stalker whisper. Didnt know the sights were crap. So i put the gamo scope back on that it came with and went back to the pba platinum pellets. I will be darned if i didn't drop my groupings down to 1.5 ". Just gotta get over the crack it makes when i shoot it. Im going to keep using this rig, but im gonna branch out as well. Is accuracy always tied so closely to the pellet? What say the OB?


Thanks and Gig'em

Good idea to consolidate all the info in one place.

On a related note, I think Michael Myers liked shooting cowbirds too.

I still don't like to see anyone shoot birds for no reward but to kill them, I dove and quail hunt but I eat them.

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I still don't like to see anyone shoot birds for no reward but to kill them, I dove and quail hunt but I eat them.

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I sure wish I could kill all the damn mocking birds around

I shoot my airguns more than I shoot our extensive collection of firearms. Mostly because the majority of my airguns are suppressed, and I can shoot them in my own backyard or even in my shop when the weather turns bad. It's nice to get home from a long and busy workday and get a little trigger time in the evening. I have 10m guns (the kind used in the Olympics), Field Target guns, plinking guns, and guns for hunting small game. Most are from Europe, where the art of airgun design and manufacture is waaay ahead of the US.

I was planning to put up a post here on the OB that outlines the different airgun powerplants. It seems that whenever the subject comes up, there are those who have little to no knowledge of the many different types and calibers of airguns that are out there. In fact, most Americans have *no idea* about the types of airguns that originate in countries where firearms are harder to get and own, and sometimes near impossible to get or own.


We have PCP's from Daystate, Weihrauch, Airforce, Air Arms, Sumatra, Walther, FX, Benjamin, and Steyr. We also have spring-piston rifles from Weihrauch, Air Arms, RWS, Feinwerkbau, and Stoeger, along with single-stroke pneumatics from Walther, IZH, and FAS. Calibers are .177, .22, and .25 (no large-bore airguns). If the upcoming work week isn't too busy, I will try to put up a few pics.....

This thread is relevant to my interests.

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I still don't like to see anyone shoot birds for no reward but to kill them, I dove and quail hunt but I eat them.

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I sure wish I could kill all the damn mocking birds around

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I think there is a book that details how to do this...

I have a rough and limited understanding of that info, but thats pretty much it. I bet those guns are way better than a gamo. Looking forward to your posts. thanks

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I still don't like to see anyone shoot birds for no reward but to kill them, I dove and quail hunt but I eat them.

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I sure wish I could kill all the damn mocking birds around

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0130 and 0400, every morning, like clockwork.

I feel your pain.

Interested as well, I have a tree rat problem that needs some attention. Those *******s are getting in my barn and chewing on the open ceiling joists and making a huge mess on the things we have stored in there. I was actually at Academy this weekend looking at what they had to offer

I have a .22 cal Gamo whisper with the 3-9 scope that came with it on it. Usually shoot crow magnum pellets. Had it about 3 years now. Shoots great, accurate, and fairly quiet. No complaints or issues here.

I shot my cousins Air Arms tx200 in .22 caliber. & could not get enough of it! It is heavy and more for bench shooting than the type of use I put my old red rider through back in the day. (Walk around and shoot anything that moves)

That Air Force Condor and Condor SS are awesome looking things.

Air Force also has a Texan that is a .45 cal.

Although that is really big, I saw another brand has a .50 cal air gun.

EDIT to correct Falcon to Condor...... memory sux.

Well, it is against the law to kill songbirds in Texas, except invasive species, so there's that.

http://tpwd.texas.gov/huntwild/wild/rehab/protected/

So, saying on a public forum that you do kill them; probably not the best thing.

Things to know about spring-piston air rifles:


A spring-piston rifle is nothing more than a cylinder (the receiver) with a spring-powered piston. The spring is compressed by a lever, and once the trigger is pulled, the spring expands and the piston at the forward end compresses the air inside the cylinder. The compressed air is forced out the front end of the cylinder and into the back of the barrel where the pellet lies, and the pellet is then more or less squirted out the muzzle. Most inexpensive springers use the barrel itself as the compression lever. There are also rifles where the lever is a separate piece. The position of the lever can be under the barrel (Weihrauch HW97), or next to (RWS 48), above (Haenel), or below the receiver (Air Arms Prosport).


Springers have the advantage of being very simple to manufacture, so many are are very low in price. The disadvantage of a low-powered springer however is that the springs can be very "twangy", and this buzz and vibration has a negative effect on accuracy. The forward recoil generated by the sudden stop of the foward-moving piston also affects accuracy too. In general though, the more you spend, the less the vibration/twang. This vibration also makes springers picky about how they are held. Some prefer a very loose grip to exact the most accuracy, and some prefer a very solid hold. Even within the very same model, two different examples can have two different hold requirements. The spring-piston airguns are generally known to be the most difficult to shoot accurately, especially the low-end magnums.


The forward recoil of the piston also can have a detrimental effect on scopes. In fact, a high-powered springer can tear apart a high-end firearm scope within a few dozen shots if the scope is not rated for piston-gun use. Also, the scope mounts can often move under recoil too. If one is going to scope a springer, then specific mounts with a stop-pin that mates to the top of the receiver is needed in order to prevent what is known as "scope creep".


Airguns are known to often prefer one or two pellet types, and the springers are usually the most "pellet-fussy". Know that if your springer is not grouping well, you either have an issue with hold (tight, or loosely), pellet type, or a creeping scope. It can sometimes take a fair amount of investigation and trial/error to determine what is causing poor accuracy.


The most important thing to know about spring-piston rifles is the danger of the extremely powerful spring becoming uncompressed at the wrong time. Until the compression lever is returned to it's resting place after full spring compression, it is always attached the spring, and the spring is always attached to the lever. If the trigger is accidentally pulled or the sear is otherwise inadvertently disengaged, the spring will expand with great force, which causes the lever to suddenly and forcefully fly to it's closed position. This force is enough to crush your fingertip if you happen to be loading the pellet at the time. Magnum springers can pretty much amputate a fingertip. These types of airguns have been known to cause facial bone fractures as well, when the lever suddenly flies upwards and catches the shooter in the face. I cannot stress enough that spring-piston rifles should not be used by younger children, and must always be used with great caution by everyone. Always keep ahold of the broken barrel with the non-loading hand when loading a pellet into the bore. Also, if a break-barrel rifle is triggered off while the barrel is in the broken position, the force of the barrel slamming upwards to the closed position will bend the barrel upwards, often necessitating a barrel replacement.


The 2nd most important thing to know about springers is that you should NEVER dry-fire one. They are designed with the capping effects of the loaded pellet at the end of the air column, and this split-second cushion of air inside the cylinder and barrel allows the piston's foward speed to decrease slowly. If the pellet is absent, there is no compression, which means no cushion of air inside the cylinder. The piston then slams into the front of the cylinder. Even high-end springers can be torn apart by just a few dry-fires. Again, never ever dry-fire a spring-piston airgun.

hth,

C

Was given a Diana as a birthday present in high school. Hands down the best airgun I have ever shot. Accurate and overall quite.

Awesome stuff. C, in your opinion, is a $3-400 rifle cheap? What your thoughts on gamo? I think i already know the answer. And i was contemplating the hold type this eve. Went through a 3-4 shot sequence where i couldnt hit anything. I was just resting the barrel on something and not holding the stock tightly.

Airgun types for the novice:


Many "outdoors-types" know about the airguns (AG's) that are easily found at your local Walmart or Academy, but most Americans are not familiar with all of the different types out there. Many airguns originate in countries where it is very difficult to sometimes impossible to own a hunting firearm. In those countries, it is often easy to own an airgun, and it is these places that have developed airguns into very advanced designs.
The main types of AG actions are: spring/gas-piston, pre-charged pneumatics (PCP), single-stroke pneumatics (SSP), multi-stroke pneumatics (MSP), and CO2 guns. Springers have already been detailed above. This post is to detail the PCP's.


Pre-charged pneumatics:
These are airguns that have an on-board tank of compressed air. With a few rare exceptions, these tanks are either 3000 lb psi, or 4500 lb psi. The most powerful airguns are of this type. They are also in general the most expensive too. They come in single-shot and magazine-fed versions, and the magazine-fed versions come in bolt-action and semi-auto types. Bolts can be of the type like on a firearm, or a lever mounted on the side of the receiver. These are known as side-levers. Magazines are essentially like the cylinder of a revolver, and capacities can range from six shots such as seen in a .25 caliber Sumatra, to 19 shots such as seen in a Huben K1 (which also happens to be a semi-auto). PCP's come in calibers that range from .177 to .50.

PCP's can be charged by using a large compressed air cylinder such as a SCUBA tank, or 4.5k psi carbon-fiber tanks. There are also floor pumps that look like a bicycle pumps that are designed for airguns, and that amazingly reach 4.5k psi. These types of AG's tend to be expensive because of the systems needed to manage air at many thousands of pounds of pressure. Besides the parts such as you would find in a firearm, a PCP also has the tank and regulator systems that firearms don't have. This makes them a much more complicated piece of machinery than is a firearm, and which also makes them more expensive to manufacture. Also, many PCP's are manufactured to extremely high levels of workmanship and extremely fine tolerance levels, much moreso than the firearms you can find at your local Cabela's or Academy.

PCP's are as a whole the most accurate airguns. That is why all of the AG's you will see being used at the Olympics or World Cup are PCP's. They also make PCP's for general plinking, and for competition Field Target (FT) use, and for hunting. Some of the better low-end hunting PCP's comes out of Korea, where it is extremely difficult to own a hunting firearm. The best PCP's come from Germany (Anschutz, Feinwerkbau, Walther, Weihrach), England (Air Arms), Austria (Steyr), Sweden (FX), and a lone manufacturer in the US called Rapid Air Weapons. "Medium-level" PCP's come from the US (Air Force, Benjamin), Korea (Sumatra, JKHan, Evanix), Russia (Kalibrgun), Czech Republic (CZ), and few others I can't immediately think of.

A decent PCP to start with is the Benjamin Maurader, and for a bit more the Air Force Talon. These operate at lower pressures, so they can easily charged with an appropriate floor pump. The .177 Maurader also has the potential advantage of being very quiet due to having a shroud surrounding the barrel. The larger calibers are also shrouded too, and are reputed to also be fairly quiet for their power levels.

To be continued.......

C

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Was given a Diana as a birthday present in high school. Hands down the best airgun I have ever shot. Accurate and overall quite.

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My first good AG was a Diana 400, used for 10m target shooting. I used it when I first started shooting with a German competition-shooting club. I later moved up to a Feinwerkbau PCP, but I do think that for a beginner, the Diana 400 along with the FWB 300s are the best places to start.

BTW, Diana is also marketed in the US as RWS......

Benjamin Sheridan or GTFO

TexAgs sleuths on other boards have found your identity in other threads. Might want to recant your song bird slayings. There are some on these forums that have and will take it farther.

I am not one of them. But just sayin.

My bb gun does the trick in taking out rats and squirrels when I shoot them in the eye in my have a heart trap. Chew thru my wires will you!

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Awesome stuff. C, in your opinion, is a $3-400 rifle cheap? What your thoughts on gamo? I think i already know the answer. And i was contemplating the hold type this eve. Went through a 3-4 shot sequence where i couldnt hit anything. I was just resting the barrel on something and not holding the stock tightly.

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Thanks C4D. I wouldn't think a $3-400 rifle to be cheap, but certainly there are AG's that are much, much more expensive. Unfortunately in the US, the great majority of persons equate an airgun of any type to be a "BB" gun, so they look upon the high prices of European high-end AG's with great incredulity. I think the average person would think a $3-400 AG to be very expensive.

I don't own a Gamo - not because I don't like them, but because I am lucky enough to afford the rifles from Germany and England. But Gamo serves a purpose, and they along with the likes of CZ and Benjamin/Crosman have brought AG's to people who either cannot or will not spend the money for a high-end gun.

Resting the barrel of a springer on something while shooting is usually highly detrimental to accuracy. You will be better off resting the stock on something instead of the barrel. Not holding the stock tighly is often conducive to accuracy, although there are some springers that like to be held tightly. Air Arms TX200's and ProSports are generally thought to be the least hold-sensitive springers out there, and certainly my experience finds this to be true.

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pellet guns and other air guns are not legal for the take of any game bird or game animal other than squirrel. To be lawful for the take of squirrel, an air rifle must be designed to be fired from the shoulder and use the force of a spring, air, or other non-ignited compressed gas to expel a projectile of at least .177 caliber (4.5mm) at a minimum muzzle velocity of 600 feet per second.

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Don't forget to have your license and know your county's season.
http://tpwd.texas.gov/regulations/outdoor-annual/regs/animals/squirrel

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pellet guns and other air guns are not legal for the take of any game bird or game animal other than squirrel. To be lawful for the take of squirrel, an air rifle must be designed to be fired from the shoulder and use the force of a spring, air, or other non-ignited compressed gas to expel a projectile of at least .177 caliber (4.5mm) at a minimum muzzle velocity of 600 feet per second.

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Don't forget to have your license and know your county's season.
http://tpwd.texas.gov/regulations/outdoor-annual/regs/animals/squirrel

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Year round, no bag limit

Problem is, in Archer County we don't have hardly any squirrels

House sparrows and starlings are both invasive right?

Right.

I dont shoot song birds. Never have. I like song birds. I want song birds around. Never said i shoot songbirds. Through this thread i have learned a few things and will take them into account.

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I dont shoot song birds. Never have. I like song birds. I want song birds around. Never said i shoot songbirds. Through this thread i have learned a few things and will take them into account.

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The birders I know do not consider the cowbirds and sparrows you mentioned earlier to be songbirds. In fact, these two species are highly detrimental to songbirds.

I shoot a Eurolux BEC Magnum in .177 - paid about $350 for it about 10 years ago. I've never chrono'd it, but it was marketed as 1450 FPS. I've got a Barska 4x on it that was marketed specifically for air rifles. I routinely get a 1" group at 20-25 yards with just crossman hollow point pellets. It drops squirrels, rabbits, rats and grackles very well, but doesn't seem to phase an opossum.

I've probably run 6000 pellets through it over the years. I find that the accuracy does drop off about every 500 shots or so, so I bought a cleaning kit & I've changed out the spring once.

from the link posted earlier in this thread:

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European starlings, English sparrows, and feral pigeons may be killed at any time and their nests and eggs may be destroyed. A permit is not required to control grackles; cowbirds; yellow-headed, red-winged, rusty or Brewer's blackbirds; crows or magpies when these birds are considered a nuisance or causing a public health hazard

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The OP deleted the part of his post which specifically stated two species (bold) NOT normally considered songbirds but nevertheless the link specifies Starlings, English sparrows, and feral pigeons may be killed at any time and a permit is not required to control grackles, cowbirds etc when these are considered a nuisance or causing a public health hazard.

The very same poster that posted this link insinuated that OP was killing songbirds. WTF ?? And then gets three stars from other posters who are also not paying attention.

I would agree that we have to watch what might be inferred by what we post on here, but the OP was judged incorrectly and three others agreed with the verdict !

For Caladan or anyone in the know... What's the quietest 22 rifle I can get without getting a pcp rifle? Let's say the budget is under 500.

I took to OP to mean feral cats. Some people need to look up the difference in meaning between the words cultivate and cull.

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For Caladan or anyone in the know... What's the quietest 22 rifle I can get without getting a pcp rifle? Let's say the budget is under 500.

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The quietest will be the gas and spring-piston rifles that incorporate a barrel shroud or a suppressor. Keep in mind that they will still make a fair amount of noise, so I wouldn't call them "quiet". Not greatly noisy would be a more accurate description. Stoeger, Benjamin, and Gamo make these types.

There are a few low-powered and un-shrouded .22 springers out there too, but most are probably to low in power to make you happy. The Weihrauch HW50s is a very nice example.

A great place to see most of what is available is at the Pyramyd Air website. They are a great place to buy from, and they usually have a 10% off coupon code most days of the year. The code is not good on the high-end Euro stuff, but is good for most other things. If you decide to order from them, let me know and I will find out what the code is.