Posts Tagged ‘accuracy’
Quackenbush .308: Part 2
by B.B. Pelletier
Quackenbush .308 is handsome even in this lowest-grade version.
Today’s report will be quite different from the norm. This is Part 2, which is normally where I test velocity. I did that, and you’ll see it in today’s report — but you’ll also see some targets, because I tested accuracy, too.
When I test a smallbore pellet gun, I know at the start how the gun should perform, more or less. Yes, there are some surprises; and yes, I do make some mistakes — but a lot of what happens can be predicted pretty accurately. But not a big bore!
With a big bore airgun, I’m almost starting from scratch. Sometimes, I will have tested something similar and can use that experience as a starting point, and there’s some of that in today’s report; but this .308 rifle is unlike any other big bore air rifle I’ve ever tested. There are more .308 lead bullet designs and bullet molds available than there are .177 pellet types on the market. Out of all that, I have to select some designs that make sense.
This is where my firearms experience comes in handy, and this is the reason I often run reports on firearms in this blog: learning the intricacies of this Quackenbush rifle is exactly like figuring out how a new black powder rifle operates. And I don’t mean some ultra-modern, bolt-action black powder rifle that uses replica powders in pellet form, either. I mean a real black powder rifle made by hand and has to be figured out as you go.
So, how do you start testing a gun when you don’t know much about it? Well, you start with what you do know and go from there.
I know that other Quackenbush Long Action Outlaw guns operate at pressures above 3,000 psi, so I’ll start with a higher fill pressure. I know that this rifle will be in the 200-250 foot-pound range with bullets it can stabilize, so I’ll select them first. I know that by reading what others have written about their .308 rifles.
I also know that Quackenbush rifles have to break in. They do get faster with use. So, I’ll look for that.
Furthermore, since this is a big bore air rifle operating at a very high level of performance, it’s going to use a lot of air. I know how much air the Korean guns like the .50-caliber Dragon Claw use, and I know that this rifle is going to use even more. So, even an 88 cubic-foot carbon fiber air tank is going to get drained in a hurry.
I cast bullets for many of my firearms, and I also happen to own a bullet mold for a nice spitzer (pointed) lead bullet that was designed for the M1 Carbine. It casts at around 130 grains, which is an ideal weight for this rifle, because the expected velocity (derived from the known power that has been published by other .308 owners) will be 850-950 f.p.s. on the first shot. I calculate this velocity range by taking the expected power (say 225 foot-pounds) and running it through the Pyramyd Air velocity calculator (use the second formula on the page to do this).
The issue here is bullet stability. These bullets are stabilized primarily by the spin imparted by the rifling in the gun. The longer a bullet becomes, the faster it must spin in order to stabilize. Since you cannot change the twist rate of the barrel, you have to drive the bullet faster to stabilize it. Sometimes, though, you’ll get away with shooting targets that aren’t too far away with a longer bullet. The bullet will be semi-stable for the first 40-50 yards or so. It all depends on the bullet’s length.
The bullets I shot are like the one at the center of this photo. At the right is that same bullet with the lubricant wiped off. At the left is a 170-grain lead bullet that’s normally too heavy for this rifle. However, for close work, it might work okay. That bullet normally takes a copper gas check, but it can be shot without one.
That velocity will give a fairly flat trajectory and stability to the 130-grain bullet as far as the rifle can be accurately shot — which is about 200 yards. But consider this: this bullet is just one of over 200 different lead bullets that are appropriate for this rifle! If you really want to experiment and push the envelope, that number grows to over 500! Nothing guarantees that this will be the one right bullet. It’s just the first one I tested.
Scope troubles
Before I went to the range, I mounted a scope on the rifle. I encountered problems right away because of how far the Weaver bases are set apart on the rifle’s action. They are so far apart that I cannot mount the leapers long eye relief scope I had planned to use, because the ring separation exceeds the scope’s tube length. This is where it gets dicey because of the scopes that were available; and the Weaver rings I had that were not committed to other tests and guns. I ended up with a set of high rings and an Osprey 2.5-10×40 scope that I don’t care for. More on that, later.
So, I get to the range and the day is pretty good. The wind is fairly calm, with just a few breezes I can wait out. Besides, I’m shooting a .308 130-grain bullet at 50 yards. The wind doesn’t affect it nearly as much as it would a pellet!
First fill
The gun’s first fill is a guess. I know my .458 Outlaw likes a 3,500 psi fill, so I go with 3,600 psi for this one. I’m looking for a couple things. First, how fast does the first shot go? Second, how fast do shots two through whatever go? That’s right — I don’t even know how many powerful shots I’m going to get from this rifle. If it were a 9mm Korean gun, that number would be 5-7. But a Quackenbush .308 is more powerful and uses a lot more air. My .458 gets two good shots per fill, so there’s a very good chance this one will, too.
Before I left the house, I oiled the striker (hammer) with high-tech gun oil. I oiled it again at the range. I know that all big bore guns need to break in to shoot their best. Then, I filled the rifle to 3,600 psi and started shooting:
Shot……..Vel.
…1……….857
…2……….816
…3……….777
…4……….730
The first few shots were over the chronograph. Then, I commenced shooting for accuracy at 50 yards. You can see how high the scope sits above the receiver.
Okay, those are the first four shots. If I’m looking for good groups at 50 yards with this bullet, only the first two shots look good. If I’m demonstrating the rifle to a bunch of Boy Scouts, I can probably continue shooting for another couple shots. Do you see what I’m doing? I’m calculating things based on what kind of shooting I expect to do.
And shot one generates 212.06 foot-pounds of muzzle energy. Shot two makes 192.26 foot-pounds.
I also noted that when I went to fill the reservoir again, the gun still had about 1,900 psi inside. Four shots used up 1,700 psi, or about 425 psi per shot. The Korean big bores use around 200 psi per shot, so that gives you a good idea of how they compare to a Quackenbush Long Action.
Next, I sighted-in the rifle. Because the Quackenbush Long Action does not allow the bolt to be removed easily at the range, I used a target paper that’s two feet by four feet. The point of aim is close to the center of the paper. That gives me a good chance of striking somewhere on the paper at 50 yards. If this were a smallbore airgun, I would have started at 10 feet, as I explain in my article about sighting in a scope; but you can’t do that with a gun this powerful unless you own a lot of private land. I’m on a club-run rifle range, and I have to obey their regulations. I’m hoping to get on paper without boresighting. I do own a boresight device, but it has only bore spuds that go up to .22 caliber, so it wouldn’t work in a .308.
I’m in luck, because the first shot hits the paper…about two feet below my aim point. Well, that isn’t as lucky as you might think. Remember the Osprey scope I mentioned earlier? Well, it has 1/8 MOA (minute of angle) adjustments. At 50 yards, every click will move the strike of the round about one-sixteenth of an inch! For two feet, I’ll have to move the elevation knob up 16 x 12 x two, which is 384 clicks! There probably aren’t that many clicks in this scope, plus I don’t know how far up it already is. I have a droop problem!
I’ll replace this scope and mounts for the next test, which means I’ll have to sight-in and do this all over again. But today is not lost. I can still continue to test the gun. I adjust the scope up so the round lands about 14 inches below the aim point, and that’s how I will test the gun today. It’s simple enough to staple two targets to the backer in line with one another, so I can aim at the top one and hit the lower one. Now, we can see how this rifle shoots with this bullet.
The only problem is — all I have are bullets that have been sized and lubricated. I know that Quackenbush big bores seem to do best with dry lead bullets, or at least that’s been my experience up until now, but I’ll use the bullets I have on hand. I will have to cast some more bullets and not lubricate them for the next test.
Accuracy
Shot one went about 14 inches below the point of aim, as mentioned already. Shot two dropped another several inches, but I compensated for it by using the tip of the bottom fat vertical duplex reticle line as a different aim point. So, I’m able to get a fair grouping of bullets, though it’s nothing I am satisfied with, yet. I’m able to shoot six bullets into a group measuring 1.6 inches by shooting just two shots per fill and using the two aim points. After shot two, the gun’s remaining pressure is about 2,700 psi, so the first two shots use about 900 psi — which works out to 450 psi per shot. Do you see how this stuff works?
Two bullets in the hole on the left, and you can see the rest. Three of them were first shots after a fill, and three were second shots. This group measures 1.6 inches between centers.
I then moved over to another set of targets and tried something different. I tried refilling after the first shot — so every shot would be going the same speed and I could use the same aim point. This time, four of the five shots grouped into 0.982 inches, but the fifth shot opened it to 1.767 inches. It looked like it was going to be better, but once again, no cigar.
There are three bullets in the large hole on the left. Shot four (top) opened the group to just under one inch, but the fifth shot opened the group to almost 1.75 inches.
After shooting at two different targets, I lubricated the striker again and chronographed the gun. This time, I tried to fill the reservoir higher than 3,600 psi, but my carbon fiber tank had already dropped to 3,600 psi. I had to stick with that as the highest fill pressure.
Shot……..Vel.
…1……….867
…2……….819
…3……….772
…4……….733
As you can see by comparing this second string to the first one, my rifle seems to be performing at the same level, more or less. That does not tell me whether 3,600 psi is the highest operating pressure or not, but it’s a good indication that the rifle either needs a lot more shots through it or it’s already broken in. I’ll have to get my carbon fiber tank refilled before I can conduct another test at a higher fill pressure.
And just for continuity, the first shot generated 217.04 foot-pounds. Shot two generated 193.67 foot-pounds.
Where to next?
If you’re as curious as I am, these results open up a lot of possibilities. For starters I want to test the gun at a higher fill pressure. I also want to shoot dry bullets, but I think I need to clean and dry the bore before I do. I can’t clean the lubricated bullets well enough to consider them dry, so I have to cast another batch.
I definitely have to mount a different scope in lower rings, and I have to be prepared to elevate the rear mount if the rifle turns out to be a drooper. All I know at this point is that I had the scope adjusted very high, which very well could have lead to the groups being as large as they were.
I have a feeling that this rifle will shoot groups smaller than one inch once I learn its secrets.
A tale of two Daisy 25 BB guns
by B.B. Pelletier
Announcement: Rick Ruth is this week’s winner of Pyramyd Air’s Big Shot of the Week on their facebook page. He’ll receive a $50 Pyramyd Air gift card! Congratulations!
Rick’s shooting his Crosman Quest spring-piston breakbarrel rifle. Since this photo was taken, Rick says he’s replaced it with an RWS 34 springer and says it’s a much better gun.
Today, Vince takes us through a test between a vintage Daisy No. 25 pump-action BB gun and its modern equivalent. In his usual distinctive way, Vince shows us how much has changed through the years, as well as what’s remained the same.
If you’d like to write a guest post for this blog, please email us.
Now, take it away, Vince!
The Daisy 25 pump BB gun, despite the endeavors of the popular-but-technically-flawed movie, A Christmas Story, remains in many ways the iconic Daisy. In my mind, it’s forever thus enshrined. I can still remember one sitting in my uncle’s basement gun cabinet — and that somehow, in comparison, my cousin’s Red Ryder and my own Daisy model 1894 looked distinctly toy-ish. Maybe it was the wooden pump handle and way the really long cocking arm blended into the front of the triggerguard. Perhaps it was the duck hunting scene pictured on the action. WOW — you could hunt DUCKS with that thing!
I never got to try out that particular gun, and it wasn’t until about 5 years ago that I finally got my hands on a used No. 25 from Gunbroker — which was promptly returned to the seller. “Good working order” is not an accurate description when the shot tube is missing.
The NEXT one I got was a plastic-stocked gun from the mid-50s, I think, and I FINALLY got to shoot one. It was all over the place. And I mean ALL OVER THE PLACE. Accuracy was poor, even by BB gun standards. Off it went to its next appreciative owner.
A short time later, I was meandering through a local sporting goods store and saw — GASP! — a brand new No. 25 on the shelf. The price was under $40, so I bit.
I got it home, and even though the gun followed the design of the No. 25 rather faithfully, somehow it didn’t quite seem right. Don’t know if was the Chinese paint, the Chinese metalwork, the Chinese wood or the Chinese plastic trigger with safety or just the fact that it said “MADE IN CHINA” on the gun. But it didn’t seem to be a real No. 25; and, even though it didn’t shoot badly, it never seemed much different than a contemporary Red Ryder.
So this latest version of the venerable No. 25 went quickly back to sitting on a shelf. A while later, however, ANOTHER No. 25 came into my hands. This one was a very early one, this — an Alpha to compliment the Omega I already had. Well, not QUITE the Alpha, but darned close – manufacturing details seem to place this gun between 1916 and 1924.
Gee. Now I’ve got a pair of No. 25 BB guns at the extreme ends of the manufacturing spectrum, their births being separated by something like 90 years and 12,000 miles. It sure sounds like a comparison test has been decreed by the Fates, and far be it from me to oppose those irresistible cosmic forces.
Two Daisy No. 25 BB guns. The new one in front looks longer because of the camera’s perspective. They’re the same length.
What is it with the Chinese and that orange-colored wood? They’re virtually identical in length at 37 inches. Oddly enough, the newer one is heaviest at 3.50 lbs., with the old one coming in 7 oz. lighter. That extra length in the cocking arm has something to do with it. The old one is blued, while the newer one is painted.
Given their disparity in origin there are going to be some detail differences. A couple show up in the top rear view of the actions.
Top view of both actions shows the differences in the sights and their placement. The newer gun (bottom) also has a backstrap that the vintage gun lacks.
The old one has a ramp-adjutable rear sight that sits a bit further away from the shooter’s eye, which makes it easier to focus. The new one is screw-adjustable, and it flips to present either a notch or a peep sight to the shooter. Another obvious addition is the additional strap extanding from the rear of the action to the top of the stock’s pistol grip. I imagine Daisy had some cracking issues to handle. [Editor's note: This strap was added to the 1930 version of the gun that was just prior to the engraved 1936 version. Once added, Daisy never removed the strap again, despite there being 20 years before plastic stocks replaced wooden ones.]
The pump handle on top is on the original short-throw pump linkage that’s held to the barrel by a steel clamp. The linkage on the new model is anchored by a spot-weld.
Speaking of handles
The handle on the newer gun is further forward. This was done when they lengthened the cocking arm (in the 1920s, I believe) to reduce cocking effort. On our examples, there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference. Other detail differences include the mounting of the front pump handle guide and the shape of the fixed front sight.
Although I’m not planning to do a teardown as part of this writeup, I can show you the shot tubes, since they’re regularly removed anyway. The shot tubes are the true barrels of the No. 25. They screw into the outer sheetmetal housing that most people refer to as the barrel.
The shot tubes look somewhat different, but actually can be interchanged.
They load the same and work the same, but obviously are made a bit differently and certainly don’t look interchangeable — there’s a cast metal breech base on the newer one.
Finally, we can see what the plain actions looked like before Daisy started decorating them. Details in the triggerguard and trigger construction are pretty obvious, especially the addition of that ungainly safety on the newer one.
The right side of the two actions shows an interesting comparison. The newer trigger (bottom) is certainly the feature that stands out the most.
Let’s start shooting
OK, tour’s over. If I’m gonna shoot these things, I need to shoot something through them — and they do have different appetites. The old one is strictly for lead shot only. If I load it, steel shot will probably come out the other end — but the feed and holding mechanism relies on the softness of the lead, and using steel shot will likely booger things up. Specifically, this rifle was made for the old .175″ air rifle shot that Daisy used to market.
Key phrase being “used to.” Daisy doesn’t make it anymore, and it was suggested to me that the closest thing we have today seems to be Beeman Perfect Rounds, which just happen to measure .0.175″ across. Picking food for the modern one is easy — it’s a Daisy, so it gets Daisy zinc-plated BBs. Tom has found them to be the better ones these days, and I’m generally finding the same thing myself.
I’m using the normal 15 foot BB-gun distance, and firing three groups of 5 shots each:
Two sets of groups — the vintage 25 on the left and the new gun on the right. Vintage gun groups measure 1.41 inches, 1.41 inches and 1 inch. New gun groups measure 0.70 inches, 1.28 inches and 1.38 inches.
Not too much difference, really, other than the lead BB’s are easier to score. In fact, it’s the newer gun that averages slightly better. That’s a bit of a surprise, as the older gun certainly shows a nicer sight picture to my eye because the rear leaf is further away — and I really think that the Beeman Perfect Rounds are more uniform than Daisy BBs. For these reasons, I would have expected more consistent grouping from grandpa.
One nice thing about the newer Daisy is the way the rear sight flips from a leaf to a peep. Will that tighten the groups?
Shooting the new gun with the peep sight instead of the rear notch didn’t improve the groups. They measure 1.05 inches, 1.60 inches and 1.45 inches.
The peep sight doesn’t really make things better. In fact, they’re slightly worse than the groups shot with the rear notch sight. The notch is the best to use for me.
Now, let’s skip back to those lead BBs in the older gun. As I said, I was expecting them to be more accurate. Heck, they sure oughta be, given their price. And how much more expensive are they? I have no idea, because they seem to be discontinued. They ARE available direct from H&N, however — but they’re $16 per 500. Crazy indeed, because you can still buy .22LR ammo for that price. [Editor's note: Gamo .177-caliber round lead balls are still available for a lot less than the H&N balls.]
This leaves me with one more thing I gotta try. Let’s say you have a vintage 25 just like I have, and you want to shoot it with some sort of frequency. Or you let your grandson try it, who then lets the can of round lead balls slip out of his hand and empties your 3-cents-a-shot ammo into the grass. There’s no doubt about it — if you’re gonna use a BB gun the way BB guns were intended to be used, you’re gonna go broke unless you have stock in the lead forming industry. So, why not just use steel BB’s?
As Tom explained it, the old shot tubes have a “pinch” in the tube near the breech that would keep the shot from rolling out when the muzzle is pointed down. If we switched to steel ammo, it would probably work for a while, but eventually we’d run the risk of that pinch being worn down. Do we REALLY want to risk an irreplaceable part on an antique BB gun, just so we can temporarily save a few bucks on BBs?
But there’s another solution, because neither Daisy nor the Chinese really have a vested interest in altering things just for the heck of it. Obviously, the shot tube assemblies from each gun LOOKS different, and some construction details have changed. But what happens when you actually try to screw the tube from the newest gun into the old one?
It may look odd, but using the new shot tube on the vintage No. 25 allows you to use cheap steel BBs.
You get what’s called “a perfect fit.” Yup…100 years apart in design, and not even the 7/16″ National Coarse thread at the bottom of the tube has changed. Time to see how this works.
Three groups with the vintage gun using the new shot tube and steel BBs. Groups are sized 1.55 inches, 0.90 inches and 1.20 inches.
As you can see, it’s slightly worse than the newer gun with this same tube, but so close as to be virtually identical. And it’s still slightly better than the original tube with Beeman ammo. Best of all, the gun fed and fired flawlessly.
I did a chrony comparison of these guns and found that that the early model seems to have lost some of its zing. Shooting it with the lead balls gave me the following numbers:
Shot..Vel.
…1….219
…2….216
…3….219
…4….216
…5….212
…6….214
…7….212
…8….210
…9….206
…10..200
The new one (shooting much lighter steel BBs) is better, but still under the advertised velocity of 350 fps:
Shot..Vel.
…1….319
…2….301
…3….319
…4….315
…5….318
…6….311
…7….310
…8….314
…9….320
…10..317
So, exageration is hardly unique to air rifle manufacturers! Lastly I tried the old gun with the new shot tube:
Shot Vel.
…1….304
…2….301
…3….302
…4….294
…5….304
…6….302
…7….297
…8….299
…9….299
…10..294
In both strings with the old gun, we see a very definite downward curve in velocity the more it’s shot. Not sure why that is; and given the gun’s age, I’m not entirely surprised. Could be the seal or the spring — but it matters little, as it won’t be seeing too much use.
So, there you have it. The old gun, firing precision ammunition a gazillion times more expensive than cheap BBs is no more accurate than a new one. The old gun, with an old spring and an old seal, might not have the power of the new one. The old gun can be updated with new parts to shoot cheap BBs, but it won’t shoot much different from a new one when you do that.
From all this, you can draw your own conclusions. It’d be easy to say “Wow! Home run for Daisy!” and pat them on the back for bringing this model back to life. And, from a cursory glance at the innards, it’s obvious that this really IS a genuine Model 25, with an internal design substantially unchanged in almost a century. If shootin’ fun is what you’re after, this one gives away nothing to the vintage model.
But is there more to it than that? For me, I can say that it’s pretty obvious that the new gun has certainly succumbed to some serious homogenization. Compared to, say, a contemporary Red Ryder, there’s just no personality to differentiate it…not even a cosmetic one, really. The metalwork, the cheesy wood finish (cheddar, specifically) and price are all in the same ballpark. Couldn’t they stain the wood a nice, dark brown? Or up the power a bit? Or SOMETHING? I know there has to be a lot of commonality among products like this, but come on — whatever happened to the virtues of “diversity”?
But this is getting a bit off-topic. The new Model 25 is a decent BB gun, and functionally gives away nothing to the old one. If you can get past the compromises that seem to be imposed by the current manufacturing climate, there’s no reason not to enjoy it.
[Editor's note: One thing strikes me about the velocities Vince got. The vintage Daisy No. 25 seems to be performing like it's lacking oil. Or at least that's how an old gun behaves when it needs to be oiled. No doubt, it's a bit tired after all those years, but Vince: Did you oil the gun before testing?]
Learning to shoot with open sights: Part 4
by B.B. Pelletier
This series began with the earliest sights that were both primitive and simplistic. Then, we looked at the evolution of peep sights, starting back before 1840 and progressing to around 1903.
There’s a lot more to be said about both open and peep sights. It was at this point in time that they each began to develop along separate lines. I think I need to concentrate on one type of sight per report to keep things straight. In today’s report, I’ll look at open sights from around the middle of the 19th century until today.
Open sights evolved rapidly after the American Civil War, which ended in 1865. Not that all the innovation was done in the U.S., mind you, but that was a time when the world of firearms was advancing though technological stages, and the sights kept pace with everything. Other wars around the world at the same time drove the armies of many nations to push the limits of firearms; and we got smokeless gunpowder, fixed cartridges, breechloading arms and eventually repeating firearms from this era.
In 1850, a military firearm was loaded at the muzzle and carried but one shot. Repeaters at this time were novelties and even dangerous experiments because of the volatility of black powder. These single-shot martial arms were accurate to about 400 yards on man-sized targets.
In 1900, there were repeating firearms holding 10 self-contained cartridges filled with smokeless powder and spitzer (pointed) bullets that could shoot accurately to more than one mile distance. Most of the primary designs we use today had been invented.
I stopped discussing open sights when I started my look at peep sights; but even though the advances in open sights were not as great in terms of the improvements they contributed to accuracy, open sights did advance in parallel with peep sights.
Range-driven improvements
The old black powder arms were accurate; but because they shot their bullets so slowly, the trajectories were huge. Bullets dropped by many feet on their way to the target. We all like watching Matthew Quigley shoot his big Sharps rifle at distant targets, but how many people appreciate that his bullets are dropping by 60-80 FEET before they impact the target?
Enough fantasy. Let’s get real for a moment. In 1874, the U.S. and Irish rifle teams shot a match at the Creedmoor range on Long Island to decide which nation had the world champion marksmen. They shot at targets at 800, 900 and 1,000 yards. At 1,000 yards, the bullets from the Americans’ .45-caliber rifles dropped more than 100 feet. So, they had to set their sights to compensate for this tremendous drop. A 550-grain .45-caliber lead bullet starting out at 1,400 f.p.s. will drop 114.69 feet when it gets to 1,000 yards.
This model 1873 Springfield Trapdoor carbine rear sight (from 1878) is graduated to 500 yards on the ramp and to 1,100 yards on the upright standard. There’s another sight at the top of the standard that’s sighted even farther — perhaps 1,300 yards. Image copied from Trapdoor Springfield by M.D. (Bud) White and B.D. Ernst, copyright 1980, Beinfeld Publishing, Inc.
This 1879 Remington rolling block rear sight on an Argentine military rifle chambered for .43 Spanish (11.15 x 58R) is elevated to shoot 400 yards. By flipping the standard straight up, the rifle can shoot out to 900 yards accurately.
I mention this because airgunners everywhere are so willing to condemn the .22-caliber pellet for having a “rainbow trajectory.” Folks, they don’t know the meaning of that term! And this is the reason that I refuse to give up my fascination for firearms — because I often find remarkable parallels between them and airguns. But some shooters will watch Quigley and then opt for the fastest .177 they can buy, so their pellets don’t drop too much at long range! To heck with that! Instead, take the time to learn where the pellets will drop and shoot the more accurate, heavier pellets. That’s what Quigley did.
So, the military rear sights of the 1870s were long affairs that had inclined ramps to raise them up for long-range shots. By 1900, this had been taken to the absurd limits of 2,000-yards. Nobody could see that far on the battlefield to shoot accurately; but by this time, military leaders were espousing area fire and talked about “beaten zones” and “cones of fire.” They were thinking of rifle bullets in a way similar to artillery shells, except they didn’t explode, of course.
By the turn of the 20th century, military leaders were thinking in terms of 2,000 yards and indirect plunging fire, as this 1896 Mauser rear sight shows. Image copied from Mauser Bolt Rifle, Third Edition by Ludwig Olson, copyright 1976, E. Brownell & Son.
By the time World War I started, the theory of indirect rifle fire was at its height, though it was proven ineffective through actual battlefield experience. Soldiers were also trained to shoot at targets directly, which ended up being the direction that proved the most effective. But the theory did not die. It persisted until the start of World War II, and the weapons that were used continued to have rear sights that adjusted for 2,000-yard fire.
Countries were also experimenting with ammunition at this same time (1898-1915). As each new innovation hit the field, nations scrambled to adapt their weapons to more modern designs that shot farther and flatter. As a result of what they learned, the rear sights also changed to reflect the flatter trajectories.
This model 1898 Mauser rear sight has been updated to reflect the more streamlined 8mm ammunition used during World War II. It’s shown elevated for 2,000 yards, but looks just a little higher than the rolling block rear sight of 1879 that’s set for 400 yards.
Of course, civilian arms kept pace with the military weapons in every way. Once the wars were over, the sights on civilian arms gained the same innovations that served the military so well; because they were sold to individuals instead of governments, they had to be more practical. No shooters wanted sights that were good for 2,000 yards — no matter what their military experience had been. So, the rear sights still elevated, but this time to more reasonable yardages.
This Winchester model 94 rear sight is probably good out to 200 yards, or so (for the 30-30 round). Photo copied from Winchester Model 94 by Robert C. Renneberg, copyright 2009, Krause Publications, Inc.
And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the express sights that were popularized by African hunters from the 1870s through the 1920s. These are sights that flip up and are regulated for a single cartridge at a single range. The most common that I have seen are those for 100, 200 and 300 yards — but there are many other combinations.
Winchester express rear sight has three flip-up blades for distances to 400 yards. Image copied from Winchester — An American Legend by R.L. Wilson, copyright 1991 by R.L.Wilson. Published in U.S.A. by Random House.
The express sight is a special adaptation of the earlier leaf rear sight that has two distances built in. Those go back as far as the 1850s. I showed you one on my 1867 gallery dart gun.
This rear sight from a gallery dart gun of 1867 could have been the inspiration for the express sights.
Well, that’s it for this time. There’s much more to say about open sights — mainly on the civilian side. We need to look at them, because airgun sights are directly related.
We’ll also look further at peep sights because we haven’t exhausted them, either. This series has at least a couple more parts to come.
Some scope fundamentals: Part 2
by B.B. Pelletier
This is one of the most popular reports I’ve done in a long time. That may be because scopes can be very cantankerous to deal with — hard to mount, difficult to zero, always seem to shift their zero, etc. Today, I’ll address some of the problems you can have and some ways to minimize them.
Scopes should work — no?
To the non-shooter, the telescopic sight seems like a guarantee of accuracy. We’ve all seen the movies. Put the crosshairs on the target, squeeze the trigger and you can’t miss.
Then, you try it for the first time, and you notice that you can’t keep the scope’s reticle (crosshairs) steady. As long as you hold the rifle, no matter what you do, the crosshairs move. Each beat of your heart makes them jump a little. Each breath you take in can move the scope or at least tilt it. You can minimize these movements through training, but nobody can eliminate them entirely. That’s why I shoot from a rest so often. But sometimes that doesn’t work — especially with spring-piston airguns. You have to learn the artillery hold; and since that technique goes well beyond what many people think, I’ll explain it more fully here.
Relax for a neutral hold
The artillery hold is really just a way to get you to follow through, but there’s more to it. An important part of the hold is how you are at the instant the gun fires. You have to be completely relaxed, so the gun doesn’t recoil back and encounter an off-center obstruction that shifts the muzzle in a certain direction.
Here’s how to achieve this relaxed state. After putting the crosshairs on your target, take a breath and expel most of it. Try to relax as you do this. The crosshairs will usually move off the target in a certain direction. If you had fired before relaxing, the pellet would have gone off target in the same direction the crosshairs just did. Maybe it wouldn’t have gone quite as far as the crosshairs seemed to, but it would have moved in the same direction. The result is a larger group.
Let’s try again. This time, after you relax, move the crosshairs back on target by shifting the gun or your hands slightly. It doesn’t take much.
Once you’re back on target, take a deep breath, close your eyes, let out most of the air and relax again. Now, open your eyes and see where the crosshairs are. They probably moved again, only this time they didn’t move so far. Shift things to get back on target again and repeat this procedure.
You may have to repeat this procedure several times before the crosshairs are still on target when you open your eyes. When they are, you can take the shot — making sure that you allow the gun to recoil and move as much as it wants to. This time, the shot should feel very different than it normally does. It should feel neutral — as though you’re no longer connected to the gun. That’s the feeling of a perfectly neutral shot and one that will group as tightly as the gun is capable of — if you can repeat the process several times.
What does this have to do with scopes? Everything! This is the only way to shoot a recoiling airgun with any accuracy; and until you can do that, you’ll never have much success with a scope.
With most firearms, except .22 rimfires, the hold isn’t nearly as important for accuracy because the bullet is out of the gun before all the movement takes place. But with airguns, and especially spring-piston airguns, the pellet hasn’t started to move before the gun does. Only a .22 rimfire is similar, and even they’re much more forgiving than most airguns.
However, you do need to know that all firearms are affected by hold, as well. Even centerfires that shoot in excess of 3,000 f.p.s. will benefit from the hold I’ve described here, but the amount of accuracy increase is so small that it’s only of interest to target shooters and long-range varmint hunters. The average shooter won’t normally notice the difference between a 1-inch group and a 1.25-inch group at 100 yards. Or if they do, they won’t care. I’ve heard that from so many shooters at my rifle range over the years that I know it’s true.
Now you’re ready
If you can learn how to neutralize your rested hold using the process I just described, you’ll see an immediate increase in accuracy from your scoped guns. Then, you’re ready to discuss scope fundamentals!
Temperature is critical
We don’t appreciate how sensitive a modern telescopic sight can be. I don’t mean fragile, either — I mean sensitive. Every change in temperature changes the point of impact of your scope a little. No scope is immune to this phenomenon, yet most shooters act as if once the scope is zeroed it stays zeroed.
Field target shooters know different. I’ve seen a field target scope with three different sets of click values on the elevation knob, each color-coded to a 20-degree temperature range. The shooter who owned that scope took the time to not only figure out all the elevation click values for every yard between 10 and 55 — he did it three separate times when the temperature was in three different ranges! That’s something Hollywood will never show you.
The optical elements inside a scope are refracting light to the millionths of an inch. When they move in relation to one another — because the metal tubes that hold them expand and contract from changes in temperature, the light beams do move. The movement is very slight, but it can and sometimes does change where the images appear. The point of aim changes.
There are many other reasons for a shift in the point of aim, but temperature is a constant one that must always be taken into account. If you’re looking for the way to prevent such changes, I’m sorry to disappoint you. There’s no solution to cancel the effect of temperature changes on a telescopic sight. But if you know it will happen you can at least anticipate it and adjust your scope when the time comes.
Reticles
There are so many different kinds of scope reticles that it would take a book to cover them all. And most of the highly specialized ones are for specific purposes, such as the ballistics of a single military round, so they have no place in a general discussion. I’ll address hree general types of reticles found on most scopes. If I miss something, you can bring it up in the comments.
The oldest type of reticle is the plain “crosshair,” which is two straight lines — one vertical and the other horizontal. In some scopes, these lines actually appear to move as the scope is adjusted, but that’s getting pretty rare today. More often, the crosshairs remain in place in the center of the image and the adjustments move the whole image, so you don’t notice anything.
The plain crosshair is the oldest type of reticle. This image shows thick reticle lines, but they can be much thinner for greater aiming precision.
Often a very thin reticle can be difficult to see against a background, so there will be a small dot at the center of the crosshairs that makes them stand out. This dot will be small, perhaps one or two minutes of angle (a minute of angle covers about one inch at 100 yards), but it doesn’t take much to be noticeable against anything but a dark woods background.
This dot looks large on the heavy reticle lines. But in many scopes, both the dot and reticle lines are very small and fine. This is just for illustration.
Plain crosshairs are best in open country and are therefore favored by long-range shooters. They’re fine for plinking, as long as the reticle lines aren’t too thin. They’re less useful in deep forests, where the reticle lines don’t stand out. For that terrain, probably nothing beats the duplex reticle.
The duplex reticle is a plain crosshair that has thicker lines near the edges of the field of view and thinner lines in the center. When I shot field target, I used a scope with a duplex reticle for two reasons. First, it was much easier to see in the deep woods where many matches are shot; and second, the duplex offers four additional aimpoints.
The duplex reticle uses crosshairs of two different sizes. The ends of the thick posts provide four additional aim points that can be used for things…like greater or lesser distance and wind.
Duplex reticles are the favorite of hunters, because they work well in deep foliage yet they permit precise aiming at the same time. Like plain crosshairs, duplex reticles come in different thicknesses.
In the mil-dot scope, the dots are an exact size (measured in mils) and are spaced apart an exact distance. On variable scopes, they must be used at one power setting to work as designed. Read the information that comes with the scope to discover how this works.
Mil-dot reticles are a more recent invention. They feature dots of a controlled size spaced along one or both reticles at regular spaces. Mil is short for milliradian, a measure of angle that, unfortunately, has never been standardized. Or perhaps it’s more correct to say that it has been standardized dozens of times — each with a different measurement. When I was a mortar platoon leader, our fire direction center and mortar sights used the old French measurement of 6,400 mils to a circle, but there are many other measurements that differ — some slightly and others in a more significant way.
One common use for the mil is rangefinding. Though it isn’t exact, we say that one mil subtends (covers) one meter at 1,000 meters. At 100 meters one mil subtends one-tenth of a meter or 3.9 inches. That’s so close to 4 inches that we round it up.
A whitetail deer is about 12 inches from the top of the shoulder to the bottom of the chest. A two-mil dot will just about cover the deer’s chest at 150 meters.
Is that too much for you? It is for many hunters who still use the mil-dot scope for aimoff when there’s wind. Or they use the vertical dots for aim points at distances other than the range for which the scope is sighted.
Focusing the reticle
The first thing a shooter must do with a scope is focus the reticle. The eyepiece should adjust to allow you to do this, and it does on all but the cheapest scopes. Focus by looking through the scope at the sky or a light-colored wall and turn the eyepiece until the reticle appears in sharp focus. I’ve read that this is supposed to be done incrementally; because if you stare at the reticle very long, your eyes will naturally focus on it. So do it in stages.
After you focus the reticle, some scopes have a locking ring to hold that focus. Others don’t have the locking feature, but the focus rings should be stiff enough to hold your focus without it.
Focusing the reticle is very important for scopes with adjustable objectives, because the scope’s designers assume the scope is in sharp focus when the objective ring or sidewheel is turned. Only when the reticle is in focus will the scope come close to the distances marked off on the parallax ring or knob, which is the adjustable objective we are discussing. And, of course, that will also depend on the temperature when the scope is used.
On the other hand, on lower-powered scopes that have a fixed parallax setting you can use the focus to bring close targets into better focus. This isn’t what the adjustment is for and it will blur the reticle somewhat, but sometimes it’s the best way to use a low-priced, fixed-focus scope at closer distances than it’s intended.
Some scope fundamentals: Part 1
by B.B. Pelletier
I’ve noticed that a lot of you are responding positively to the fundamentals that have come out in some of the recent reports, so I thought I would do a few more important ones for you, starting with scopes. This will be a series of bite-sized reports.
My experience shooting the Conquest with a 4x scope at 50 yards last week and getting great groups prompts me to want to share a number of scope evaluation tips with you. And, as always, I expect the comments from our readers are going to be even more interesting than the reports.
What magnification (power) to choose?
Starting with the Conquest accuracy test, it’s obvious that you don’t need a lot of magnification to shoot well. I normally use more than just 4x for a gun as accurate as the Conquest, but not on all rifles. As a scope increases in power, it also gets longer and heavier, so a compromise between power and size is usually best.
I have some 3-9x scopes that have unusually clear optics and thin reticles that I enjoy using. Of all of them, the one I like the best is not marked in any way. I think it’s a Leapers, but there are no identifying marks that reveal who the manufacturer is. The optics are clear and the crosshair is thin and sharp. This is often my go-to scope to use for a quick test.
My favorite power combination is probably a 4-16x. I find it packs the most power into a convenient package without the scope becoming too long and heavy. Given today’s optics, a good 4-16x isn’t much longer than a 3-9x from a decade ago.
But you don’t need even 16x to shoot accurately. That is what the new airgunner must understand. I have a .250 Savage centerfire rifle that shoots 10-shot groups smaller than one inch at 100 yards nearly every time. The scope on that rifle is a vintage all-steel Weaver V9 W, which means it is a 3-9x variable that has a wide field of view. The objective lens is only 32mm, so it isn’t as bright as some modern scopes, but it has a super-fine reticle with a tiny dot at the intersection of the crosshairs. If I ever find another scope like this at a gun show, I am prepared to buy it because the combination of power, optical clarity and crosshair size is ideal for this rifle. I use this rifle for prairie dog-sized targets out to 300 yards. That’s good enough for me.
Another rifle that shoots small groups is a custom No. 5 SMLE that I’ve converted to .219 Donaldson Wasp. The scope on this one is another one that’s vintage and all-steel — a Redfield 2-7x variable with what appears to be a 28mm or 30mm objective. The crosshairs are even finer than those of the vintage Weaver, and the dot at the intersection is also smaller. This rifle should be good for prairie dogs out to 300 yards, as well, but I feel the power of the scope limits the range to 250 yards for targets so small. Coyotes to 300 yards are possible because they’re much larger. So, I’m saying that a 7x scope works well at 250 to 300 yards, but the maximum effective distance depends on the target — at least for me.
It might be an ugly rifle, but this .219 Donaldson Wasp can shoot. It has a custom Shaw barrel of my own design with a faster twist. And the little Redfield scope is plenty good for what I want to do.
Going the other way, I absolutely love Leapers’ line of long eye relief scopes that produce 1.5-4x. These scopes may not make the target appear large, but they can’t be beat for clarity. For value, I don’t think the Leapers 1.25-4×24 long eye relief scope with the one-inch tube has any equal. It’s currently priced at only $85, which is very little for such a great sight. It would be ideal on big bore airguns of all kinds, as well as powerful springers that won’t be shot past 50 yards — rifles like the Beeman R1 in .22 caliber, for example. Yes, the parallax is set at 100 yards, but I have found that when the magnification is this low, it doesn’t matter where the parallax is set. This scope would be ideal on a New England Firearms (NEF) single-shot rifle in .45 Colt or .44 Magnum or on any small carbine in a pistol caliber.
What about more powerful scopes?
There are a FEW applications for the scopes with power up to 32x and more. Field target competition is one such game — not because of the additional aiming precision, but because that extra power helps you resolve small objects out at 55 yards, so you can determine ranges with the parallax adjustment more precisely. When you can focus on very small objects at long distances, the scope helps to determine the range to them. And long-range target shooting is another time when a higher-powered scope is needed. When you’re going for the absolute best group that can be fired from a gun, the scope must be powerful enough to reduce the aiming error to the smallest fraction of an inch.
Talk all you want about big scopes. Try carrying around one like this for a couple hours! A Daystate Harrier is dwarfed by this monster Tasco Custom Shop 8-40×56.
HOWEVER — and this is the whole point of this discussion — it doesn’t take the Hubble Space Telescope to shoot good groups at 50 yards. As you clearly saw in my report on the Conquest, I did it with only 4x. Consider that when thinking of your next scope. You can have a handy package that carries easily and handles rapidly or you can mount the biggest bragging-rights scope money can buy on your air rifle and then suffer for it.
Clarity
Clarity goes hand-in-hand with accuracy when using a scope. In fact, I think clarity is the single most important attribute a scope sight can have. There are technical means of determining relative clarity in scopes. The most common one is determining how many line pairs the scope can resolve in a standard test. Clarity is actually a statement of the scope’s ability to resolve an image. When we say clarity, we mean resolution.
I am not an optical engineer, nor am I qualified to discuss how scopes are tested. And the subject is so technical that even if I could discuss it, not everyone would understand what I was saying. I’m going to reduce the resolution/clarity question to something we can all understand.
I have a simple test I use to subjectively determine the relative clarity of a scope. All I do is point the scope at the roof of my neighbor’s house about 25 yards distant and look at the shingles. If the shingles appear sharp, with the vertical joints well-defined and the abrasive particles standing out clearly, I know the scope is clear. If any of the image is muddy, even after the scope is adjusted for that range, I know the scope is not as clear as I would like it to be.
I developed this test a couple years back when I pitted a Hawke scope against a Leapers scope of the same power and specifications. Until that test I thought nothing affordable could ever beat a Leapers scope; but in that test, the Hawke scope emerged as the clearer sight. It was also more expensive, but it didn’t cost twice what the Leapers did, as I remember. The shingle test is a good one for any scope you intend using for target shooting or hunting, as nothing in the field will exceed the fineness of the image the shingles can give.
If you don’t have access to shingles, anything with a fine grain will work just as well. Old wooden fences are another way of testing the resolution of your scope. Just be sure to always test every scope at the same distance and using the same object, and your test will soon become very refined.
When you buy a scope, you usually can’t perform the test I just described. You have to take someone’s word on the clarity. But I have a couple tips about that.
1. Multi-coated optics on inexpensive scopes are usually not as clear as single-coated lenses. Leapers has used a single coating of emerald for as long as I’ve known them, which is why they’re as clear as they are at such a low price. You might give up something else with single-coated optics, such as five minutes hunting time in the morning and evening, but that depends on what kind of coating it is.
This deserves an explanation. While multi-coatings can be applied to make optics perform their best, the hype of multi-coating is too powerful to be overlooked by the marketing departments of many manufacturers. Therefore, the cheap scopes are multi-coated without regard to light transmission or any other enhancements. As a result, these multi-coated optics are much like airguns that shoot over 1,000 fps — lots of hype but you’re giving up accuracy. On the other hand, expensive multi-coated optics deliver superior performance.
2. The objective size doesn’t matter as much as you think. You don’t always need the 56mm objective to see clearly. The quality of the lens material and the optical coating(s) matter more than the objective size.
3. A 30mm scope tube will be noticeably clearer than a one-inch tube, if all else is equal.
4. You can live with a lower-power scope if it’s also clear, but a high-power scope that doesn’t focus or is unclear is the worst headache imaginable.
The bottom line
Considering just these two subjects — power and clarity — shop for a lower-power scope with a 30mm scope tube and a single lens coating. From what I saw in the Leapers booth at this year’s SHOT Show, there will soon be a flood of very clear scopes at good prices (but not cheap!) hitting the market this year.
Price
Stop shopping for scopes by price, alone, and then condemning your rifles, pellets and the entire hobby of airgunning when things don’t work out! Most cheap scopes are cheap for a good reason. I understand trying to buy the best scope you can afford, but stop focusing on the price so much.
Cheap scopes aren’t usually that much worse than more expensive scopes. I say “usually” because I’ve seen a couple brands that can be counted on to be bad. But cheap scopes don’t pass through the quality controls that most of the more expensive scopes do. You’re far more likely to end up with a lemon if you buy the rock-bottom scope.
And this final tip is worth the price of this entire blog: Most combos (rifle and scope for one price) that are put together by manufacturers are put together by their marketing departments to get rid of the cheap scopes nobody will buy! However, when a combo is put together by a dealer, that usually isn’t the case. Pyramyd Air has put some very decent scopes on some of their combos because they realize their customers really care which scope comes with the gun. The more the combo costs, the better the scope will probably be.
But watch out for those manufacturer combos!
Evanix Conquest PCP air rifle: Part 3
by B.B. Pelletier
The Evanix Conquest has features that set the bar very high for air rifles.
The cat’s out of the bag, so to speak, because today’s title tells you what my big news is about. And I tied reader Kevin to this report because he owns an Evanix Conquest PCP air rifle that hasn’t given him much joy. Today, I’ll show you the most astounding shooting I’ve ever done, but I’ll also address a mechanical concern and how it was corrected! This will be a report to remember, and here we go.
The Conquest is a very different air rifle. It took me two separate reports just to get through the general description because there are so many differences and unusual aspects of this airgun. The action is operated by a battery in the same way that an AEG airsoft gun operates, so I had to show you all of that. And, as I predicted, the forums are full of discussions about upgrading the battery pack — discussions among shooters who haven’t even seen the gun, yet. My advice it to see it and shoot it, first. It might just be good enough as is.
The rifle shoots both semiauto, which very few pellet rifles do, and full-auto, which only one other CO2 gun (the Auto Ordnance SMG-22 belt-feed carbine) currently does. Until this test, I had a lot to say about the wisdom of providing a full-auto mode — likening it to a shopping cart with wheels rated to 200 mph. That’s my way of saying, “Who needs it?” Today, I’ll eat those words. Stick around.
Posting backwards?
Also, I am reviewing accuracy out of the usual order. Normally, I look at velocity first and accuracy afterwards. Several readers have commented that they do it the other way, because who cares how fast certain pellets will go if they aren’t accurate?
Believe it or not, I put a lot of thought into doing a review in the order I usually do it. When I review velocity it’s not to correlate it with accuracy, but rather to show the power potential of the powerplant. I do understand the readers’ viewpoint that only accurate pellets are interesting; and like everyone, else I do tend to shoot only the most accurate pellets. But when I do the velocity test, I’m separating the power question from accuracy. I want to know what the gun is capable of doing as far as power is concerned, then in a separate test I want to discover what its accuracy can be.
Yes, I’ll recommend shooting the most accurate pellet, but if it only produces 20 foot-pounds while the most powerful pellet produces 25 foot-pounds, I want to show that the gun is fully capable of producing 25 foot pounds. Who knows if there will be a new pellet in the future that will be able to use all the power the rifle has and be accurate at the same time? So, my test will have demonstrated the peak power potential. If you look back at my discussions of accuracy and power in many past tests, I think you’ll see this has always been my thrust.
Today, we’re looking at accuracy first, because I had the opportunity to get to the rifle range on a dead-calm day. I could not let such an opportunity pass. So, today is accuracy day, and velocity day is still to come for the Conquest.
A couple corrections
During the time I was examining the rifle for this report, Edith wrote the most comprehensive airgun manual I’ve ever seen. She wrote it for both the Conquest rifle and the Speed, and we had to operate the gun extensively to check facts for her manual. Several things I initially told you have been changed as a result of this more detailed look.
1. The batteries need at least an 8-hour initial charge before the first use.
2. The magazines hold only 10 rounds instead of the 12 rounds I told you (with all double-mags holding 20). That holds true in all three calibers (.177, .22 and .25) but not for the 9mm, which is yet to come.
3. There was a problem with the magazine sticking in the action that was corrected by lubrication. Let’s look at that right now.
Magazine sticking problem
When I first examined the gun, I noticed that sometimes the magazine would not come out of the action when it was supposed to. When this rifle fires, the bolt passes through the magazine and pushes the pellet into the breech just before an air blast propels it out the barrel. If the bolt doesn’t retract all the way after the shot, you can’t remove the magazine because the bolt will still be inside.
Now I know what the plastic window on the right side of the receiver is for! Use it to access the bolt, so you can lubricate it properly. Then, it’ll retract and the gun will run perfectly — or at least mine did.
The bolt has two diameters — a large rear section and a narrow front section. Both diameters must be lubricated, because they pass through different passages in the receiver.
Use an oiling needle to get oil onto both diameters of the bolt. The larger black steel portion on the left looks oily in this picture, while the smaller silver portion on the right, to the right of the hook-like part in the middle of the window, looks dry. That’s because the surface is too smooth to see the oil. It’s there. I used bike chain oil, but Pyramyd Air used FP-10, and both products did the trick.
Once I lubricated the bolt with the oiling needle, it worked fine and there were no more sticking magazines. But if you do encounter a sticking mag, the recommended solution is to pull the trigger and hold it back for a few seconds after the rifle fires.
A great day at the range
Well, it was a great day for shooting the Conquest. The morning was foggy, where not a breath of air could be felt. I shot the entire test in the most perfect conditions imaginable. And all shooting you are about to see was done at 50 yards.
Accuracy
The rifle comes without sights, so I mounted a Bushnell Trophy XLT 4-12×40AO scope on low two-piece rings. I then sighted-in the rifle with Beeman Kodiak pellets.
The first four rounds got me on target, and then six more went into a group that measured 0.811 inches between the two widest centers. If I accepted 5-shot groups as standard, my job would already have been done, and the Conquest would be a very accurate air rifle. But that’s not how I roll, as you know, so I reloaded the magazine and shot a full 10-shot group.
Ten Beeman Kodiaks went into 1.241 inches at 50 yards. That’s okay, but not great. Time to try the next pellet.
Ten shots into 1.241 inches isn’t the level of accuracy I’d hoped for, even at 50 yards, so I decided to move on. However I note that the 21.1-grain Kodiaks do feed smoothly through the magazine. Length is not a problem.
The trigger and what it feels like to shoot
Shooting these two groups (6 shots, followed by 10 shots) afforded me the opportunity to get used to the Conquest’s trigger. I remember saying that a rifle at this price has to have a perfect trigger. Well, the Conquest trigger is far from perfect. But then I thought of another semiautomatic air rifle — the FX Revolution, which I’d tested a couple years back. It also has a less-than-desirable trigger that slaps you back through the trigger blade every time the rifle fires. In comparison, the Conquest trigger is less annoying. Instead of breaking like glass, this trigger has a rocket-push feel to the release. It’s difficult to describe, but you feel the movement of the bolt through the trigger blade.
But the magic of shooting a semiauto with almost zero recoil allows every shot to go where you want, and soon you forget the trigger. Knowing the rifle will stay exactly on target — and all you have to do is pull the trigger for another shot — builds your confidence like you wouldn’t believe!
JSB Exact Jumbo Heavy
Next, I tried the 18.1-grain JSB Exact Jumbo Heavy pellets. In many rifles of this power, the 18.1-grain Jumbo Heavy JSB is the most accurate pellet, but not this time. In the Conquest, 10 JSB Jumbo Heavys made a group measuring 0.958 inches between centers. That’s not bad, but it’s still not the best the rifle can do.
Now this is more like it! Ten JSB Exact Jumbo pellets in 0.958 inches at 50 yards. This kind of performance is very credible, though not as good as the Conquest can shoot.
JSB Exact 15.9-grain
The next pellet I tested was the JSB Exact 15.9-grain dome. JSB calls this one a Jumbo, but I find that confusing with the Jumbo Heavy, so I make an exception by referring to this one by its weight. Over time, I’ve found this pellet to be the most consistently accurate .22-caliber airgun pellet.
Now, that’s a group! Ten JSB Exact 15.9-grain domes made this 0.547-inch group at 50 yards. This is fantastic performance. It is accuracy rivaling some of the finest semiautomatic rimfire rifles — after they’ve been accurized.
The 15.9-grain JSB Exact shot many groups between 0.50 and 0.75 inches, time after time. It was so dead-reliable on this perfect day that I would have picked it over all other PCPs for a benchrest match. But there’s one dynamic you do need to watch.
Other pellets tested
I also shot the .22-caliber Crosman Premier and the heavy 28.4-grain Eun Jin dome. Both groups were about the same as the Kodiaks, and I did not pursue them beyond a single group.
Shot count
The Conquest holds a lot of air, so the tendency is to keep right on shooting for magazine after magazine. If you are shooting spinners at 35 yards you’ll get away with it, but out at 50 yards things start to look different. That’s why I test at that distance with super-accurate PCPs like the Conquest.
I noticed that the first three 10-shot groups were all very tight. The group of JSBs going into 0.547 inches, shown above, was the first group fired on a fresh fill of air and also the best group of the test, but let’s take a look at the fourth group fired on the same fill with the same pellet.
This group of JSB Exact 15.9-grain domes was the fourth group on the same fill. It measures 1.267 inches between centers. Three 10-shot groups are the limit at 50 yards when the best accuracy is required.
That fourth group is approximately the same size as the group of Beeman Kodiaks I showed you first. While it’s a good group, it’s not representative of this rifle’s true capability at 50 yards. What this means is the total shot count you’ll get on a fill with this rifle depends on what you’re shooting and how far it is. If you want the absolute best the rifle can do, refill the gun after 30 shots. But if you’re hunting squirrels at 35 yards you can go to at least 40 shots, if not more.
This 10-shot group of JSB Exact 15.9-grain domes measures 0.760 inches between centers. There were many groups like this, and I would say this is representative of what the rifle will do all the time under good conditions with this pellet.
Full-auto
Of course, semiautomatic is only half of the game with the Conquest. I had to fire the rifle on full-auto, even though I was scoffing at the thought. Why would anybody even do that, I wondered. Well, the first group I shot answered my question.
The big surprise!
When I looked through the scope after the burst was finished I couldn’t tell if all the pellets were in the group or not, so I checked it with my new super-sharp spotting scope. What I saw caused me to jump up and down and pretty much stop the shooting on that range.
I am fortunate that my shooting buddy, Otho Henderson, was there to witness what happened. I had told him the Conquest was a full-auto gun; but until you hear it rattle the shots off, it doesn’t sink in. Seeing me this hyper after looking through the spotting scope, he knew something was up because I don’t even crack a smile unless a group is really astounding.
We both walked down to the target to examine what was a single ragged hole at my exact point of aim. I had used a 12-inch by 12-inch paper target, stapled to a 24-inch by 48-inch cardboard backer that had no other holes in it close to this target. The other target on which I’d been shooting semiautomatic groups was 12 inches above this one, so it was clear that all 10 shots went into the same tight group.
The first full-auto group from the Conquest measures 0.568 inches between centers! Never in my wildest imagination did I think this rifle could ever do something like this on full-auto!
Now I know what many of you are thinking. This was a fluke. You’ll never do it again. I thought the same thing, so I shot a second full-auto group for you.
Ten JSB Exact 15.9-grain domes went into this group measuring 1.001 inches between centers. I would expect this to be more representative of a full-auto group at 50 yards. Even so, it’s fantastic!
I’m guessing that this second group is closer to what the Conquest will do on full-auto at 50 yards most of the time on a perfect day. But since 90 percent of all the air rifles in the world can’t do as well shooting their pellets one at a time, it’s still pretty amazing.
In fairness to Mac, he did predict exactly such a thing when we were still in Las Vegas. He once owned a .22 rimfire semiauto that would occasionally dump its whole magazine; and he noted that when that happened, the group was always smaller than what he could shoot pulling the trigger each time. Apparently the gun takes care of business before the shooter can screw it up. I didn’t believe him until this happened.
All the good was used up!
Following the Conquest test, I went over to the 100-yard range and proceeded to shoot my old Ballard with the new bullets and loading techniques. Nothing worked, and the best I could do was shoot 4-inch groups! Then, I tried a 30-30 that had shot a half-inch at 50 yards the time before and it, too, shot four-inch groups. So, all the accuracy for the day was used up by the Conquest.
One last thing
Perhaps I should have mentioned this earlier, but I thought it would be a nice surprise here at the end of the report. I had mounted a 4-12x Bushnell scope on the Conquest for this test, but in doing so I failed to notice exactly which Bushnell it was. When I got to the range and tried to adjust the power ring, it wouldn’t budge. I had mounted a broken scope on the rifle, so the entire test had to be shot at 4x!
I doubt that mounting a 32-power scope would improve the groups all that much, simply because these groups can’t be improved much more than they are right now. But please feel free to imagine what might have happened if the scope had been better.
We look at velocity and power potential next, but at this point in the test my mind is already made up. The Evanix Conquest is a most worthy precharged pneumatic air rifle. It has a number of interesting deviations, some of which, like the battery, will turn off some shooters. But other features, like the full-auto capability, are surprisingly more effective than you might imagine.
As I look at these results, I’m reminded of two weeks ago at Las Vegas, when I pounded a 200-yard metal silhouette with the 9mm Conquest that’s still in development. Who knew these guns could be this accurate?
It was a very good day for the Evanix Conquest!
Sterling HR-81 .177 underlever air rifle: Part 4
by B.B. Pelletier
Now that Vince has tuned the Sterling, it’s time to see how she shoots.
It’s time to see how the Sterling underlever rifle shoots. Benjamin put Lothar Walther barrels on these rifles, so I’m hoping the pedigree will show in today’s test. Vince got the velocity back up to a respectable level, as we saw in Part 3 (and Vince showed you what he did to the gun in his guest blog about the Sterling), so there should be nothing to prevent the gun from shooting its best.
When I went to mount a scope, I saw that the Sterling has two vertical holes that can be used for a scope stop. They’re located where the front ring needs to be, but with two-piece rings that presents no problem.
There are two vertical holes for a scope stop on top of the Sterling scope rail. They require the stop to be positioned forward, so I used the front ring of a two-piece ring set.
Since I wanted to give the rifle every chance to shine, I selected the Hawke 4.5-14×42AO Sidewinder Tactical scope for this test. This is the finest of all the scopes I have available for testing, so the Sterling is getting the absolute best of everything.
All shooting was done from a rest at 25 yards. I used my indoor range, so nothing got in the way of the Sterling this day. As usual, all groups contain t10 shots.
H&N Neue Spitzkugel
I thought I would give a pointed pellet a chance this time, as I seldom use them. The H&N Neue Spitzkugel (new pointed bullet) has a very shallow point and looks almost like a wadcutter at first glance. Pointed pellets are most often inaccurate, so I usually don’t bother with them, but it’s always nice to check from time to time to see if there have been any advances.
Well, 10 H&N Neue Spitzkugel pellets made only a mediocre group at 25 yards. With some breakbarrels, this would be pretty good, but I expect more than this 1.146-inch group from this Sterling. The shot at the left is a called flyer, resulting from an inconsistent hold — the only one of the test.
While loading, I noticed that the skirts didn’t always want to go into the loading trough unless I pressed them in with my thumb. The trough is probably on the small side for larger pellet skirts. This made me watch that the pellets didn’t flip backwards before the bolt pushed them into the breech.
Trigger
I also had plenty of time to observe the Sterling’s trigger. It seems to be a single-stage, but the pull is short enough. There’s some slight creep, but you need a target-shooter’s trigger finger to feel it. Overall, it was good enough for very precise shooting without disturbing the aim. If I pull the gauge very slowly, the trigger breaks between 2 lbs., 3 oz. and 2 lbs., 5 oz., which is plenty light enough for good work. I said it was 2 lbs., 8 ozs. in Part 3, but that was when it was pulled more deliberately. I know Vince had a hand in making it so nice, because Sterling triggers have a reputation for being crude and not so good.
JSB Exact 8.4-grain
Next I tried some 8.4-grain JSB Exact domes. They’re at the upper limit of weight of I would choose for a gun of this power, but sometimes that’s a plus. Not this time, though, because 10 went into a 0.788-inch group at 25 yards. That’s okay for many breakbarrels — but from a fixed-barrel rifle that has a Lothar Walther barrel, I expect more.
Getting better but this 0.788-inch, 10-shot group is still not as good as expected for the Sterling.
Shot cycle and hold
The Sterling shoots with a very pronounced forward jump — reminiscent of spring guns of the 1970s. It feels like the stroke is long, and the piston is heavy. On the other hand, the rifle lies completely dead in my hand, so applying the artillery hold is easy. My off hand touched the triggerguard, yet I could still feel the cocking slot of the stock on my palm. That means the stock is cut far to the back, which means Vince did a wonderful job of deadening the powerplant to get the rifle as smooth as it is. I just wish airgun makers today would go to the same trouble instead of mounting everything in rubber to deaden the vibration that’s still in their guns.
Crosman Premier lites
Next up was the venerable 7.9-grain Crosman Premier lite pellet that often wins the race in these tests. This was the only pellet of the four tested that fit into the loading trough without a push, yet it was also the pellet that gave the most trouble by flipping backwards in the trough.
This time, I got the results I was hoping for, though the group is more open than I would have liked. Look at the group and read the caption, though, because you’ll be surprised where most shots went.
More like it! The group of 10 Crosman Premier lites measures 0.606 inches between centers, but the surprise is in the largest hole in the center of the group. Six shots went through that one hole! Now, we’re talking!
Scope not mounted perfectly
By this time, I noticed that I’d mounted the scope a little too far to the rear, and the high mounts I used were not needed. Repositioning the scope in lower mounts would make the rifle easier to shoot — though I don’t think it would affect the accuracy. However, if I were to keep a scope on this rifle (and it can’t be this wonderful Hawke, as I need it for other tests) I would remount whatever scope I used.
JSB Exact RS
The last pellet I tested was the 7.33-grain JSB Exact RS. You might recall that this pellet is one of Kevin’s favorites, and we have seen it do amazing things with some spring guns in the past. The report I did a while back on the Beeman R8 was the most dramatic example of the capability of the RS.
And it didn’t disappoint this time, either! Ten RS pellets went into a group measuring just 0.41 inches at 25 yards! That’s game, set and match as far as I’m concerned. The Benjamin Sterling has proven itself to be a very accurate underlever spring rifle that warrants special attention from shooters as well as collectors.
Ten JSB Exact RS pellets went into 0.41 inches at 25 yards, proving beyond a doubt that the Sterling can shoot!
Summary
This test series has been long and rewarding. Thanks to Vince, we now know what a Benjamin Sterling can do under the right conditions. I’m sorry this rifle is no longer available. Except for the lower power and stiffer trigger, it could hold its own with a TX200. When I usually do these reports on vintage airguns, we get to see a lot of warts, but the Sterling doesn’t have as many as I was prepared to see. Without a doubt, Vince’s work has a lot to do with that.
