Tell me about air rifles

[scottmandue]

Vash's turkey air gun hunt thread got me thinking... then searching on the internet.
Back in the day if you has a .117 pellet (over a BB gun) you had it going on... a .22? Furgetaboutit!
Now I see .25, .35, even .45!?!
Also see everything from $100 to $5000.
So, if I wanted a fun little target rifle what is a good brand/model and how much do I have to budget for something like that?

[nota]

single pump
multi pump
co2

Czech for the older ones
avoid china even big old names

[look 171]

Scott, you gotta drive outta of the city to shoot that thing. I have a cheapo air gun from way back that I want teach my kids hot to shoot to the defenseless birds, coyotes and trespassing neighbors in my back yard. LAPD informed me (with rolled eyes) of that info real quick.

[scottmandue]

Originally Posted by look 171

Scott, you gotta drive outta of the city to shoot that thing. I have a cheapo air gun from way back that I want teach my kids hot to shoot to the defenseless birds, coyotes and trespassing neighbors in my back yard. LAPD informed me (with rolled eyes) of that info real quick.

Dang! I was afraid of that... however I could take it one of our indoor ranges.
Is there any economic benefit from shooting .22 air rifle Vs .22 rimfire?

[Les Paul]

Unless you have your own personal stockpile of 22lr it is still hard to find.

[Don Ro]

Unless your neighbors are right next to your property line, see if you can open a back door, set up a target, and shoot from inside your house. (?)
Or even stay indoors...shoot from room to room.
.
Edit: If I sit next to my bed, open one of the doors, I can shoot a good 70 - 80 feet to the end of my sun room.

[look 171]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

Dang! I was afraid of that... however I could take it one of our indoor ranges.
Is there any economic benefit from shooting .22 air rifle Vs .22 rimfire?

I m the wrong guy to ask.

[Don Ro]

"Is there any economic benefit from shooting .22 air rifle Vs .22 rimfire?"
.
You mean cost of ammo? OMG, yes.

[vash]

the gun most folks get is the Benjamin Maurader. there was a fun of sub-par barrels in the .22..so the .25 caliber really took off. super accurate and really hard hitting.

i'm talking PCP guns. pre-charged pnuematics. (i blew that spelling, sorry)
the gun has a big reservior of compressed air. my .22 gun gets pumped up to 3000 psi, 200 BAR (in the spirit of the Metric thread) and i can shoot about 25 shots before it drops down to 2000psi. i repump from there back up to 3000psi. i dont let it go down that much because i elected to use a hand floor pump to do the work. is it easy? no..about as difficult as digging a hole in the beach. you go slow and deliberate to not overheat the pump. the last few pushes work you ab muscles. i will have a six pack soon..just need to get the fat to get out of the way.
if i wanted to spend more $$, i can buy a airtank. airtanks get filled to 4500PSI!! i heard i can fill my gun 60x with a big tank. about the size of a scuba tank. i had to search out a place to fill it. firemen shops can..and so can some scuba shops. i found one near my future city, and will buy a tanks soon. they make small tanks that i can put in a backpack.

all my friends shoot .25 maurauders. so had to be different. i bought a Hatsun AT44 QE from turkey. damn accurate. and it has a silencer. i checked..airgun silencers are legal here. they call them baffles. hahah. it is not totally silent. i chose a heavy pellet so i can get it sub sound barrier.

i cannot tell a hole in a can from a .22 rimfire hole in the can. i bet my gun is shooting a 20 gr pellet at 800fps.

all my rimfire friends teased me for hours about the $$ i spent, saying things like..you could get three 10-22's!!! i shut them all up when i planned my first turkey hunt. they all want to come with me so they can take a shot with my rifle.

i drank the kool-aid and ordered my gun from Pyramid Air. not the cheapest, but definately the easiest. you pick a gun, and they link all the fittings you need to make tanks, handpumps, etc work. they even sell bundles that include the scope and things. they also have a 20 for 20 program where you pay them $20 and they shoot your gun 20 times. saved me the headache of having to send a leaky or non shooting gun back to them. they then mounted my scope and sent me a computer print out of my 20 shots thru a chronograph. and they sighted the gun in sort of..got it hitting paper at least. ftr, my gun shot a 12 gr pellet 20 times at 1200fps.

[scottmandue]

Originally Posted by vash

. I will have a six pack soon..just need to get the fat to get out of the way.

if i wanted to spend more $$, i can buy a airtank. airtanks get filled to 4500PSI!! i heard i can fill my gun 60x with a big tank. about the size of a scuba tank. i had to search out a place to fill it. firemen shops can..and so can some scuba shops. i found one near my future city, and will buy a tanks soon. they make small tanks that i can put in a backpack.

all my rimfire friends teased me for hours about the $$ i spent, saying things like..you could get three 10-22's!!! i shut them all up when i planned my first turkey hunt. they all want to come with me so they can take a shot with my rifle.

I already have a six pack... I keep it safe under this protective layer of fat.

That sounds way cool... but I'm just thinking about sticking my toe in the water here and not going to jump into that kind of $$$
Besides this would be for fun plinking/target, don't need hunting firepower.

[Evans, Marv]

I'm happy with my RWS Diana mod. 48 (.17 cal.) that I bought from Air Guns of Arizona maybe six or seven years ago. You can buy either .22 (900 fps.) or .17 cal. (1,100 fps.) Seems like I paid some where in the range of $200 to $250 at the time, but I noticed they are now right at $380. Mine has worked out great for what I bought it for, which is eliminating varmints - mainly ground squirrels. Mine seems to be super accurate out to 100+ ft., which is the range I've killed a few squirrels at with iron sights. I'm no great shot either but it seems like if it's zeroed in well, you can hit anything consistently. For varmints and targets, I think .17 cal. is just fine.

[vash]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

I already have a six pack... I keep it safe under this protective layer of fat.

That sounds way cool... but I'm just thinking about sticking my toe in the water here and not going to jump into that kind of $$$
Besides this would be for fun plinking/target, don't need hunting firepower.

i dipped my toe with an old school Benjamin Blue Streak.

you pump it up. my gun, 6 pumps is super accurate. i was told full pumps i'm seeing 1200 psi. mine is a .20 cal.

if i ever get off my butt and send it off to get a peep sight installed..look out!! it will be very very accurate.

i bought mine used off of GunBroker for a super fair price. i think $175. it is giddy good fun. hurry, good ones are getting harder to find.

[Don Ro]

.
~~~~~~~~~
.
RWS Diana Mod. 38 ... .177.
RWS is a good start to look for a quality pellet rifle.
Pyramid Air is a great place...you can call them and they will talk all day long w/you.

[mattdavis11]

Benjamin 392 .22 caliber, Zeiss 4x6, and two happy labs. Good times.

[rfuerst911sc]

Here's my Diana # 35 we bought this in Germany back in 1968. It is a .177 cal. back in the day I took out a good chunk of the squirrel community . She's a fun piece and I'll never let her go .

[sc_rufctr]

I've seen the pump ones with suppressors in the UK. They are very popular there.
You'd be amazed at how powerful they are.

[cabmandone]

I'm a cheapskate, I shoot a .177 GAMO. The thing is ridiculous accurate. On a calm day if you can figure the drop, you can shoot it accurately out to 50 yards or a little farther. If have done target shooting at 50 yards and can actually group pretty well. My son wanted an inexpensive air rifle and bought a Ruger. It shoots accurately but I've got to get him a better scope for it.

These are the pellets we shoot. Robot Check We both tried the tapered point pellets and couldn't group them consistently.

BTW, I bought my GAMO several years ago for $100 and put a Simmons 3x9 on it from my 22 mag. My son's Ruger cost about $100 and came with a throw away scope.

[gr8fl4porsche]

I have a cheap Gamo break barrel.177 as well. I bought it for target practice in the backyard with the kids. Even the $150 one from Walmart is too much to shoot in the backyard in a subdivision. When and if the pellets go supersonic it sounds like a .22. Echoes through the neighborhood.

Even the CO2 BB gun's we shoot are borderline too loud.

It is impressive what you can get for $150 though. I have mine sighted in with a red dot. I can put that pellet wherever I want at a reasonable 25 yards or so.

[cabmandone]

Randy made a great point about the noise. My son's Ruger is slightly louder than my Gamo and I'd say both are about as loud as shooting a standard .22 rim fire.

[id10t]

Originally Posted by Les Paul

Unless you have your own personal stockpile of 22lr it is still hard to find.

Low end match ammo - the Norma/Geco/RWS offerings, SK and Wolf - have all been available very consistently for 2 years now... I pay $68/brick for 2 to 4 bricks of SK Std+ delivered to my door from several vendors...

Of course, if you live someplace crazy that restricts what you can order online (New York and California I'm looking at you!) you are stuck with local market. But if you have a Bass Pro, Gander, etc. near you they may let you order ammo online and do ship to store. Still have a 3 box or so limit per order, but you can order daily for a week and pick it up all at once.