Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2020 i Airgun Shooter

FROM MODERATOR TO VENTILATOR Huggett Moderators, whose products include the Astile and Belita, is now making components for medical ventilators for the NHS as part of the battle against coronavirus. Owner Andrew Huggett was approached by McLaren, as the Formula One team are now part of a group commissioned by the Government to make more of the devices. A mechanical ventilator is a machine that moves air into and out of a patient’s lungs when they are physically unable to breathe themselves, or are breathing insufficiently. The key part that Andrew has been asked to make is an absorber dock guide. He admits that he has no idea what this is or what it does, but is just happy to be helping the NHS. New equipment, including a hi-tech metal…

When did you get into shooting? I started shooting at a young age as my Dad had an old springer. But as I got older, other things came along to distract my attention. I got back into airgun shooting again a few years ago and now realise how much I missed it. What type of shooting do you enjoy? I enjoy all sorts of shooting from targets to tin cans to live quarry. I have a few permissions, farmland and people that have birds, and as we know where there’s food, there are rats. I also take out rabbits when the landowner thinks he is getting too many of them. What airguns do you use? I started out with an old .22 springer, which I still have. Then I got…

So your club’s closed, your permission is temporarily off-limits and your sport is on hold, right? Well, if you have access to a garden, and that also includes a smaller one, then shooting can very much continue. Unlike a regular shooting range, a garden is always open for business. With a few legal and safety points adhered to, the garden is an excellent place to shoot our airguns, allowing us to plink to our heart’s content, practise our shooting skills or even set up and test a new rifle and scope combo. If you don’t own a garden of your own, try persuading a friend or relative to let you shoot in theirs once the current coronavirus lockdown is over. And who knows? You may end up converting somebody else…

INSIGHT AND EXPERTISE TO HELP YOU RAISE YOUR GAME Atrigger is so important to how a rifle performs. A bad trigger can make even an excellent gun a pig to shoot, even one fitted with a match trigger if it has not been adjusted correctly. Manufacturers will usually set their guns on the high side of a sensible weight for final let-off. For sporting rifles, the trigger will release at a pull weight of about one pound – and sometimes much more. Still, air rifles are usually fitted with a half-decent trigger from standard, which is more than can be said for many firearms which are far from allowing a good, controlled pull of the trigger without moving the gun, and its barrel, off-target during the process. For this reason,…

While I would never describe an infestation of rats in the garden as being fortuitous, I would go as far as to say that the presence of rodents in my backyard has been handy over the past couple of weeks. I am writing this three weeks into the coronavirus lockdown, and being able to control nocturnal pests without having to leave my home has enabled me to put a new piece of thermal imaging kit through its paces without breaking government guidance on self-isolation and social distancing. The Saim SCL35 (IRay) arrived in a package from Optical Solutions a couple of weeks before we were all told to stay at home. Being too busy to set it up, I decided to try it out on some springtime rabbiting sessions over the…

Take a look at the array of PCPs on sale right now and you’ll find a similarly huge array of black rifles and bullpups, and that’s a good thing, because it means more choice for the shooter. But Webley is here with a reminder that amid all these militaristic-looking airguns, the making of a traditional sporter is far from being a lost art, thanks to the appropriately named Raider Classic. This multi-shot PCP costs less than £450 and comes with two high capacity magazines, offering 14 shots in .177 calibre, like the gun on test here, and 12 in .22. It’s definitely old school, as it has an ambidextrous sporter stock that’s made of walnut. Traditionalists don’t have it all their own way though, as this scope-only rifle features a…

FOR SALE: Artemis M16 PCP rifle in .22. Only had 50 pellets through, all went through the same hole. Comes with two magazines and silencer, all in original box. Only selling due to upgrade. Cost £415 plus £26 for spare magazine. Mint and new condition. £315. FOR SALE: Logun Eazi-glide pump. Nnever used, still in original box. Offers. Gregory Heath (Cambridgeshire). Tel: 07534 574406. FOR SALE: Feinwerkbau 300s. Not mint, but good condition, many medals to confirm accuracy. No marks or dings. Custom wood case. New breech and buffer seals last year. Piston ring in good condition. New ring with it. £275. FOR SALE: Rare Drulov 10 Condor target pistol, five-shot C02. Cased with all the tools, set of seals, unused set of selected pellets, buddy bottle and receipt from…

What type of shooting do you do? I started off Sporter while shooting with the Scouts, but always wanted to do Precision, so after proving to my parents I was dedicated enough, they purchased my first Precision air rifle. After a year I tried out .22 prone and loved it. I now shoot 3P smallbore as well as air rifle. How did you get started? Back in 2010, I got invited to shoot with the Scout group I was a member of, at the age of 10, after trying rifle shooting on our summer camp. I shot for one of the groups in the National Scout Championships where I was asked to join the national Scout squad. What motivates you? My motivation in shooting is the challenge to improve, get…

Optical clarity, a decent level of magnification and a useful reticle are probably the three main features shooters look for when choosing a new optic. Luckily for us, the Hawke Airmax 30 Touch is able to offer all these features – and more – in an overall package that’s far shorter and lighter than usual. The Touch has a standard 30mm body tube, but a small 32mm objective lens, which means it can be mounted a bit lower than normal if required. It’s only 266mm (10.5”) long and weighs 572g (20.2oz), making it a good choice for one of the numerous small rifles that are currently available. But even if carbines, semi-bullpups, regular bullpups or micro bullpups aren’t your thing, there’s nothing to stop you putting the Touch on a…

Anyone tasked with the control of grey squirrels will know that it’s a year-round job – take the pressure of these invasive rodents for just a few weeks and their numbers will soon bounce back. I have shot quite literally hundreds of squirrels since the autumn winds stripped the trees bare of their foliage. With the canopy open, it was easy to spot greys trying to hide up in the treetops, and the lean months of winter made them eager to visit feeding stations loaded with an enticing meal. Now that the trees are starting to leaf up again, it is easier for squirrels to go unnoticed. Fewer sightings can give the false impression that all the squirrels have gone, but that is unlikely to be the case. It is…

One of the most important contact points for the accurate shooting of any gun is that of the pistol grip. Most sporters, in other words guns that are not specifically designed for target shooting, will have a swept back pistol grip that allows the gun to be brought into the aim with relative speed. Guns that possess this feature will usually be designed for use in the field, hence the term ‘sporter’. The ability to bring the gun swiftly onto aim is obviously something that is inherently useful in a gun that might primarily be used for hunting, as it allows the gun to be positioned correctly for a swift shot where necessary. Obviously, other considerations such as the position of the cheekpiece will allow the shooter to gain the…

I’m concerned. Over the last few weeks we’ve been preoccupied by coronavirus, and rightly so. But before that it was the environment that was top of the agenda. The shooting industry isn’t immune to the mounting pressure to change our ways, and BBASC and a number of other countryside organisations have already said they would like to see lead phased out from shotgun cartridges over the next five years. After all, the manufacturers haven’t been sitting on their hands; lead-free pellets have been around for years, catering to those whose environmental conscience has been pricked, or those for whom such ammunition is a condition of their permission. I’m looking at a range of lead-free pellets from H&N and Gamo. I’d hoped to include some from RWS, but they didn’t leave…

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so they say, but I challenge anyone not to be seduced by the Walther CP88 Competition from Umarex. This gun has a longer barrel than the standard model, which should provide a modest increase in velocity and accuracy, but I suspect most people wanting this gun will be getting it for its looks alone as it’s a stunner, especially in the nickel finish seen here. The CP88 can trace its roots to the powder-burning Walther P88, a semi-automatic that was designed in 1988 for military and law enforcement use, hence its name. Eight years later, the P88 was discontinued in favour of the P88 Compact - a slightly lighter and smaller version of the gun. With an overall length of 180mm, Umarex’s…

Just after the Second World War, the first air pistol to use canned gas was released – and this was the Schimel. Prior to that, people could buy CO2 gas guns, but had to lug the large cylinders back to the gun shop for refilling. Even worse, some guns were designed to use these while being connected to them. But after eight gram bulbs were invented for soda dispensers, one designer wondered whether you could drop one of these bulbs into the grip of an air pistol and then pierce it. What a far out idea! And the famous Schimel pistol was born. Looking like the iconic wartime P.08 Luger, the Schimel even has a similar side-mounted release for the trigger. There’s no valve hammer as such, because pulling the…

Long-range shooting with airguns is on the rise, helped by the development of airgun slugs and the manufacturers’ willingness to create slug-friendly barrels to optimise their performance. Anyone wanting to take advantage of a rifle that can shoot accurately out to 100 yards and beyond will need a scope that’s up to the task, like the Tango4 4-16x44 FFP from SIG Sauer. Most shooters will be aware of SIG’s impressive line-up of rifles and pistols in both powder-burning and airgun format, but this company has a healthy optics division as well. The Tango4 range includes the first focal plane 4-16x44 scope seen here, but there’s also a 6-24x50 model, and both optics are available in a choice of milliradian or minute of angle reticles, courtesy of Highland Outdoors. The good…

We all wish for more – to play in that football team, to be part of that F1 pit crew, to star in the latest blockbuster film. So when Daystate introduced the ASP ‘Airgunners’ Support Pack’ to shooters who were wanting to be lent a top-of-the-range airgun in return for pictures and reports, I applied immediately. As I have been an avid shooter for most of my life and already held a love for the Daystate brand, it was a no-brainer and I knew I wanted to be part of the programme. It helped that I was already pretty well known to Daystate as I had been a collector of their Limited Edition rifles for some time and had pestered them on more than one occasion. The football, the F1,…

I have joined an airgun club. This is actually quite a big deal for me as I’m a shy person. Through several cruel twists of fate I’ve found myself in a job which often requires me to be uncharacteristically gregarious. This can be exhausting, so when I’m not at work I tend to avoid contact with people I don’t know. Just ask my wife how hard it is to get me to phone for a takeaway. To date, I’ve enjoyed shooting at Emmett & Stone’s pay and play airgun range in Buckinghamshire, but getting there involves a 45-minute tour of two of southern England’s finest motorways, plus the M25. So I’ve been looking at some closer options. It didn’t take much research to realise that these would all involve joining…

In the late 1990s, shotgunners here may have recognised the name Baikal when nobody else did. Parent company Izhmekh, or Izhevsky Mekhanichesky Zavod, was better known for its military weapons. The famous 9mm semi-automatic PM Pistolet Makarov had developed into a larger capacity Pistolet Makarova Modernizirovannyy, or PMM. Not that it mattered here, as we couldn’t shoot either due to the then-recent handgun ban. Off the back of this ban, legal restrictions were lifted on CO2 airguns, which very oddly included replica guns – work that one out! We didn’t complain as lovely revolver and semi-auto-style air pistols flooded in. Barely noticed, one little air pistol arrived by the back door – all the way from Russia. The boffins at Izhmekh had decided to create an air pistol based on…

Rolling development is a popular word in the marketing of modern air rifles, but is actually a very wise approach to design. After all, why should manufacturers replace a successful model with something else just because there’s pressure on them to unveil a new piece of hardware every time a shooting show opens its gates? Surely it makes more sense to tweak and improve something that works. And rolling development has just given a huge boost to Brocock’s already brilliant British air rifles. The range has recently been treated to the XR treatment, which means their cocking and loading mechanisms have been updated with a slick sidelever system and they’ve had their firing cycle enhanced. It may only sound like a small change, but in this case it has made…

Say the name ‘Rifle’ and most shooters will think of a gun, but in this case we’re talking airgun ammunition. Rifle is a Brazilian pellet manufacturer, and despite the odd name this company’s products have been used to win medals at Olympic and World Cup levels. I’ve previously tested Rifle’s Premium Series Round in .177, so this time I’m focusing on the .22 variety. While these pellets are called Round, the head looks a little squashed, reminding me of a chess piece. The ones I’ve been evaluating come in a tin of 500, but these pellets can also be bought in tins of 125 and 250 if you want to test the water before committing yourself. The tin is sturdier than usual, has a screw-top lid, which is always a…