Air Rifle Thread

I'm looking for a good, scoped air rifle for a squirrel and chipmunk problem I have in my back yard. Anyone think they've found the perfect rifle? Please share your wisdom.

I've had lots of fun with my Gamo Big Cat 1200.

http://www.gamousa.com/product.aspx?productID=235&product=Big%20Cat%C2%AE%201200%20.177%20cal.

There is a Chinese version of the old Crossman 160 bolt action CO2 rifle that has a huge following. Its is cheap at under a hundred dollars and can be easily modified into a multi shot. I have one with a custom stock, modified valve, Scope and 8 shot magazine. It really has taken the squirrel population down a notch in my neighbor hood.

Check Archer Airguns.

Chip.

If you want clean kills on squirrels go for a high power model. Those 500 fps and under rifles do not make clean kills.

That is awesome! I've got a walther breakbarrel I like, but that's the next level. +1 on the power, you'll need at least 1200FPS and some flathead pellets. Good clean fun!

I picked up a Gamo wispier varmint hunter. comes with a great scope. 0ed it at 30 yards and it's deadly at 75. It ant cheep but it's worth it.

http://www.gamousa.com/product.aspx?product=Whisper VH&productID=286

If I were looking for something to actually take out small rodents rather than just plinking, I'd be looking at Beeman breakbarrels.

Single shot, break barrel pump are the best air rifles around. I have a German RWS Diana with a wood stock that I purchased in Greece when I was a kid. This thing is a seriously accurate and powerful rifle. 1200+ fps. I used to pick off individual crows out of the sky with this thing.

RWS model 34 is a good entry level gun. If you are wanting to thin the squirrel population, I'd opt for the .22 cal over the .177.

If you buy a spring operated gun and want a scope, purchase a scope designed to handle the double recoil of springers, regular rifle scopes have a short lifespan when mounted on these guns.

http://www.airgundepot.com/22caliber-air-rifles.html
I would personally look to the .22 caliber air rifles, 950 FPS with a 22 is close to 22 short cartridge power.

Air Arms Prosport in .22 with a 4x40 scope, its a spring gun with a sliding breach and cocking lever on the underside that is flush withe stock line, looks great, works fantastic

nothing more to say

Break barrels are OK but can loose accuracy imho

Hay Ewe

These are just part of my collection, Ive been shooting and collecting airguns for 35 years. I own a cronograph and none of these high powered air rifles gets 1200 feet per second. Very few spring piston rifles shoot in that range unless they are dieseling. Just my 2 cents

Feinwerkbeau 124 D Custom Stock, Custom Barrel, Paul Watts tune


Air Arms TX200 Mk III Maccari Stock, Paul Watts Tuned


Daystate Huntsman Precharged Pnuematic

If you have the wallet. An ISP Spartan takes some beating.

Chip, real nice collection you have there. Used to drool over the Feinwerkbeau's top end models as a young adult, just couldn't afford them. I have owned numerous Beeman break barrel springers and the only one of them I was comfortable shooting ground squirrels with was the R10 in .20 cal and would drop a squirrel dead cleanly. Most the .177 calibre, especially high FPS versions are piss-poor at stopping small game as even blunt or semi-hollowpoint pass right through with little stopping power. Several years ago I made the big purchase, at least for my cheap ass, and bought a Webley FX2000. This is a precharged eight shot bolt action repeater with drop in load carriers. I had it tuned slightly hotter and in .22 cal get a good 28 shots of 920 fps before I need to pump it back up. With a silencer on it makes for enjoyable outing staking out the ground squirel lairs littering the fields around here. The precharged are nice in that there is no recoil to speak of and accuracy is very good. I bought four drop in cartridges so I can go right through my shots in no time at all, then reload the cartridges and recharge the gun. I would highly suggest Pyramid Air as I have had nothing but good experiences with those folks.


http://www.pyramydair.com/cgi-bin/show.pl?cmd_category=show&category_id=2

K.B.

The Gamo .177 with pointed hallow points will fire through a deer skull at 45 yards. and at 50 I can take cloths pins off a line. I think a head shot will stop a squirrel with ease. and I really don't think it would survive a chest shot.

i got mine to take out feral cats.

I do agree a .22cal would have more punch. I got mine at bass pro. they have a nice selection of air riffles and you can pic them up and hold them ... i got the Wisper because of the scope and stock it had. had the best fill for my long arms and the scope was NICE...

I had a 124 also.. a "regular". I put a peep sight on it. A wonderful and fine gun.

I've enjoyed my RWS 34 for more than 15 years. It shoots plenty hard, and it's probably capable of better accuracy than am I.

Here are a couple pistol for you who love short barrels

Crosman Mach 1 "LD" by Mac1 airguns. This is a fully custom limited production 22 cal pistol



Crosman 2240 with Valve work, Custom Breech, Laser, Custom grips & Trophy Red Dot site, Oh and a dead Ground Hog

Not arguing that a .177 can kill a squirrel or not, it is just the efficiency in which it does the job. Ground squirrels by their nature make it pretty easy with them poking their heads out of their holes to see what is going on around them; it's either a head shot or a miss. I really hate the idea of wounding an animal to have it slowly die from infection opposed to a clean kill.

And cats with a .177? Sorry but even a head shot will often result in a nasty wound and not instant death, the cat will eventually die but the manner in which it dies is pretty brutal. The .22 can push a 15 grain pellet nearly as fast as a .177 with a 9 grain pellet and has almost double the energy at impact. Plus the .177 hollow points do not so much mushroom as the skirt accordians to the head, the .22 will actually open up a bit plus the skirt accordians.

For some one going out to buy something new, I would highly suggest buying up to what you are comfortable paying and buy the larger calibre from the start. It will afford you a wider range of animals in the varmint world and long term cost is marginal in cost of pellets. Having had at least nine different springers over the years, I would highly suggest spending up to the precharge pneumatics if it is possibly in your budget.



K.B.

That is pretty sweet pistol, who did the custom work for you? Curious what kind of fps you are getting with the .22 in that pistol? Definitely something I could see adding to the arsenal.



K.B.