Well, it's been a few weeks since I last posted. I've since become a father once again (yay!), so I've been taking it easy for the online activities. Anyhow, I have a few moments between diaper changes and such, and since my son is sick today, I'm home with him. He's napping now, so I have an opportunity to get back into the swing of posting here.
Well, lots to post about, and we can talk parenthood and fatherhood and childrearing and what not in future posts for sure, but for the avid air gun and air rifle enthusiasts out there, I want to make sure I put a review in your hands of what I consider to be the absolute best air rifle that I have owned thus far. It is the RWS (rebranded Hammerli by Umarex) Air Magnum 850, in 22 caliber. This is, without a doubt, the sweetest shooting CO2-powered rifle one can get their hands on. In Canada, this baby requires you to have a gun licence, or a PAL, so if you want one of these, go for your CFSC safety course and exams and be prepared to wait a bit, not to mention the mandatory registration of this rifle with the Canadian federal long-gun registry.
First, a little about the rifle. It is an all-black synthetic stock CO2 rifle, which uses an 88gram canister. I guess for those who play paintball, you'd be used to 88g markers, but make no mistake, this ain't no paintball gun, folks (the fact that you need a firearms licence to possess would make that obvious). It comes in .177 and .22 caliber, but why anyone would want the .177, I do not know. It weights around 5.5lbs, and is a little over 40" long (maybe 43 or 44"). It has rails built-in, should you wish to add scoping optics. It uses an 8-round cylinder magazine, which is extremely well made. It also features and automatic safety, and it uses a bolt action system. The factory specs on velocity for .177 and .22 are 760FPS and 655FPS respectively. On a 88g cartridge, the manufacturers say that you can get around 200 shots with it.
At around $250.00 + tax, this rifle is not one of the cheaper ones. But once you get the box in your hands, you'll know that like anything else, if you want quality, you're going to have to pay for it. The rifle arrives in a fairly large box, which upon closer inspection is actually a fitted foam box with an outer wrap-around cardboard shell. Regardless, you should know that your rifle will not arrive damaged. It is packaged really well, with the rifle itself being wrapped in a plastic bag, and includes a nice big bag of silica salt to ward off moisture (of course, I just bought a huge box of silica salt the week before, but that is neither here nor there). It comes with a manual, and two 8-shot magazines. You'll have to buy your own CO2, but that's OK, since they're around five to six bucks per 88g canister.
The feel and weight of the gun is really good, even for my stature. The CO2 is inserted in the front of the gun in compartment, of which the snappable plastic cover removes quite easily (the downside is that it feels a little too plasticky and can eventually break). The CO2 canister is screwed in tightly and then turned about a 1/4 turn counterclockwise (don't worry, the gas will only leak for about one second). Now, with 200 shots, you're probably thinking whether it's wise to get this, since you may not use 200 shots and as such, be releasing the rest of the gas out, wasting it. I know of this concern, as I had it myself, but in looking further and talking with airgun experts, it is actually OK to leave your CO2 cartridges in your rifles and pistols, despite what the manufacturers say. More damage can be done to the O-rings if you were to release the gas manually, freezing the rings. Besides, leaving the gas cartridges in the gun keeps the seals from drying out, and dust out as well. I've done this with no adverse effect on any of my CO2 guns. Still, if you're ultra-paranoid, you can always buy the additional attachment that allows you to use two (2) 12g cartridges instead of a single 88g unit. However, the adapter runs around $100.00, and in my opinion, is not a worthwhile expenditure.
The automatic safety is right on the back of the breech, and you need to manually disengage it with your thumb before taking the next shot (it's a two-stage safety, more or less, with a bigger external button and one inset button that have to be pressed to disengage the safety). This is OK the first time, but when you have to do this 100+ times in a row, it gets a bit annoying.
The bolt, I will have to say, is one of the nicest features on the rifle. It is a huge side bolt and pulls back very nicely. The cylinder magazine is loaded from the left hand side and is locked into place by a switch on the same side. The rifle features fiber-optic sights, but no doubt you'll want to put a scope on this thing. Another additional item you can add is the muzzle-brake, to give it a more tactical look (my wife thought it looked like a silencer, but it's not, since silencers are illegal in Canada).
OK, performance. I found that out of the box, the 850 Air Magnum will shoot around 620FPS when chronied. Now, for a firearms-grade airgun, that may seem rather low, but this is not a hunting rifle, and you can't expect supersonic performance with CO2 anyway. This is probably the fastest and most powerful CO2-powered gun you can buy. Of course, bear in mind that with CO2, the faster you shoot a repeating airgun, the lower your velocity will drop. So while you can probably train yourself to cycle the bolt and safety pretty quickly, don't expect consistent velocity as a result. This rifle's use is really in plinking, target shooting and if you must, small rodent control (and I mean small rodents). The report of the rifle (sound) is not too bad - lot loud at all, and shooting decent groups is possible (provided you have a half-decent scope attached - I use the Bushnell Sportsman 3-9x32mm with AO).
I don't believe you get get a better rifle for the money. There's not a whole lot of .22 caliber CO2 rifles out there anyway, and even less in the firearms-rated range, so this is definitely a must-have for any airgun enthusiast.
JUNE 2008 EDIT: It has become abundantly clear to me that this gun is not designed for Crosman Premier Hollowpoint .22 pellets. Avoid these at all costs. The intial few were fine, but then I started experiencing extreme jamming when the cylinder magazine was cycled. Then somehow, one of the pellets fell back into the bolt action (DO NOT LOAD THE MAGAZINE WITH THE RIFLE POINTING UP). That jammed the bolt action to the point where I could not even remove the magazine since the bolt pin was in the way. Eventually, through shaking it here and here I managed to get the magazine out, but then the bolt would only retract 90%, which of course is useless. I was about 10 seconds from looking to disassemble it (and knowing me, I would have likely destroyed the gun as a result), when I put a Q-tip into what I could see of the bolt and trigger assembly and did some more shaking, and lo and behold, the bolt cycles now. That being said, I looked online and from the people who have experienced similar bolt problems, they said it is either Crosman Premier's or Beeman pellets that contribute to these problems - not to mention a poorly designed cylinder magazine with which the pellets can fall out, skirt-first, into the action. I have read that RWS Hollowpoints or RWS Hobby pellets are the only way to go here, as the mag is only designed for RWS (but not Superpoints). *sigh*
Showing posts with label co2. Show all posts
Showing posts with label co2. Show all posts
Friday, March 28, 2008
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Beretta M92FS .177 Caliber CO2 Pistol Review
Just like anything else in life, you get what you pay for. Just like there are cheap cars out there (a colleague of mine years ago rolled into work in his new Kia Rio subcompact car, which he said cost him under $10,000) and there are your more higher end cars like Lexus and BMW. Hard to be able to compare a Lexus and a Kia.
I recently discovered that sometimes it's not just name or brand recognition that differentiates similar products in varying price brackets. Most of my CO2 air pistols I have purchased for under $100.00 each. And I can tell some of the contributing factors to the cheap price - more plastic parts, less features, etc. But I was OK paying for more cheaper construction, as long as there was a decent modicum of quality in the gun.
Well, I recently thought I'd splurge a bit (last month or December - don't remember exactly when) and I dropped over $200.00 for the Beretta M9FS .177 Caliber CO2 Pistol. I have seen this in the catalogs and have been interested in checking it out. Now, there is a BB version, but as an aspiring competitive sport shooter, I wasn't going to make the same mistake as I did when I bought the Crosman T4. I am not interested in backyard plinking or in shooting tin cans. My desire is to acquire rifled steel barrel pellet guns that are decent for accuracy on paper targets. I was pretty sure that the M92FS wasn't going to be match-grade, but I thought I'd pick it up nonetheless.
Now I know why the gunshop is constantly out of these (I had to put myself on a 3-month long waiting list, before mine came in). This is a fabulous gun in almost every regard, from presentation, look, feel, and especially performance. It was $200.00+ well spent, and I can honestly say that if it weren't for the fact that my wife and I are expecting a child anyday now, and I need to save my cash, I'd probably spring for the sister-version of this pistol, the Colt 1911A Government. But enough of my wish-lists - let's get on to the review of this pistol.
The first thing that you will notice when buying this gun is that it comes in a nice, compact, hard plastic, foam-insulated carrying case. It's not security lockable, but it is only a sub-500FPS airgun, afterall. The case does lock with standard plastic flaps, but it would have been nice to have a lockable loop where you can hang a padlock or a keyed lock. The pistol itself is fairly authentic in its look and feel (the weight is close to 3lbs, and if you've ever handled a "real" handgun before, you'll know that the weight is pretty close). The gun comes with two (2) 8-shot rotary cylinder magazines, though I already had a few that I bought for my CP Sport (the cylinder magazines are interchanged with the other Umarex guns - Walther, Colt, Beretta, Magnum Research, Inc., etc.).
By the way, as an aside, I should note that while this gun is branded Beretta, it's actually made by Umarex U.S.A. (who bought the branding rights for the airguns from the above manufacturers). Just like the Hammerli guns you see out there are all made by Umarex.
Asthetically, the version that I purchased was the all-black version (some refer to it as a slightly blued version), though it also comes in nickel (yuck) and you have the option of wood grips. Because mine was all-black, it came with the default plastic grips - in fact, the grips are the only thing plastic about the gun - it's solid metal pretty much everywhere else.
The gun is similar to the CP Sport in terms of how the 12 gram CO2 cartridge is loaded. In other words, it's a severe pain in the butt to load - at least for me. You need to press the grip release on the left-hand side, and that pops the opposing grip out. I originally assumed by sight that the grip and its connectors are all plastic, and inferred that over time I can see something breaking, with all the snapping in and out. However, as a subsequent edit to this review, it was pointed out to me by a couple of folks that there is actually a metal lining inside the grip, which I obviously missed. This reinforces the grip and really makes it difficult, if not impossible to break by indvertent mishandling. As a result, my assessment of the grip is no longer negative.
Anyway, after you pop out the opposing grip, you pull out the lockable feet (at the butt of the gun) and then turn the notched wheel to lower the CO2 retainer. Then you place the cartridge in, start turning the wheel again to more or less lock it in place (not too tight) and then snap the feet back into place so it locks - I experienced the need to do this a few times as I wasn't sure how tight to turn the wheel initially - I still don't have that sense). Now, some have suggested that this system is better than other guns, but from a simplicity standpoint, no one can convince me that the loading of the CO2 in this gun is comparable or easier than, say, a Crosman 2240 or a Crosman/Benjamin EB22, where you just unscrew a cap, put in the CO2 cartridge, tighten the cap, and press the trigger to puncture the 12g powerlet. But I digress...
After doing all this, then snap the grip back into place, and try to do a test fire after taking off the safety (which is conveniently one switch connected to both sides of the gun near the hammer in the back of the breech - you can flick it on/off easily, unlike the pressurized one on the CP Sport). As you probably know, it's OK to dry-fire CO2 powered guns, so go ahead and test it out.
This gun's metal rotary cylinder magazine is easy to load - the slide release switch is on the left hand side. Once the magazine is loaded, pull the slide to lock into place. As for aiming, you have the standard front and rear sights, with the rear site adjustable for windage. There are no rails on which you can mount accessories or sights (I originally thought there was, but a reader had corrected me on this).
Now onto performance. Surprisingly, this pistol is quite accurate. The trigger was a non-factor - I liked the feel and weight of the trigger and while I believe the trigger is adjustable, I didn't have to do any adjustments. For the first 16 shots, I was able to get decent groupings, though I was only at 10 yards. Add to this the adjustments I made in getting used to the pistol, and I was quite happy with the initial performance. I used Crosman standard .177 wadcutter pellets - I have lots of these el cheapo pellets, though I wouldn't mind trying RWS or even Gamo in the future to compare results.
The sound was reasonable, and didn't sound like a bomb exploding, like the EB22 does.
Perhaps the most surprising aspect of this pistol was its gas economy. On all my other guns, I get around 50-65 shots on one 12g CO2 canister. That is pretty good, all things considered...of course, that is standard fare from my experience (except for the EB22, which gets around 30). Once I hit the 60 shot range, I was expecting to call it a day. But for reasons I can't understand, the gun still had gas in it. In fact, it wasn't until I hit slightly over 100 (that's right, one hundred) shots - around the 106 mark - that the pellets started to bounce off the target, and I was literally out of gas. But by then, I had looked at my target and it was awash with cleanly punched pellet holes within about a 3 1/2" diameter (which I know from 10 yard is nothing special, but many of my other guns will group 5" or so - it could just be my unsteady hands and my bad eyesight - or the other guns).
Overall, this gun gets my highest recommendation. With only the cheap plastic grips and the obtuse Umarex CO2 loading mechanism as the exception, I cannot find enough good things to say about this gun. Apparently, there is a match/competition version, but that may be for another day. I was quite happy with the feel/look and performance on this pistol and for over $200.00, it was well worth the money, in my opinion, especially given its accuracy and its incredible gas economy. You won't be disappointed with the Beretta M92FS.
I recently discovered that sometimes it's not just name or brand recognition that differentiates similar products in varying price brackets. Most of my CO2 air pistols I have purchased for under $100.00 each. And I can tell some of the contributing factors to the cheap price - more plastic parts, less features, etc. But I was OK paying for more cheaper construction, as long as there was a decent modicum of quality in the gun.
Well, I recently thought I'd splurge a bit (last month or December - don't remember exactly when) and I dropped over $200.00 for the Beretta M9FS .177 Caliber CO2 Pistol. I have seen this in the catalogs and have been interested in checking it out. Now, there is a BB version, but as an aspiring competitive sport shooter, I wasn't going to make the same mistake as I did when I bought the Crosman T4. I am not interested in backyard plinking or in shooting tin cans. My desire is to acquire rifled steel barrel pellet guns that are decent for accuracy on paper targets. I was pretty sure that the M92FS wasn't going to be match-grade, but I thought I'd pick it up nonetheless.
Now I know why the gunshop is constantly out of these (I had to put myself on a 3-month long waiting list, before mine came in). This is a fabulous gun in almost every regard, from presentation, look, feel, and especially performance. It was $200.00+ well spent, and I can honestly say that if it weren't for the fact that my wife and I are expecting a child anyday now, and I need to save my cash, I'd probably spring for the sister-version of this pistol, the Colt 1911A Government. But enough of my wish-lists - let's get on to the review of this pistol.
The first thing that you will notice when buying this gun is that it comes in a nice, compact, hard plastic, foam-insulated carrying case. It's not security lockable, but it is only a sub-500FPS airgun, afterall. The case does lock with standard plastic flaps, but it would have been nice to have a lockable loop where you can hang a padlock or a keyed lock. The pistol itself is fairly authentic in its look and feel (the weight is close to 3lbs, and if you've ever handled a "real" handgun before, you'll know that the weight is pretty close). The gun comes with two (2) 8-shot rotary cylinder magazines, though I already had a few that I bought for my CP Sport (the cylinder magazines are interchanged with the other Umarex guns - Walther, Colt, Beretta, Magnum Research, Inc., etc.).
By the way, as an aside, I should note that while this gun is branded Beretta, it's actually made by Umarex U.S.A. (who bought the branding rights for the airguns from the above manufacturers). Just like the Hammerli guns you see out there are all made by Umarex.
Asthetically, the version that I purchased was the all-black version (some refer to it as a slightly blued version), though it also comes in nickel (yuck) and you have the option of wood grips. Because mine was all-black, it came with the default plastic grips - in fact, the grips are the only thing plastic about the gun - it's solid metal pretty much everywhere else.
The gun is similar to the CP Sport in terms of how the 12 gram CO2 cartridge is loaded. In other words, it's a severe pain in the butt to load - at least for me. You need to press the grip release on the left-hand side, and that pops the opposing grip out. I originally assumed by sight that the grip and its connectors are all plastic, and inferred that over time I can see something breaking, with all the snapping in and out. However, as a subsequent edit to this review, it was pointed out to me by a couple of folks that there is actually a metal lining inside the grip, which I obviously missed. This reinforces the grip and really makes it difficult, if not impossible to break by indvertent mishandling. As a result, my assessment of the grip is no longer negative.
Anyway, after you pop out the opposing grip, you pull out the lockable feet (at the butt of the gun) and then turn the notched wheel to lower the CO2 retainer. Then you place the cartridge in, start turning the wheel again to more or less lock it in place (not too tight) and then snap the feet back into place so it locks - I experienced the need to do this a few times as I wasn't sure how tight to turn the wheel initially - I still don't have that sense). Now, some have suggested that this system is better than other guns, but from a simplicity standpoint, no one can convince me that the loading of the CO2 in this gun is comparable or easier than, say, a Crosman 2240 or a Crosman/Benjamin EB22, where you just unscrew a cap, put in the CO2 cartridge, tighten the cap, and press the trigger to puncture the 12g powerlet. But I digress...
After doing all this, then snap the grip back into place, and try to do a test fire after taking off the safety (which is conveniently one switch connected to both sides of the gun near the hammer in the back of the breech - you can flick it on/off easily, unlike the pressurized one on the CP Sport). As you probably know, it's OK to dry-fire CO2 powered guns, so go ahead and test it out.
This gun's metal rotary cylinder magazine is easy to load - the slide release switch is on the left hand side. Once the magazine is loaded, pull the slide to lock into place. As for aiming, you have the standard front and rear sights, with the rear site adjustable for windage. There are no rails on which you can mount accessories or sights (I originally thought there was, but a reader had corrected me on this).
Now onto performance. Surprisingly, this pistol is quite accurate. The trigger was a non-factor - I liked the feel and weight of the trigger and while I believe the trigger is adjustable, I didn't have to do any adjustments. For the first 16 shots, I was able to get decent groupings, though I was only at 10 yards. Add to this the adjustments I made in getting used to the pistol, and I was quite happy with the initial performance. I used Crosman standard .177 wadcutter pellets - I have lots of these el cheapo pellets, though I wouldn't mind trying RWS or even Gamo in the future to compare results.
The sound was reasonable, and didn't sound like a bomb exploding, like the EB22 does.
Perhaps the most surprising aspect of this pistol was its gas economy. On all my other guns, I get around 50-65 shots on one 12g CO2 canister. That is pretty good, all things considered...of course, that is standard fare from my experience (except for the EB22, which gets around 30). Once I hit the 60 shot range, I was expecting to call it a day. But for reasons I can't understand, the gun still had gas in it. In fact, it wasn't until I hit slightly over 100 (that's right, one hundred) shots - around the 106 mark - that the pellets started to bounce off the target, and I was literally out of gas. But by then, I had looked at my target and it was awash with cleanly punched pellet holes within about a 3 1/2" diameter (which I know from 10 yard is nothing special, but many of my other guns will group 5" or so - it could just be my unsteady hands and my bad eyesight - or the other guns).
Overall, this gun gets my highest recommendation. With only the cheap plastic grips and the obtuse Umarex CO2 loading mechanism as the exception, I cannot find enough good things to say about this gun. Apparently, there is a match/competition version, but that may be for another day. I was quite happy with the feel/look and performance on this pistol and for over $200.00, it was well worth the money, in my opinion, especially given its accuracy and its incredible gas economy. You won't be disappointed with the Beretta M92FS.
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Beretta CX-4 Storm Semi-Automatic .177 Carbine Review
For those airgun enthusiasts who are looking for the ultimate tactical unit, I'd encourage you to check out the Beretta CX-4 Storm. This gun is not very easy to get - you won't find it at your local sporting store per se, since one of the well-known airgun collectors in Toronto told me recently when I visited his shop, that if there is one gun that is an exact replica of the "real thing", but uses gas-powered powerplants, it is the CX-4. Most stores don't want to carry it, just in case some psycho decides to buy it and then hold up a bank with it (or worse). Until recently, I only saw photos of the unit, and when comparing it to the actual CX-4 in photos, you will be hard-pressed to see the difference. Even in real life, it looks pretty authentic (some airguns look absolutely cheesy, but not this one).
Now, some quick comments on it. If you're looking for power, this is not the gun for you. On a typical shooting chrony (I have an F1 model), the Canadian model will get around 350-380 FPS on it (despite what the box says), well under the Canadian legal limit of 500 FPS. Apparently the U.S. version will go up to 600, but in all honestly, CO2 semi-autos as a general rule cannot fire the projectiles at a consistent rate with rapid pulls of the trigger - the colder the environment (and with each firing the CO2 canister gets considerably colder) - the slower the pellet travels. It uses .177 caliber pellets so we're talking not a whole lot of power here. All that being said, the big selling point to this carbine is the fact that it uses a 30-shot rotating belt-style magazine, which is very uncommon for airguns. As mentioned, it is a semi-automatic, that is powered by an 88gram CO2 canister. Some people have written that this airgun is good for target practice (I say yes) as well as personal defence (I would vehemently say no - most airguns are very poor self-defence choices, due to lack of power - the ones you get that are over 500FPS are usually rifles, and even then you are looking at mostly .177 caliber, which is fine for hunting birds and squirrels and such, but hardly has the stopping power for the two-legged variety of varmints.
You can get some mountable options such as scopes and laser sights for this. Even with open sights, the adjustment is interesting - the front sight adjusts for elevation, while the rear sight adjusts for windage. The carbine is fairly light at around 5 lbs., and its length is around 30 inches (maybe slightly more). Of course, the thing is black as night.
If you are looking for this airgun, you can get it through airgun-specific shops like D&L Airguns out of B.C., or you can find some local private dealers that can buy them directly from the manufacturer (if you live in the Toronto area and don't know any, just email me and let me know). At a little under $300.00 for these things, they aren't cheap, but if you're wanting the tactical look and don't care about the power loss, I'd say that it's a pretty good deal.
Now, some quick comments on it. If you're looking for power, this is not the gun for you. On a typical shooting chrony (I have an F1 model), the Canadian model will get around 350-380 FPS on it (despite what the box says), well under the Canadian legal limit of 500 FPS. Apparently the U.S. version will go up to 600, but in all honestly, CO2 semi-autos as a general rule cannot fire the projectiles at a consistent rate with rapid pulls of the trigger - the colder the environment (and with each firing the CO2 canister gets considerably colder) - the slower the pellet travels. It uses .177 caliber pellets so we're talking not a whole lot of power here. All that being said, the big selling point to this carbine is the fact that it uses a 30-shot rotating belt-style magazine, which is very uncommon for airguns. As mentioned, it is a semi-automatic, that is powered by an 88gram CO2 canister. Some people have written that this airgun is good for target practice (I say yes) as well as personal defence (I would vehemently say no - most airguns are very poor self-defence choices, due to lack of power - the ones you get that are over 500FPS are usually rifles, and even then you are looking at mostly .177 caliber, which is fine for hunting birds and squirrels and such, but hardly has the stopping power for the two-legged variety of varmints.
You can get some mountable options such as scopes and laser sights for this. Even with open sights, the adjustment is interesting - the front sight adjusts for elevation, while the rear sight adjusts for windage. The carbine is fairly light at around 5 lbs., and its length is around 30 inches (maybe slightly more). Of course, the thing is black as night.
If you are looking for this airgun, you can get it through airgun-specific shops like D&L Airguns out of B.C., or you can find some local private dealers that can buy them directly from the manufacturer (if you live in the Toronto area and don't know any, just email me and let me know). At a little under $300.00 for these things, they aren't cheap, but if you're wanting the tactical look and don't care about the power loss, I'd say that it's a pretty good deal.
Friday, August 3, 2007
Gamo Recon Combo Scoped Rifle - A Great Value
I had the opportunity recently to test out a few air rifles that have been available for some time. Without having a PAL, I was legally limited to the under 495FPS set, which is really all I need, since I don't hunt and as a result, I don't need the additional firepower. Both rifles that I tried use standard .177 calibre lead pellets. Both are fairly entry level rifles.
I tried the Crosman Quest first (500 model). Not bad, but a bit too much of a heavy trigger. Seemed kind of heavy as well. Plus, I did not really like the wood stock. Cocking effort is not bad (most air rifles are break-barrel, which means that you literally pull the front of the barrel downward in order to build the air pressure in the rifle), and accuracy is OK. Sometimes, the pellets jammed in the Quest, so it wasn't a 100% good experience.
What I really liked was the Gamo Recon Combo. It's called a combo because it comes with a mountable scope (don't have the specs with me, but I believe it was an entry level 4 x 20). Now, Gamo is a Spanish company, and for whatever reason, people either like their guns or hate their guns. I think it's more the pistols that are on the crappier side, but I was impressed with the Recon Combo. I found it to be a slightly lighter rifle (around 4.5 pounds, compared to the Quest at between 5.5 - 6 pounds - and then there was the Hammerli 490C which was a whopping 8lbs.), and a a result, a shorter rifle, so it feels good in the hands of someone who is not that tall, and is asthetically pleasing to the eye as well (especially with the thumb holes in the stock). The trigger pull is of reasonable weight, and accuracy is really good, given the price of the unit - you do need to adjust your windage and elevation to get the rifle to shoot decently - once you set it, though, you can be assured of decent shots. The only downside is that the scope is pretty cheap and not that great quality (can't expect much else for the price), but at least it's included. The only other problem is that it appears to be pretty picky with the pellets. While it's true that most guns have their own preference (based on manufacturing, etc.) on what pellets it likes, this rifle seems to be extremely picky and that a change of pellet brand may cause some major differences in where the groups land, not to mention, causing constant adjustments to the scope. Of course, that is fixed by just using the same kind of pellets (find what you want that works) and getting a totally different scope (RWS, Bushnell).
The rifle does have several safety features including anti-bear trap locking mechanisms - it's not a big deal anyway, since the cocking effort you can do pretty easily. It has a manual safety as well as a trigger safety. It has a tactical look with a thumbhole in the stock for comfort and ease. It has a rifled bull barrel, and has an all-weather synthetic finish. Yes, there are some plastic parts, but that's OK. I haven't had a chance to chrony this thing yet, but since the box has 525FPS and the PAL limit is under 500, I'll assume it's 495FPS or thereabouts.
I tried the Crosman Quest first (500 model). Not bad, but a bit too much of a heavy trigger. Seemed kind of heavy as well. Plus, I did not really like the wood stock. Cocking effort is not bad (most air rifles are break-barrel, which means that you literally pull the front of the barrel downward in order to build the air pressure in the rifle), and accuracy is OK. Sometimes, the pellets jammed in the Quest, so it wasn't a 100% good experience.
What I really liked was the Gamo Recon Combo. It's called a combo because it comes with a mountable scope (don't have the specs with me, but I believe it was an entry level 4 x 20). Now, Gamo is a Spanish company, and for whatever reason, people either like their guns or hate their guns. I think it's more the pistols that are on the crappier side, but I was impressed with the Recon Combo. I found it to be a slightly lighter rifle (around 4.5 pounds, compared to the Quest at between 5.5 - 6 pounds - and then there was the Hammerli 490C which was a whopping 8lbs.), and a a result, a shorter rifle, so it feels good in the hands of someone who is not that tall, and is asthetically pleasing to the eye as well (especially with the thumb holes in the stock). The trigger pull is of reasonable weight, and accuracy is really good, given the price of the unit - you do need to adjust your windage and elevation to get the rifle to shoot decently - once you set it, though, you can be assured of decent shots. The only downside is that the scope is pretty cheap and not that great quality (can't expect much else for the price), but at least it's included. The only other problem is that it appears to be pretty picky with the pellets. While it's true that most guns have their own preference (based on manufacturing, etc.) on what pellets it likes, this rifle seems to be extremely picky and that a change of pellet brand may cause some major differences in where the groups land, not to mention, causing constant adjustments to the scope. Of course, that is fixed by just using the same kind of pellets (find what you want that works) and getting a totally different scope (RWS, Bushnell).
The rifle does have several safety features including anti-bear trap locking mechanisms - it's not a big deal anyway, since the cocking effort you can do pretty easily. It has a manual safety as well as a trigger safety. It has a tactical look with a thumbhole in the stock for comfort and ease. It has a rifled bull barrel, and has an all-weather synthetic finish. Yes, there are some plastic parts, but that's OK. I haven't had a chance to chrony this thing yet, but since the box has 525FPS and the PAL limit is under 500, I'll assume it's 495FPS or thereabouts.
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