Crosman T4 .177 Caliber Repeater Airgun Review

I've been on some airgun forums lately, where people have asked about the Crosman T4. If you do a search of the internet, there are very few extensive reviews on the pistol. So I thought I'd do people a favour and write up a short little blurb about this glock replica. If you have any questions on the pistol, feel free to email me or post your question here.

The Crosman T4 is more or less modelled after the 1088 series. There are two flavours of the T4 - standalone or OPs. The OPs come with some additional tactical accessories, and naturally, carries a heftier price tag. Since I don't own an OPs, I'll just review the basic T4.

Based on my limited, and often-failing memory, the T4 kit includes shooting glasses, a 250-tin of wadcutter pellets, a couple of CO2 canisters, and some paper targets. The T4 also comes with two (2) 8-round clips, and will shoot 177 caliber pellets OR BBs (oh yeah, the kit also comes with a small baggie of steel BBs). Do not use airsoft ammo for this. For safety, the T4 kit comes with a cross-bolt safety switch, as well as a keyed trigger-guard safety mechanism (just like anything else, don't rely on these alone for your safety). I believe the velocity on the .177 pellets is something like 430, while the BBs are around 460.

The first thing that impressed me about the T4, even before I tried it out, is the look. It looks like a cool pistol, unlike many of the airguns out there, which may perform well and may even be used in official olympic match competitions, but look rather lame. It has a reasonably good resemblance to a glock pistol (don't brandish it in public, just like any other airgun), and despite what people say, how the pistol looks has an impact on your mindset when you take it to the range or wherever. Try taking those silly airsoft guns that are clear (the ones with the orange tip at the end) to any range - even if it shoots 1000FPS, you'll have a hard time taking it seriously. Anyhow, the CO2 canister for the T4 is inserted via the back of the grips (butt of the gun), which flip outward toward you. You insert the canister and then close the grips. Now, this next part I am unsure of, but either the canister is punctured when you close the grips or when you fire the pistol. A number of people have tried to convince me of the latter, but I believe it is the former, because if you don't quite close the back handle properly, you will start hearing the CO2 leak. Maybe I just did it wrong, who knows.

You pre-load your pellets or BBs (do not mix and match) into the 8-round magazine, push down the lever on the left side of the slide to engage the loading port, and then literally drop the magazine in the port with the ratchet side facing forward, and hope for the best. This brings me to my first issue with the T4 - the silly loading mechanism, and its subsequent problems. The T4 that I bought had problems right at the outset with pellets intermittently (I should say regularly, since it's more around 75-80% of the time) being jammed in the magazine and not firing. I consulted an enthusiast in the U.S. who also have owned numerous 1088s and T4s and he told me that the T4 has a problem with indexing, due to the nature of how the rounds are loaded. Basically, because the magazine is dropped in the port, there may be misalignment problems. As a result, when the magazine spins, the pellet is not quite lined up with the barrel and subsequently will hit the inside of the barrel and go back into the magazine. I found this to be the case, as upon opening up the loading port and removing the magazine, I saw nicks and depressions on the pellets - not only were they wasted, but it also wasted the CO2 as well as potentially damaging your gun long term. After owning the T4 for only a month or so, I had it shipped back to Crosman Canada for a replacement. To Crosman's credit, they not only replaced the pistol, but gave me a brand new pistol kit (it is completely plastic sealed, like many things you find at CostCo - you need scissors to open up the package). The replacement T4 no longer had the indexing problem, but right away, the lever that opens up the loading port no longer works (it gets jammed, though I can alternately open the loading port but pulling back the slide with one hand, while I push the lever down with the other - it's annoying but I'd prefer this problem over the indexing one). I'd send it back to Crosman, but I don't want to get a replacement gun that has the indexing problem.

As for CO2 life. It is very disappointing. For a 12 gram canister, I get maybe 25 - 30 shots. Which is absolutely terrible considering the fact that the 2240 can take about 40-60 shots before the CO2 is expended. It may be a leak in the T4s seals, but I've heard others who have mentioned the same thing, so I would imagine it's by design.

Performance. Well, I knew when I got it, that it did not have a rifled barrel, so I wasn't expecting great results. I don't measure groupings, so I can't comment, but I can say that with open sights, it was pretty bad. Thankfully, I was at a range that had backstops and what not. There is a manually adjustable rear sight, but I don't think that makes a difference, and it's not me, because I shoot much better with a 2240, or a Walther CP Sport. I haven't tried the BBs yet, and have no desire to do so, since I'm only interested in target shooting and the wadcutters are great to use for that.

The pistol feels very plasticky (because it is) and is heavier than your average air pistol. The feel of the grips is OK, but not great.

Overall, I was disappointed in the pistol. Crosman has produced better guns at less cost. While the pistol looked cool, some of the issues with it eroded the asethetically pleasing initial impressions. For a beginner plinker, it may be fine, but if you want to get better with your target shooting, you'll probably want to look at another product.