American Airguns Blog

Back to 800

2009-10-12T22:37:00.005-05:00

When the HW97 first came out back in 1994 the velocity advertised in the Beeman catalog was only 800 fps. As I remember it, most of the velocities for the catalogs were measured using the Beeman Silver Bear pellets, which only weights 7.1 grains so the actual power level of the original HW97 rifle was only 10 ft lbs of energy.

I remember my first HW97 that I bought for $330 in 1994 only shot about 10.5-11 ft lbs after it broke in and stopped dieseling. However, it was very smooth and accurate. My second HW97 that I bought from Bob Zimmerman a few years later shot much the same. In fact, it is even more accurate than my #1 rifle. I once shot a 60 shot FT match with it shooting at 775 fps with Crosman Premier 7.9 pellets. FT back then didn't have straps or thigh rests and the max distance was 50 yards so the courses were a bit easier than today. At any rate, I shot a 56x60 with that HW97 shooting only 775 fps and was only 3 shots off the top PCP shooter that day. The HW97 Mk1 (the 25mm piston) really shoots well at the 11-12 ft lb energy level.

Over the years I have had my rifles tuned and the power tuned up to get a bit more velocity. When tuned up the rifle would shoot accurately but had pretty sharp recoil. It would shoot accurately but it really required strict discipline to shoot consistently accurate. I shot a match last weekend with a home tune using an OX spring I picked up in the UK last July. The rifle shot hard but had some recoil.

I decided to go retro and re-tune the rifle back down to factory specs. After a little work, I had the rifle shooting right at 800 fps with Premiers with reduced recoil and very smooth firing cycle. The rifle shoots like I remembered it shooting years ago and I am really enjoying it. I am going to shoot it for a good while like this and enjoy the joys of lower power shooting!

My First Go At It

2009-07-25T11:52:00.002-05:00

I have been in the UK for the past week for work and had to stay over the weekend. Due to some work requirements, I had to hire a car on Thursday. So, of course, I was on the computer Thursday night to find some local airgun shops and clubs that I could visit over the weekend. I found Park Street Guns (http://www.gunshot.co.uk/) in St. Albans which is about 6 miles south of my hotel. I also found Lea Valley Airgun Club (http://www.lvagc.com/) that was about 15 miles east of my hotel.

I planned to go to LVAGC and Park Street on Saturday but as it turned out, I finished my business a little early on Friday afternoon so I headed down to Park Street to check out the gun shop. It is a small but quaint shop with a small selection of various airguns and equipment. The also had a nice selection of firearms and a lot of beautiful shotguns. The had a cabinet full of high end .22 rifles and nearly all of them had silencers. I spent a good bit of time in the shop looking and chatting with the guys there.

They told me that they had just received their first HW97KT which is a new model HW97 with a new thumbhole stock. I asked to see it but the rifle sold about an hour after it had showed up. I found a picture of one on the HW site and it is a nice looking rifle. They had a selection of OX springs so I picked up one for my 12 ft lbs TX200 and one for my HW97s.

Saturday morning rolled around and after sleeping in, I got up and headed to the Lea Valley Airgun Club. Driving on the "wrong" side of the road is a trip. The hardest thing for me is giving myself enough room on the left side of the car to get around stuff along side the road. I arrived at the range around 10:30 am and after a safety tour of the grounds by Bob Ruggles the chairman of the club, I bought some pellets and borrowed a nice BSA Scorpion from Bob and got to shooting. They have a pretty nice plinking range with lots of reactive Knockover targets (http://www.nockover-targets.co.uk/home.html).

I played there for about an hour and then headed over to what they locally called the Rest Field Target match. This is pretty much a Hunter Field Target match but the shooters can use any kind of rest they want to bring along. I just shot normal FT style sitting with my left fist on my knee and the rifle on my fist. I have found for me that this position is the most stable for me when I shoot a sporter rifle. The Scorpion had a 6x Walther scope mounted on it. It was different using such a low power for target shooting but I managed to a good bit of the targets and have a lot of fun too. Every one was nice and helpful. After a spot of tea and a snack, I was on my way back to my hotel.

It was a fun day of shooting and I was very happy to be able to find a good club so close to my location. Hopefully, if all goes well, I may have a chance to shoot with another club west of London tomorrow.

Stock interference with the trigger

2009-07-14T07:43:00.002-05:00

A few years ago I bought a DaveG stock for my HW97. It is the maroon HW97 ProHunter stock shown on his site (http://www.davegcustomstocks.com/hw97mainpage.html). Dave make wonderful stocks and I really like this particular model. I had my #1 HW97 in it for a long time but didn't shoot it much.

I pulled it out of the closet last month to shoot it at the Good Old Boys FT match. I decided to put my #2 action in this stock to shoot the match since it is a bit more accurate, but after stripping out the front stock mount I put the #1 action back in and sited in.

While the action was in my Macarri target stock and I adjusted the trigger and it was shooting nicely. After putting it in the ProHunter stock it shot well but the trigger seemed to be less consistent. I initially thought it was because I had swapped the powerplants between my two HW97s and the new powerplant had a bit more power. However, last night I found out the real reason.

I got my #2 action back from David Slade at Airgunswerks (http://www.airgunwerks.com/) after he fixed the stripped front stock mount and put it into the ProHunter. After mounting the 2 stage trigger suddenly became a single stage trigger and was pretty heavy. That wasn't right.

I figured that the trigger was contacting the stock somewhere so I removed the action from the stock and sure enough, the rear of the trigger housing was rubbing the rear inletting of the stock. So I got out my Dremel tool and opened up the rear of the inletting and widened the rest of the trigger inletting as well to give it plenty of room to breath. I thought that should take care of it but I found that the front of the inletting was also contacting the front of the bottom sear arm. After a few more seconds with the Dremel that problem was eliminated.

Now the trigger is free of the stock and work fabulously. This can be a problem with any custom stock and this stock was made without the aide of having an HW97 action to check it, so I can't blame DaveG. I should have thought of checking it with my action when I first received the stock. I had a similar problem with a CS800 stock I recently purchased from CustomStocks. I love the DaveG stock and I am glad that it is now ready to shoot!

Single Stage Match Triggers

2009-07-11T22:30:00.004-05:00

Most of my air rifles have two stage triggers, even most of my match rifles. The 2 stage trigger allows for a safe trigger while also providing a very light and crisp let off of the trigger. For a hunting rifle, the 2 stage trigger offers some additional safety as the trigger can be set so that if the gun is dropped it won't accidentally let off a shot.

I have a Falcon FN19 in a CS1000 stock that I bought a number of years ago to shoot Field Target. The rifle is very accurate and I tied for 5th place with it at the 2001 Nationals. I had forgot that I set the match trigger on the Falcon to single stage until I took it out a few weeks back. I had forgotten how much easier it seemed to shoot accurately with a single stage trigger.

The advantage of a single stage trigger is that all you have to do is lightly rest your trigger finger on the trigger and when you start to think about squeezing trigger it breaks and the shot is gone. I have found that as I pull through the first stage of a 2 stage trigger, I tend to tense up, which forces me to have to think about relaxing again before applying pressure to the second stage. If I don't pay attention to this tensing, I will push the shot low with the tension in my right shoulder or flinch the shot high but flexing my left arm (I use the over the arm position).

After shooting the Falcon for a while I found that I didn't tense up as much when preparing for the shots and that I tended to squeeze the trigger more consistently while also following through better. It was like a light bulb going off in my head, again.

I knew this from years past but had forgotten it when I went back to my HW97 spring gun. I was told from a very reliable and experienced source that the Rekord trigger works better with a longer first stage and a short, crisp second stage (it has to do with the design of the sear arms), anyways, my HW97 is set up with a 2 stage trigger. When I went back to shooting it I forgot what I had learned about the single stage match trigger.

After my single stage epiphany, I got out my AA ProTarget and re-adjusted the trigger to a single stage. Wow, what a difference. The ProTarget trigger is better than the Falcon as far as the adjustments available and after adjustments, it is pretty incredible. I can safely rest my finger on the trigger and when I start to apply pressure it will break. It is wonderful and makes shooting accurately easier.

I really have come to prefer a single stage match trigger for competition shooting. I think it will add shots to my score. I am going to go through all my match rifles and change the triggers on those that I can to a single stage trigger.

HW97 #1

2009-07-09T21:37:00.002-05:00

I bought my first adult airgun back in the late summer of 1994. It was an HW97 and it was one of the first ones sold in Florida. I bought it from Bob Koshler who lived at that time in the Tampa area. I was looking for a used FWB124 since my dad had one and I really liked it. Bob talked me into the HW97 and I haven't regretted buying it. I shot my first Field Target match later that year with that rifle and shot it exclusively for a number of years. Over the course of the first few years I shot thousands upon thousands of pellets through that rifle.

In recennt years #1 has set in the gun cabinet while I played with my other toys. I recently got it back out to shoot again and it shot wonderfully. The original HW97s were design for 12 ft lbs and I found that over time mine usually settled in around 11 ft lbs. After setting for a number of years it was only shooting around 760 fps or about 10 ft lbs. This is a bit low for field target but it sure shoot sweet at that power. It is so smooth and accurate at the lower power.

I had shot a lot of match in the olden days at 10-11 ft lbs and did quite well with it. I decided to take it out to a local FT match and ended up taking top piston honors. #1 is still a smooth shooting machine and I still enjoy shooting it. Over the years I have had #1 tuned for higher power but it just seems to like shooting in the 10-11 ft lbs range and I enjoy shooting it in that range. Trying to get the extra power just made the shooting cycle a bit harsher so I am going to leave it at the lower power and enjoy it.

#1 is now an old boy at 15 years old but it is still shooting like a champ.

Field Targets and Splits

2009-05-13T20:45:00.002-05:00

I have been working on a new gravity fall field target design over the past few months. The design is a combination of a couple other target designs with my own improvments added in. I had always thought that gravity targets were split resistant in that any split would not take down the target.

That had always been a problem with spring loaded targets, with the trip point set down to 2-3 ft. lbs. a moderate split would take down the target. The main reason for this is that the target mechanism is "prelocked" by the spring pulling (or pushing) the face back into the sear mechanism. The gravity fall target don't have this problem, or so I thought.

After testing a couple of my new targets I realized that minimal split would still take the target down. This confounded me. I did more testing and found that if the nose of the pellet hit on the inside of the kill zone, the paddle swung back and the face fell. Since my target was based partly on a couple other designs, I decided to see how those targets handled a split. As it turns out those targets also reacted the same way, if the nose of the pellet made it inside the kill zone the target went down. I have a version of just about every target type every made and so I tried them all and to a target, every one of them reacted the same way.

It makes sense too. The face has a much bigger mass than the pellet and with the nose of the pellet hitting on the inside of kill zone only a small amount of energy is transfered to the face while the rest of the pellet continues to travel forward and hitting the paddle. The face moves back very slowly due to the small amount of energy applied to the it while the paddle gets hit with most of the pellets energy, which drives it back faster and harder. So, the face won't lock up the mechanism fast enough or hard enough to prevent the the face from falling.

If the pellet nose hits on or outside the killzone edge, everything locks up and the face won't fall. I didn't have a target with the kill zone paddle that is smaller than the kill zone but I would think that the split would work in reverse on that type. The bottom line is that I don't think, or at least I haven't seen, any target design is totally split proof.

Scope Click Values

2009-03-04T21:12:00.005-06:00

I have been using ballistics program for many years to estimate the trajectory of my airguns. I even wrote my own program for Windows with a very simple interface. However, none of the programs ever seemed to be very accurate at closer ranges like 10 or 11 yards. I just figured it was an estimation error in the programs calculation.

I remember many moons ago Rodney Boyce teaching me a really easy way to measure the actual click value of a scope. I don't remember the formula anymore but I figured out a pretty simple way to measure it and calculate the click value. It is pretty simple, just pick a close distance to shoot, say 15 or 20 yards, and record the distance. Measure out the distance to be accurate. Put out a target and shoot 5 or 10 shots into the target. Then click the scope up (or down) a number of clicks to get the groups apart and record the number of click of change. I used what I thought would be about 1 inch of clicks. Then shoot the same number of shots at the new setting. Then measure the distance between the groups and record it.

With these three values, the click can be calculated using the following formula:

D = distance to the target
c = number of click adjusted between groups
d = distance between the groups

click value = ((100 / D) * d) / c

Years ago I had tested my Baush & Lomb 6-24x scope and found it to be .125" per click just as specified. The Burris Signature 8-32x was specified at 8 click per MOA but they measured 6 clicks per MOA. Since measuring the click values way back then I just always used .125" per click for the Elite series scopes. Well I decided to check one of my current Elite 6-24x scopes tonight and found that it measures around .133" per click. That surprised me and make more sense that my numbers up close would be so far off. I didn't have time to plug in these values into trajectory program and then shoot test them. So, that gives me something to try in the next few days.

S

2009-03-04T21:12:00.001-06:00

Gravity Fall Field Targets

2009-03-02T10:32:00.005-06:00

Back in the mid '90s when I started holding field target matches at my club in Florida, I pushed the idea of spring loaded field targets. Spring loaded targets are less fussy to setup. They require less leveling and are easier to use for tree targets. This is because the spring has the target sears locked up and the spring will overcome any problems with the target not being level. They fall quickly and usuall much flatter than most gravity fall targets.

The downfalls of spring loaded field targets are that a split many time will trip the target and many have a "sweet spot" away from the kill zone that will trip the target. The reason is that since the sear is pre-locked prior to the shot, a split will not add enough addition lock up to stop it from tripping the target. Also, with the sear pre-locked, a shot away from the kill zone can bend and vibrate the target face enough to break the sear and trip the target. There are some spring target designs that work better than other but all are suseptable to these problems.

I have tested a lot of different spring target designs over the years and have concluded that I haven't seen a spring target that will overcome these problems. There may be one developed in the future but none of my prototypes or any of the current target designs I have tested have overcome these problems.

You might ask, "so what is the big deal if a split or sweet spot takes a target down?" Well, as a match director it comes down to fairness. If two guys shoot a spring target and both split the pellet. Guy A has a lower power rifle that doesn't take the target down. Guy B has a higher power rifle and powers the target down. Both split the pellet but Guy B gets a point but Guy A doesn't. That is the problem. This is the same problem with a sweet spot. If the sweet spot works for only a high power or low power rifle then one or the other has an advantage. As a match director, it is my responsibility to make sure that the course is setup, as much as possible, to make sure that it is fair to all and that no one has any unfair advantages.

This brings me back to gravity fall targets. They aren't perfect either but they are more split and sweet spot resistant than spring loaded targets. I have been working on a variation of the old British designed Meade target. The Meade target used a pivoting arm attached to the target face to pull down the target when the paddle is hit and falls rearward. The paddle falls onto the pivot arm and the weith pulls the face downward. The top of the paddle arm forms a sear with a chunk of steel welded to the rear of the target face. When the face is hit by a pellet it rotates back into the top of the paddle arm. The kill zone paddle is attached to the rear top of the paddle arm. The system work great but it does require a bit more attention when it is set up and it still won't fall flat.

I have been working with a modified design that uses a small chain connected to the face and paddle arm to pull down the face on a hit. I have also weighted the target paddle so that when the paddle rotates back to the extent of the chain, the weight will pull the face down even with the face tilted forward 10 degrees. The face is also weighted a bit more forward so if the target is unlevel, it won't fall on its own or when it is blown by the wind. The design won't be perfect but it will make it easier to setup and work properly and help to reduce some of the target problems with spring loaded targets. I am going to retrofit some of more of my older gravity targets and some of my spring loaded targets and give the design some long term testing.

How quickly we forget.

2009-02-26T21:11:00.002-06:00

I have been reworking my auto resetting target design over the past weeks trying to finalize the design so it can be produced. I reworked a squirrel target and put it out at 50 yards to test. I have been shooting a 12 ft lbs PCP rifle for the past year and I use it to test the targets to make sure they work with the lower power rifles.

I took my squirrel out to 50 yards and shot him with my AA NJR100 action and plopped him right over and he popped right back up again. I got my 15 ft lbs ProTarget and shot him a few more times. Then I decided to try it with my 12 ft lbs TX200 MkI.

Wow, I have shot my spring guns on and off over the past year but mostly for testing targets, not really shooting much. Tonight, I had such a hard time hitting the broad side of a barn, or in this case, a small resetting target. Oh how quickly we forget alll the fundamentals of shooting. My trigger control and follow through were terrible. It took me a good ten minutes to really settle down and do the discipline again. The target worked great when I finally was able to hit it.

Piston guns require keen attention to discipline. They are an unforgiving mistriss. It takes consistent practice to master them.

Discovering An Old Favorite

2008-11-05T15:21:00.002-06:00

I bought an FWB300 several years ago and have enjoyed shooting it in the back yard. It never seemed to be nearly as accurate as I thought it should be. I usually shoot it at longer ranges (25-50 yards) so I just assumed the inaccuracy was due to the longer ranges. I had it tuned by David Slade and he worked his magic on it. When I got it back it definitely had more power and was smoother shooting but the accuracy didn't improve dramatically. I put it back in my gun cabinet and didn't shoot it a lot after that.

A couple of weeks ago I got into a conversation with David about cleaning airgun barrels. He mentioned that he uses a brass brush on a solid coated cleaning rod when a barrel looks leaded or really dirty. I was always hesitant about pushing anything down my airgun barrels but I thought I would try brushing my 300s barrel.

I went out and bought a coated 177 cleaning rod with a brass jag and brush and went to cleaning the barrel. I pushed several 1" patches wet down with Windex down the barrel before using a brush on it. After a couple of passes with the brush I pushed a clean patch down the barrel and man did it come out dirty! I pushed enough patches through the barrel until they came out clean.

I re-zeroed the 300 at 35 yards and now it is shooting a nice tight, mostly touching groups. Wow what a difference. I had cleaned the barrel by pulling patches through with coated cord but the brush really cleaned out the gunk that had built up in the barrel over the years. Now my 300 has a bit more power and definitely more accuracy. I sat one evening shooting at my 50 yard field target and was able to hit the 1" kill 8 out of 10 times.

I am having a great time shooting my revitalized 300. It is so easy to shoot with little movement or noise. And at longer ranges it can be very challenging, especially in the wind. I wouldn't have thought that just brushing the barrel would have made that big a difference but it did. Now I am going to have to really clean some of my other rifles too.

Cheerio ole England

2008-08-30T05:03:00.001-05:00

I spent the past week in London England and had a few hours free on Friday afternoon so I decided to visit a pair of airgun shop in north London.

I had researched the shop locations at my hotel the night before and found that both May of London and Woody's of Wembly were located within walking distance of the London Underground.

I decided to go to May of London first since they were closer to my meeting in London. After a 40 minute tube ride to the Buckhurst Hill area in northeast London I found the shop just outside the train station. I went in and looked around a bit before one of the stores chaps asked if I needed help. We started chatting and he let me shoot a rare TX200SR MkI on there indoor range. The shop also carries firearms so we talked about shotguns and rifles as well. The shop owner even dug out his custom hunting rig to show me. The fellows running shop were very friendly and the one chap gave me a couple of airguns magazines to read on my flight home. They had a good selection of new and used airguns and equipment.

Back on the tube, I was headed up to Wembly to visit Woody's of Wembly. Their shop was about 1/4 mile east of the train station. Woody's handled only airguns and fishing equipment. They had a larger selection of airguns (both rifles and pistols) on display including a new Daystate Mk4 in a gray laminated FT stock. It was beautiful but had a heft price tag of £1700 or $3400! This shop also had a good selection of accessories like springs, target, scopes and mounts.

While I was there I got into a conversation with three lads one of whom was looking to buy an air pistol. We discussed several different models and he decided on an HW45. I also talked about Field Target, firearms, and my website. Every one I met were friendly including the shop ownner and his son.

If you ever make to the London I would highly recomend visiting these two shops. It was a very fun experience for me.

http://www.mayoflondon.co.uk
http://www.woodysofwembley.co.uk/

Another Good Old Boys Match

2008-06-17T15:33:00.002-05:00

This past weekend I helped out at the eight annual Good Old Boys FT match up in Pulaski Tennessee. This match has grown a lot since 2001 and we have had a lot of good matches up at Roz's Hollow. I had the privilege to design and setup the Blue course that is in a wooded area nestled at the base of a tall hill. The course has a stream running down through it at the base of the hill so it offers a lot of interesting shots. Normally I have 2-4 shots that are way up the hill at long distances and steep inclines, however this year I decided to not go so far up the hill and put a target in a tree about 25 yards from the firing line but up about 30 feet. It was an interesting shot.

I really enjoy planning and setting up courses and this years course was no different. I love to be out in the woods away from civilization. This year it was really hot and boy there were a lot of ticks out and about. I even saw my first Cotton Mouth along the creek while I was setting up the course. The course turned out to be a bit more difficult than the other course but not by much.

For some reason, this particular course gave me more fits than any course I can remember in recent history. I had a bunch of cold lines for target malfunctoins and string problems. The weird thing to me was that I did all my normal target maintainence and checkout prior to the match. There were two Stoutenberg targets that failed during the match that I had tested and they worked great. Both failed to fall reliably with a high power hit on the paddle. Both would fall with a hit from a 12 ft. lbs. rifle but not with a high power hit. The both would fall when shot with a 3 ft. lbs. air pistol at point blank range too. I am going to work on these targets and see if I can figure out what causes this sort of problem with the Stoutenbergs.

I have been setting up courses and running matchs now for 13 years but I never stop learning. I learned a few things this weekend too. One thing was not to put two targets that look similar to each other only a few yards apart and somewhat obscured by the brush around it. I had two vulture targets up the hill that were at 44 and 46 yards. The 44 yard vulture could be seen by either moving completely to the left of the lane or in the middle of the lane but through a small channel between some small trees. I had a lot of people complain that they had a hard time finding the second target. I like to have my lanes setup so that all target can be seen and shot from one point at the front of the lane. It helps to make the match run a bit smoother.

Even though I had to run my butt off on Saturday chasing down target problems, I still had a great time. I didn't shoot real well but that was to be expected since I didn't really have much time to practice this year. I have spent too much time playing with my auto reset targets and other family events kept me from shooting. One high point of Saturdays shooting for me was lane 10. After having run up the hillside three times to work on an old wood target, I sat down on lane 10 and cleaned a not so easy lane. That put a smile on my face.

Saturday night we had a social gathering at the practice range after supper. A bunch of us sat around and talked about airguns, movies and a whole host of other topics. Some had a few adult beverages made up by Kenneth Hughes. I took my little Yorkshire Terrier with me and she had a great time running around, sniffing everything and barking at a few people. s

Sundays shooting wasn't much better but I was much more relaxed and was exprimenting a bit with my shooting position. I shot with Rod Bradley and Kenneth Hughes both of whom are good fellows. I knew when I walked up to the lane and saw them sitting there that I was going to have a fun day. And I did.

Even though my shooting was subpar, I really enjoyed myself againg at the GOB match. It was nice to see my old friends there and shoot a bit too. Even though the weekend wore me out physically, it recharged my mentally and I was glad I was able to be a part of the event. Lord willing, I will do it again next year.

Field Target Tester

2008-03-23T19:10:00.007-05:00

Last fall I developed a very simple but rough field target tester (ft tester roughcut) after a suggestion by Nick Jenkinson. We were talking after the Worlds match and he suggested that a simple device that you could put up to a field target and fire it to test it without actually having to shoot it. It was a great idea and I came up with my first rough design. Over the weekend I finally took the time to develop a prototype unit that I believe I can make reliably.

Last week there was a discussion on one of the FT forums about AAFTA testing targets. Somewhere along the line I saw a thread about the Croman 2240 air pistol and I noticed that the CO2 tube was very close in size to my target tester and BAM, the light went on. I went down a day later to my local Gander Mountain and bought a 2240. Man, the 2240 is a simple gun to tear down. With three minutes I had all the pistol stripped and ready for developing. With a few hours of play and testing I was able to make the parts and tweak the springs and had a nice working prototype.

It is simple to use, to cock it you just push in on the plunger until it cocks. Then you put the plunger up to kill zone and pull the trigger. The safety even works. The plunger doesn't shoot out of the end hard enough to hurt anyone so the safety really isn't necessary. I still have some work to do to the design but I think it will work out pretty good.

ft tester prototype video - large
ft tester prototype video - small

Auto Resetting Practice Field Target

2008-03-11T20:39:00.002-05:00

Since I first posted about my new auto resetting practice FT target I have been working on and refining the design. I had two more faces plates and paddles cut out by a gentleman I found on line who has a computer controlled plasma cutter. The revised designs cut on the CCPC appeared to work really well so far. I have had the flu the last few days so I have only been able to do a few limited tests on these targets. However they fall over with less energy than the original target and reset a bit slower. I am also going to use a thinner material for the flag so I should be able to make it a bit bigger and easier to see.

I have ten targets faces that I want to make once I get the design down. The faces should be complete interchangable with the based and paddles. Lord willing, I hope to be able to sell just the faces so the shooters can swap out different faces on one base or change the face to a smaller kill zone. I haven't figured out an effective and inexpensive reducer yet but I am thinking about it. I am also thinking of an add on component that could hold the paddle longer but it would require a battery.

Right now I have a design for black bird, frog, prairie dog, 2 rabbits, rook, skunk, sparrow, squirrel, and a squirrel climbing up. If you have any suggestions for target faces, shoot me an email with your suggestion and I will take them under consideration. Thanks.

Target Sears Update

2008-03-08T17:19:00.007-06:00

I while back I wrote about updating the sear on my metal targets that were based on my wood design (http://www.airguns.net/blog/2008/01/target-sears.html). Well, I updated an older Dragon Fly Juneau target that I gave me constant problems with the new sear. Now it is working great. I took some time to take a few pictures of the new sear so I thought I would post them here.

Airgun Venue Lost

2008-02-27T10:19:00.004-06:00

Our local airgun club, the Tennessee Valley Airgunners, have been shooting here in Huntsville for about 5 years now. We have been shooting on a piece of property that is owned by one of our club members. It is a beautiful piece of land that stretched up to the top of one of the hills that are prevalent in this area. We shot in a nicely wooded area that had both heavily wooded areas and open areas. Unfortunately for us, the land owner decided to sell almost all of the land to another individual and we cannot shoot on the land any longer. Our club has lost our shooting venue.

It is a real shame for us. The venue had a lot of space to shoot but was still pretty close to Huntsville. The club was slowly starting to grow as more airgunners in the area found out about us from the Internet. The area on the property that we shot in had a nice big field next to the wooded area that allowed for a vast practice range with a very short walk into the wood for the match. With in the woods, there was some heavily wooded areas and then some more open areas including a 50-60 yard wide field that always had some kind of wind going on. The shooting path was completely in the shade though which was really nice in the hot summer months. All in all the venue had a lot to offer with a wide variety of shooting possibilities.

I started thinking some about home much time and effort running the club took. Basically it was a two man operation with myself and Donnie Ross pretty much doing all the prep work and running the matches. We are the only two local members of our club so the responsibilities fell on us to make things happen. We enjoyed the matches so it wasn't a big burden for us.

Now that our range is gone, I am looking forward to spending my time on other endeavors. I have been wanting to develop my website more and I have a whole host of ideas for targets and other airgun related projects. I would like to start writing reviews again and spending more time puttering around my house with some small projects there that I have been wanting to do. There is just so much stuff I would like to do and only so much time to do it.

I was shocked and saddened when I first heard the news of the property sale but now I see it as an opportunity to do some other things that I have been wanting to do. I have been running various matches now since 1995 and it is time for a break. I will probably get the itch in the near future to be a match director again but until then I am going to enjoy the break and turn my attentions to some other airgunning activities.

Airgun Videotaping

2008-02-20T11:18:00.002-06:00

Today I was taking some video of a target that I am developing. I took several shots in my garage with a digital camera and a video camera. Then I decided to take some shots through the scope on my PCP rifle. I have seen a lot of videos like this on YouTube so I thought that it shouldn't be any problem for me to take a couple of quick videos of my rifle hitting the new target. Well, like many things in life, it was easier said than done.

After setting up the rifle on a bench, I adjusted the rifle vise to get the crosshairs on the target. Then it was just a matter of putting the video camera behind the scope and taking some video. However, what I found out is that getting the orientation and positioning of the video is pretty difficult with a high magnification scope. There is a very small position that the video camera can be set at in order to get a good image. I held the camera by hand which compounded the problem since any little movement caused darkening in the image. I managed to get some decent video but it was as high quality as I would have liked.

I can see that in the future if I want to record video through my high magnification scopes I will need to make some type of fixture on which I can set the camera and make adjustments to line up the image.

FT Max Power Limit

2008-01-09T14:44:00.001-06:00

As a match director, one of the most time consuming things I do before a match is target preparation. The thing that makes this especially difficult is trying to set the targets for the wide range of power levels that the targets will be subjected to during a match. With guns varying in muzzle energy from 12-20 ft. lbs., it is a difficult task to get the targets to fall reliably for a low power rifle and not fall with a split or face hit from a high power rifle. I have seen 20 ft. lbs. rifles power down every type of target made with either a split or face hit. That can lead to an unfair advantage for a competitor using a high power rifle over someone using a lower power rifle.

Another issue is that higher power guns tend to beat up the target faces on targets that are placed at closer ranges. Over the course of a match, the smaller kill zone targets placed at closer ranges tend to get peened down to a slightly smaller size (even the Stoutenberg targets have this problem). That makes the target more difficult as the match progresses which creates an unfair situation for shooters who shoot the target later in the match.

A simple solution to these issues would be to drop the maximum energy level allowed at a Field Target match down from 20 to 15 ft. lbs. of energy. Using a ballistics program to calculate energy levels, velocities and trajectories for the various pellets used today shows that there is very little difference in the flight path of a heavy pellet fired from a 20 ft. lbs. rifle and a lighter pellet fired from a 15 ft. lbs. rifle.

The trajectories of the pellets are very close. Using Crosman Premiers as an example, the 10.5 pellets fired at 20 ft. lbs. will drop about 2.07 inches at 55 yards with a 25 yard zero. The 7.9 pellet fired at 15 ft. lbs. will drop around 2.27 inches at 50 yards with a 25 yard zero. The difference is about 1/8th of an inch or about one-two clicks.

The wind drift isn’t significantly different either. Using the same example as above, the 10.5 Premier will drift about 2.18 inches at 55 yards in a 5 mph 90 degree wind while the 7.9 will drift about 2.6 inches. That is less than half an inch more.

The 15 ft. lbs. velocity limits for various pellets would be:

Crosman Premiers 7.9 925 fps
Crosman Premiers 10.5 800 fps
JSB Express 7.87 925 fps
JSB Lites 8.44 895 fps
JSB Heavies 10.34 810 fps

Approaching this with a match director’s point of view, it is my belief that lowering the power lever from 20 to 15 ft lbs would facilitate the maintenance and setup of targets. Reducing the energy differential from about 8 ft lbs. (12-20) to about 3 ft. lbs (12-15) would allow the targets to be setup to perform more consistently with less wear and tear on the targets during the match. With all the rifles being closer in power, there would be less of a chance that one rifle might split a pellet and take down a face while another rifle won’t.

The 20 ft lbs limit was set many years ago based using airgun technology that is now nearly 20 years old. Perhaps it is time for the Field Target community to take another look at the power limit through 20 years of experience and see if there is a smarter and fairer way of doing things.

Target Sears

2008-01-04T15:13:00.001-06:00

I have been working with field targets now for well over about 12 years. I think I have seen and just about every type of design out there and played with variations of them in my home shop. Some of the experimental designs worked really well and some didn’t work at all. One of the best designs is the over-center design that is used by the Knock-Over, Stoutenberg, Otten and Pounded Paddle targets. However, this design will allow the target to be knocked over with a split, especially with higher power rifles. That is a common problem with spring loaded targets.

One of the first designs I used in my targets was the sear on the top of the paddle design. This is the design that was suggested to me by Rodney Boyce back in 1994. His idea was to angle the face back so the sear rested on the paddle and then gravity would pull the target face down. I refined the design to use a spring to pull the face down and lock up the sear so that splits wouldn’t take the target down so easily. This design worked great for the wood targets so I decided to try the same design with an all metal target. The design worked for the wood targets so it should work with a metal target too, right?

Well, yes and no. The design does work pretty well in all metal but there are a few differences that needed attention. The biggest problem with the metal design is that face hits could vibrate the target down. At first I used a piece of angle iron as the sear. The problem with the angle iron sear is that in order to allow the paddle to trip with a low energy level hit, a strike to the face plate about halfway down the face would trip the sear as well. Also, splits would take down the target easily. I tried increasing the spring strength and reducing it. I tried angling the target face back some and dampening the back of the target face with a wood backer. This all help some but didn’t completely cure the problem.

The solution to this problem came to me one night a few weeks ago while I lay in bed sick with a head virus. The real problem was that the friction on the sear pieces was too high. The sear engagement wasn’t enough to keep the face from rattling the sear open, very much like when a trigger is set to light and a bump to the butt of the rifle causes it to fire. On the wood targets I typically used a ¼” or 3/16” bolt extending from the target face to contact the top of the paddle which has a much lower resistance to the movement of the paddle.

I reasoned that if I were to use a piece of 1/8” steel and weld it to the faceplate so that the 1/8” edge would contact the paddle top it would reduce the resistance and allow the sear to be set farther back on the paddle. I also decided to round the edges of the 1/8” steel to further reduce the resistance and increase the sear engagement. I figured that the rounded edge would flatten some with use but that is would settle out quickly and stay consistent. I also measured the angle of the sear edge to make it 5 degrees above the horizontal to more closely match the wood target design.

I tested my theory with a new skunk faceplate. I mounted it on an old Juneau base that was laying around and installed the sear. The sear was adjusted to fall with about 3 ft. lbs. of energy which positioned the end of face plate sear all the way to the back of the paddle. At that position, the paddle could still be pushed to trip the target with little effort. The big test was with my .177 ProSport, the faceplate was shot with about 15 ft. lbs. of energy but the target didn’t fall. In fact, it barely moved. After about 20 shots with no face falls the face was shot with my ProElite which shoots about 22 ft. lbs. at the muzzle. After another 15-20 shots the target still didn’t trip.

I ran the target out to my 35 yard target stand and staked it down. The ProSport had no trouble knocking it over so I tried it with my 6 ft. lbs. Walther LGR. The first shot knocked it right over, as did second and third shot. I am going to continue testing and refining the new sear and see what other problems might crop up with it. So far though I am happy with the way it has turned out.

Commercial Airgun Targets

2007-11-27T11:47:00.000-06:00

I recently bought a couple of commercially made airgun targets to use at our airgun club. I hadn't really tried many of the commercially made targets since I usually made most of the target for our club. I thought this might be a good chance to try out the commercial targets and get some more stuff to shoot on the range.

The first target is the Caldwell Airgun Resetting Target. This target has four 1 1/2" round spinners that when hit, rotate around and land on a crossbar. The crossbar is attached to another 1 1/2" target that when hit, allow all the other targets to fall down so they can be shot again. The target is made of thick metal and pretty robust. When I first saw the target I was concerned that my lower powered airguns might not spin the targets around to hit the crossbar. However, my Walther LGR spun the targets around fine. The target is set on the ground and the forward angle is set by two legs that can rotate around the main legs. The system works fine however it is very low to the ground so if you shoot sitting the foliage will need to be trimmed or the target will have to be set up on some type of riser. The top reset target can rotate 360 degrees around it's pivot axis so if it is hit with a high power airgun and it spins all the way around, it will return to a position to hold the lower targets when they are shot.

The target works very well. I have shot it with a variety of different airguns and it has worked well. The only problem I have seen is that when the far left or right targets are hit with a higher power rifle it may knock the opposite target free if it is already sitting on the crossbar. This doesn't happen every time but it has happened. Other than that, the target has worked great.

The other is the Champion Airgun Pellet Auto Reset Target. This target works on the same principle as the previous target. When the lower two targets are hit, they spin around and land on a crossbar. When the top target is hit, the crossbar swings out and the lower targets fall back to a reset position and are ready to be shot again. This target has a turkey and pig figure on the lower targets and a prairie dog figure for the reset target. This target is made of lighter steel so it could be deformed by high power airguns. The whole target sits up off the ground so it is easier to see and shoot. The reset target pivots on a rod that extends up from the main target. Because of the pivot rod, if the reset target spins around it will hit the rod and the target won't work properly until the reset target is manually spun back around to the reset position.

I enjoy shooting this target since the irregular shape of the figures adds some fun to the shooting. I did have problems with the reset target spinning around and getting stuck on the pivot rod with anything shooting over 10-11 ft. lbs. of energy. I found that if I aimed at the lower part of the reset figure, then it wouldn't rotate around backwards and the target would work ok. The target would work better if it used the same type design as the Caldwell. However, for backyard plinking, it is a fun target to shoot.

Spring Loaded Target Holder

2007-10-18T22:03:00.000-05:00

For years I have used paper target holders for home and club use that are made from 1/4" rod. The paper is secured to the target frame using black paper clips that are made from thin metal. Well, over time the clips shot and broken. Well, one night I woke up with an idea for a new way to hold the paper to the target frame.

It was kind of weird how it came to me, I was half awake / half asleep and thinking about a more robust and easy way to hold paper to the frame. I wanted something sprint loaded so it would be easy to install the paper. I was thinking of a spring loaded hinged of some sort when it came to me. If I used a spring loaded 1/4" bolt with a fender washer welded to the top it could hold the paper very securely.

I stopped the next day at our local Home Depot and bought some of their standard compression springs and the bolts and washers I needed. The fender washers are 1" in diameter so I made some 1" tabs with 1/4" holes drilled in them and welded them to the target frame. I used 1 1/2" x 1/4" bolts for the shaft and welded the fender washer to the head. Then all that had to be done was to slide the bolts through the tabs, slide on the spring, and secure the whole thing with some Nylon lock nuts.

When you push on the back of the lock washer the bolt and fender washer push out away from the tabs and the paper can be inserted in between. When the lock nut is release, the fender washer pinches the paper between it and the tabs. It is simple and really works great. If a bit more grip is needed, 1 1/4" x 1/4" bolts could be used so that the spring would be a bit more compressed.

The ground has been extremely hard this year due to the drought here so I mounted the whole target frame into an old coffee can and added some cement so now all I have to do is place it on the ground where I want to shoot and it is good to go.

I included a 4" handle placed in front of the target frame so that when I lift the whole assembly the target frame will fall back away from my body and not knock into me while I carry it around. The system works great and is easy to use anywhere.

Air Arms MPR

2007-08-10T16:08:00.000-05:00

After shooting my Walther LGR for almost a year now I have been wanting to try a 10 meter PCP on my 35 yard range. I decided to save up for a Steyer LG110 and have been doing so for a couple of months now. Early in July I contacted Bori at Top Gun Airguns to purchase a factory spring for my TX200 and found out that he had about a dozen of the Air Arms MPR 10 meter rifles on hand that he was closing out for $580. The normal going price is about $800 so I thought I would buy one and shoot it until I had enough money for a Steyr.

The rifle arrived right before I was scheduled to go out of town for the weekend. I only had time to unpack the MPR and check to make sure it survived the shipping. The rifle was packed up nicely and arrived looking fine. I pulled it out of the box and plastic wrap and shouldered it. My first impression was that it felt really light and small. The length of pull seemed really short so I grabbed my tape measure and sure enough, the LOP was 12.25" and that was with one butt pad extension in it. I did try the trigger and it was a bit heavy on the second stage pull weight but it broke clean and crisp.

After arriving back from my weekend excursion, I put my new Swift 8-32x scope on the MPR using a one piece BKL cantilever mount on top of a BKL riser mount with .004" droop. With out changing a thing on the rifle I took it out to the garage and started shooting. It was actually pretty close to being on the mark. With just a few turret adjustments the rifle was putting pellet after pellet through the same hole.

It shot fine but the LOP out of the box was just to short for an adult. There were two buttpad extension pieces but the buttpad screws weren't long enough to use them. I went down to Lowes and got a couple M5 x 35mm screws that allowed me to put in one of the extension pieces but not both. It really needed a 40mm or 45mm screw to add all the extension pieces. With the one extension installed the LOP is now 12.75" which is pretty close to the 13" I like in my rifles.

I have been shooting the MPR now on my home range for a few weeks and really enjoy it. The rifle is light, easy to point, and compact. It would be a very good rifle for a youth or lady shooter as well as most adult men. The trigger is really good, I have it adjusted to a light but predictable setting. There is very little movement on the firing cycle so I can see the pellet fly down range and hit (or miss) the target. It is an enjoyable rifle.

Bori told me that he still has several of these rifles at the $580 (as of 9/2007) so if you are interested in getting a nice 10 meter match rifle you might look into the MPR.

Acquiring a Swift 8-32x Scope

2007-08-08T11:17:00.000-05:00

On Saturday of Memorial day weekend this year my wife and I went to nearby Hartselle Alabama to spend the day visiting some of the shops in the historic downtown area. As I tend to do when ever I travel to a new area, I searched the internet to find out if there were any gun shops in the area. I found one right in the downtown area so I paid them a visit while we were there.

It was a small shop but they had a lot of guns and most of the long arms were out where you could pick them up and examine them without having to ask the sales person. In the back of the shop they had a variety of hunting optics but amoung them was a Swift 8-32x scope. I had seen these scope on line but I hadn't seen one in person. I took a bit of time to examine the optics and the focusing capabilities and was fairly impressed with the clarity of the image. It appeared to range find pretty well too. I thought about buying it but they wanted $300 for it and I knew that I could get it for $235 on-line so I decided to hold off buying it for the time being. I did notice while I was there that they had the exact same oak gun cabinet that I had in my gun room back home.

The wife and I meandered through the interesting little shops. At the last shop we visited we came across an antique wardrobe cabinet. The cabinet had some beautiful burl panels and we decided to buy it as a gun cabinet (I'll have more on that in another blog). We got it home and I replaced the oak gun cabinet with the new antique wardrobe cabinet. After a month went buy I decided to sell it the oak gun cabinet. I didn't have much luck with selling it outright and then a couple of weeks ago I remembered that the gunshop in Hartselle had the exact same cabinet. I gave them a call to see if they were interested in buying my oak cabinet to go along with the one they already had. The owner was interested but wouldn't be able to purchase it outright and wondered if I would like to use the cabinet in a trade. Well, the Swift scope came right to mind and the next day I took the cabinet down the to the gun shop and with a bit of money I went home with a new Swift 8-32x scope.

I was very happy with the trade (I saved a lot of money) and so far I have been happy with the scope. I will have more to say about the scope in another blog. I find it interesting how things like this work out sometimes.

My New Target Holder

2007-08-01T15:35:00.000-05:00

In my new house I can open the rear door of my garage and shoot 35 yards to the back of my property. I have gotten to know the gentleman that owns the land behind my house and he has graciously permitted me to use a small portion of his property so I can put some targets at 50 yards so I can practice for Field Target shooting.

I have one nice steel target stand that I made a few years back that I am going to move out to the 50 yard mark but I wanted another target stand for my 35 yard shooting that I do with my 10 meter match rifles. So I decided to make a new stand from 1"x4" pressure treated wood instead of steel. The assembly was pretty easy and it only required 3 1"x4"x8'boards and one 4"x4"x4' pt post. The nice thing about a wood stand is that fabrication and modifications are easier and when a pellet hits the stand it is a lot quieter.

I made my new stand with an area that I can shoot MiniSniping ( www.minisniping.org) and I made the spinners with on spinner on top of the other. Having the spinners offset like that makes them spin a lot even with low power rifle hit. I put some gray screen around the back to keep the targets from flying all over the place when they are hit. The stand works pretty well and so far I am happy with it.

Target Stand Diagram