Since no one, (until today, RR did) had expressed any interest in the higher power regions for this little carbine, I took the time and indulged one of my personal projects:
¿How would this little carbine fare as a youth oriented 3P Airgun "SPORTER Rifle"?
¿Why do I think this is so important?
Of all the shooting sports currently in practice, none is growing as fast as the Sporter section of the 3P Airgun.
Sponsored by a Council that includes the CMP, the Army Marksmanship Unit, the Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force. There are other civilian sponsors: 4H Clubs, Daisy, and Orion.
The Council reviews the rules and enacts them, but the rules have been pretty much stable for several years now, unlike some other airgun sports.
The Council also saw the importance of initiating the shooters under a "Sporter" Class, that is a severely limited class of rifles and so, it has all the makings of a practical shooting discipline for all.
Everyone that knows and/or has shot with me knows that I like most those disciplines that teach as much as possible, the practical elements of good riflery. They are skills that once acquired will remain with you for the rest of your life and will yield great satisfactions.
Once those basic skills are learned you can choose to go into a number of specialized disciplines with great success. Trying to jump into the deep of the pool without acquiring first good habits may create a lot more vices than virtues.
I firmly believe that we need to put more emphasis on teaching our youth to shoot, without young shooters, shooting itself will become an endangered sport.
And so, with that in mind, I set out to research what the Stormrider could do when tuned down to sub-600 fps as the rules call for.
I will not bore you with endless strings of shots nor the two tries that I had to make to get to the objective MV, two tries that took all of 15 minutes.
What I will tell you is that after the final configuration for the TP of this very limited power discipline was finalized, the shot count had gone from 50 to 90 shots per fill, MV's were 570 fps with JSB S-100 pellets and 530 with RWS SuperMag. Variations on the MV's were very low (under 1%) for the shot strings and so, consistency was there.
It's been many years since I have not had to test all the different head diameters of the Finale Match, or he R-10's, and so those two were the only two WC's I had on hand.
As the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and so I shot a few groups to ascertain what sort of accuracy/precision one could expect from the pellets and the clear winner (between these two pellets ONLY), was the JSB S-100
Here you can see in the top left hand bullseye what a 10 shot group at 10 meters looks like
¿How would this little carbine fare as a youth oriented 3P Airgun "SPORTER Rifle"?
¿Why do I think this is so important?
Of all the shooting sports currently in practice, none is growing as fast as the Sporter section of the 3P Airgun.
Sponsored by a Council that includes the CMP, the Army Marksmanship Unit, the Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force. There are other civilian sponsors: 4H Clubs, Daisy, and Orion.
The Council reviews the rules and enacts them, but the rules have been pretty much stable for several years now, unlike some other airgun sports.
The Council also saw the importance of initiating the shooters under a "Sporter" Class, that is a severely limited class of rifles and so, it has all the makings of a practical shooting discipline for all.
Everyone that knows and/or has shot with me knows that I like most those disciplines that teach as much as possible, the practical elements of good riflery. They are skills that once acquired will remain with you for the rest of your life and will yield great satisfactions.
Once those basic skills are learned you can choose to go into a number of specialized disciplines with great success. Trying to jump into the deep of the pool without acquiring first good habits may create a lot more vices than virtues.
I firmly believe that we need to put more emphasis on teaching our youth to shoot, without young shooters, shooting itself will become an endangered sport.
And so, with that in mind, I set out to research what the Stormrider could do when tuned down to sub-600 fps as the rules call for.
I will not bore you with endless strings of shots nor the two tries that I had to make to get to the objective MV, two tries that took all of 15 minutes.
What I will tell you is that after the final configuration for the TP of this very limited power discipline was finalized, the shot count had gone from 50 to 90 shots per fill, MV's were 570 fps with JSB S-100 pellets and 530 with RWS SuperMag. Variations on the MV's were very low (under 1%) for the shot strings and so, consistency was there.
It's been many years since I have not had to test all the different head diameters of the Finale Match, or he R-10's, and so those two were the only two WC's I had on hand.
As the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and so I shot a few groups to ascertain what sort of accuracy/precision one could expect from the pellets and the clear winner (between these two pellets ONLY), was the JSB S-100
Here you can see in the top left hand bullseye what a 10 shot group at 10 meters looks like
The bottom Bullseye is a solid "10", not perfect, not 10.9, but still a very good "10"
The group of 5 bullseyes on the right is an exercise, resting elbows on a stool and sitting on the floor.
Some good shots, some others not so good, but is, eminently, a "Very Shootable Carbine", for me to shoot a 90/100 at these targets is quite a good result.
And to finish off the test, but this time, completely offhand:
The group of 5 bullseyes on the right is an exercise, resting elbows on a stool and sitting on the floor.
Some good shots, some others not so good, but is, eminently, a "Very Shootable Carbine", for me to shoot a 90/100 at these targets is quite a good result.
And to finish off the test, but this time, completely offhand:
Apart from those two occasions where I used the wrong aimpoint in the scope's reticle, all shots landed exactly where I was pointing the gun at the moment of trigger release.
As I said, it is an eminently shootable carbine.
To finalize the test, it took 45 pump strokes from my Hill handpump to refill the air tube.
2 shots per pump stroke ain't bad. ;-)
There are several modifications that will need to be made to fully qualify within the rules, and further refinements could be achieved with a larger assortment of pellets to test, but the capabilities of the machine are there, and that is always a good starting point!
Keep well and shoot straight!
HM
As I said, it is an eminently shootable carbine.
To finalize the test, it took 45 pump strokes from my Hill handpump to refill the air tube.
2 shots per pump stroke ain't bad. ;-)
There are several modifications that will need to be made to fully qualify within the rules, and further refinements could be achieved with a larger assortment of pellets to test, but the capabilities of the machine are there, and that is always a good starting point!
Keep well and shoot straight!
HM
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