(Preface - this took me a little longer than anticipated to post .. starting my Monday workday soon, so I'll try and backfill this post with photos and images later on)
Curiosity got the better of me. I was originally planning to hold out for a 600mm in .22, but I'm actually glad that I went with 700mm for this caliber for the 40 grain 2-S node Griffin RBT slugs that I shoot primarily in this caliber. It doesn't actually feel that long (not a broomstick like I thought)!
Although I've only had my hands on this rifle for a couple of days, I think I have enough time with it to make an initial educated assessment.
Unboxing & First Magazine - my objectives were:
The first thing that I noticed after unboxing the rifle was the reg pressure. It was sitting at 172bar. I thought this looked weird and sure enough it had crept up from the factory set point. I filled the rifle and didn't touch the power wheel for the first mag, but it clearly had a bunch of valve lock. It took 4-5 shots to get it down to the set point, which appeared to be 132bar.
After verifying the reg set point, I turned up the power wheel to see where it maxed out at 132bar and found that it could shoot the 40gr at 925FPS. I zeroed my optic and and changed my POA (50m) and put (5) shots through the same .22' hole. Not bad!!!
I filled the rifle a second time and saw that regulator jumped up to the low mid-140's. I paused for a bit and ~20 minutes later the regular was sitting at 148bar. I'm thinking at this point that the odds were probably 50/50 that the reg either needs to break in or has a creep issue. A few mags later, the regulator stabilized at 132bar and remained there through Saturday morning. This relieved my concerns and confirmed that the creep issue was transient.
Day 2 - my objectives were:
I tried several combinations of springs and hammer weights (up to 14.2 grams) and the maximum velocity that I was able to achieve with what I had on hand was 1007FPS. I DO believe that it could be possible to squeeze more out of the rifle at the cost of shot count (i.e., not enough air capacity for an NRL22 course unless you have a 300bar bottle and multiple air tanks on hand).
There was not much of a difference in velocity when I ran a heavy spring + heavier weight compared to heavier springs and lighter weights. I think the best configuration for max power would be a 16-18 gram weight with a heavier 52mm spring, but I screwed up the heavy 52mm compression spring that I made a few weeks ago and didn't have one to test with over the weekend, so during my testing I used the factory 56mm spring, a heavier 56mm, and a 53mm spring that's in between the two.
Therefore, I was not able to exercise the full capabilities of the vale over ~172.5bar. I was also warned to not use the 26.5 gram tungsten weight with the Panthera, but I suspect that could be due to some early reports of bent valve pins that were being caused by an interference issue when the valve was bottoming out against the Arca rail retaining piece that covers the two brass threaded plugs on the muzzle side of the block.
Day 3 - my objectives were:
In short, thus far I have found that the optimal 40gr tune that provides sufficient shot count for NRL22 courses (usually 12 shots max) with the factory 300cc (250bar) bottle is as follows:
Reg pressure set point of 170bar (hammer tension is also maxed) is optimal, in that there is STILL some valve lock. There is VERY little recoil and virtually no hammer bounce. The hammer energy is JUST enough to work the valve in a very consistent manner.
In retrospect, the velocity drops to ~985 at 175bar and the ES starts getting erratic (+/- 5FPS) from there. At 160-164bar, the velocity drops down, however the RECOIL and hammer bounce become PRONOUNCED. This translates to optimal precision and an extremely tight ES.
At this point - my split personality Q&A would something along the lines of:
Curiosity got the better of me. I was originally planning to hold out for a 600mm in .22, but I'm actually glad that I went with 700mm for this caliber for the 40 grain 2-S node Griffin RBT slugs that I shoot primarily in this caliber. It doesn't actually feel that long (not a broomstick like I thought)!
Although I've only had my hands on this rifle for a couple of days, I think I have enough time with it to make an initial educated assessment.
Unboxing & First Magazine - my objectives were:
- Getting a feel for the rifle
- Testing the out of the box tuning configuration
- Determining the maximum velocity with 40gr ammo with the factor hammer and hammer spring
The first thing that I noticed after unboxing the rifle was the reg pressure. It was sitting at 172bar. I thought this looked weird and sure enough it had crept up from the factory set point. I filled the rifle and didn't touch the power wheel for the first mag, but it clearly had a bunch of valve lock. It took 4-5 shots to get it down to the set point, which appeared to be 132bar.
After verifying the reg set point, I turned up the power wheel to see where it maxed out at 132bar and found that it could shoot the 40gr at 925FPS. I zeroed my optic and and changed my POA (50m) and put (5) shots through the same .22' hole. Not bad!!!
I filled the rifle a second time and saw that regulator jumped up to the low mid-140's. I paused for a bit and ~20 minutes later the regular was sitting at 148bar. I'm thinking at this point that the odds were probably 50/50 that the reg either needs to break in or has a creep issue. A few mags later, the regulator stabilized at 132bar and remained there through Saturday morning. This relieved my concerns and confirmed that the creep issue was transient.
Day 2 - my objectives were:
- Determining:
- Maximum power with 40gr (goal: mid-1000's)
- Optimal hammer weight & hammer spring configuration
- Getting a feel for this new valve system
- Gauging efficiency and shot count
I tried several combinations of springs and hammer weights (up to 14.2 grams) and the maximum velocity that I was able to achieve with what I had on hand was 1007FPS. I DO believe that it could be possible to squeeze more out of the rifle at the cost of shot count (i.e., not enough air capacity for an NRL22 course unless you have a 300bar bottle and multiple air tanks on hand).
There was not much of a difference in velocity when I ran a heavy spring + heavier weight compared to heavier springs and lighter weights. I think the best configuration for max power would be a 16-18 gram weight with a heavier 52mm spring, but I screwed up the heavy 52mm compression spring that I made a few weeks ago and didn't have one to test with over the weekend, so during my testing I used the factory 56mm spring, a heavier 56mm, and a 53mm spring that's in between the two.
Therefore, I was not able to exercise the full capabilities of the vale over ~172.5bar. I was also warned to not use the 26.5 gram tungsten weight with the Panthera, but I suspect that could be due to some early reports of bent valve pins that were being caused by an interference issue when the valve was bottoming out against the Arca rail retaining piece that covers the two brass threaded plugs on the muzzle side of the block.
Day 3 - my objectives were:
- Finding a viable tune for NRL22
- Testing precision & accuracy at higher velocities
- Experimenting with wider grips
In short, thus far I have found that the optimal 40gr tune that provides sufficient shot count for NRL22 courses (usually 12 shots max) with the factory 300cc (250bar) bottle is as follows:
- 1000FPS
- 170bar
- Heavier 56mm hammer spring
- Factory hammer weight
- ES is 3FPS (18 shots, 997-1000FPS)
- Minimal recoil, no perceived hammer bounce
- 14 fully regulated, full power shots with a 250bar fill
- 15th shot (off-reg) falls 10FPS (989FPS pretty consistently)
Reg pressure set point of 170bar (hammer tension is also maxed) is optimal, in that there is STILL some valve lock. There is VERY little recoil and virtually no hammer bounce. The hammer energy is JUST enough to work the valve in a very consistent manner.
In retrospect, the velocity drops to ~985 at 175bar and the ES starts getting erratic (+/- 5FPS) from there. At 160-164bar, the velocity drops down, however the RECOIL and hammer bounce become PRONOUNCED. This translates to optimal precision and an extremely tight ES.
At this point - my split personality Q&A would something along the lines of:
- Is it NRL22 worthy? -Yes, definitely. Although the Arca rail has way too much play!!! So much so that it interferes with the shroud, but I already knew this going into this purchase
- What about the.22 rimfire speeds and FX's stated max velocities with 40gr (1040FPS)? - Again, I DO believe that if a 300bar 300cc bottle is used, there is more velocity that can be realized. I'm pretty confident that the shout count would be comparable (possibly better) with the reg up a bit higher using a 16-18 gram weight and a shorter heavy spring cut to perfect size (I'm planning to makes some new springs soon from the wire stock that I use to dial this in as best that I can). I also think that it would be worthwhile to test with heavier valve springs to manage VDT for higher power, but I haven't even torn down the rifle that far yet so I can't be certain. The current valve spring feels somewhat weak though.
That said, I would LOVE to hear from FX on the hammer spring and weight that was used to come up with this 1040FPS/40gr specification.
- FX Panthera vs. AirForce Texan LSS:
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