It's a slippery slope

Jump to latest Follow Reply
ironlion269

ironlion269

Member
Mar 10, 2017
773
77
North Central Indiana, United States
So I pulled the trigger (heh heh) and made yet another air rifle purchase today. I went digging around on the interweb thingy for an under-lever style rifle, became distracted for a while by the low-end PCPs and their promise of quiet and modernity, then looked very close at the Diana Air Guns line of break barrel rifles. I was within a click or two of buying a Diana 240 when I awakened from my fugue state and realized that I’d be paying a premium for a European rifle that was probably too good for my ability. I reassessed my air gunning mania and went looking with a different idea in mind. I began looking for a good backyard shooter that can reach out to about 50 yards (I am firmly planted in suburbia but have a considerable back yard to work with) using open sights, all for not much over $100. I mean, c’mon a quality spring-action air rifle made in the USA should not be hard to find. I ended up on the Crosman web site where I discovered the Crosman Optimus air rifle in either .22 or .177 caliber. A deeper dive into blog reviews and Youtube posts showed that the Optimus is a fine break barrel air rifle; not perfect, but a great value and fine shooter. A check of Amazon and PyramidAir found this rifle offered for something around $120-$140. On a hunch, I hopped over to www.midway.com to see whether the Crosman Optimus was available on the site and was stunned to find a .22 Optimus offered for $99! A wood stock and 4x32 scope made up the package. I am not bound eternally to the scope – in fact I’m an old fart who learned on open sights and never evolved beyond ‘em – though having it around for kicks-n-giggles is fine. As to the open sights, like I said, “I’m and old fart…” so having the fiber optic fore and aft configuration is a welcome sight (again, heh heh) to me. Moreover, with a price point that low I was able to talk myself into splurging on the delivery so that my new sweet shooter should be on my doorstep by tomorrow evening! Aye, many a poor Splatterburst and Dirty Bird will bleed for my mania in the coming days…
 
I been using Crosman Nitro Pistons for this entire last year. They do just fine for me. I sold off all my extras, now its just me and my 177 Nitro venom......Try out the Crosman Premier hollow Point 14.3 Gr, they work great in Crosman 22 cal, I tried the expensive wizz bang fancy pants RWS and always came back to the good ole el cheapo CPHPs
 
Upvote 0
Side note....I found I got better penetration with 177 cal, than the 22 cal. I used ice blocks and did some testing with the same pellets in the same rifles, but one in 177 and the other in 22 cal. The 177 consistently penetrated the ice block better. I sold off the 22. Good thing is, you can just buy the other barrel and swap em out for under 20 bux!
 
Upvote 0
Bobbed06, I am following the trail you blazed and am preparing to sell off some of my guns in order to focus more completely on the ones I really want to master. Looking back, this OP really caught my excitement in joining the modern airgunning world, although the subject of the post no longer resides with me. It was only a week before I realized that I was to untrained and impatient to make a go of the trigger provided on the Optimus. I traded it out and brought home a Hatsan Mod 95 spring piston in .177 and haven't looked back. I was right about the slope being slippery: last count had me at over six airguns and already pulling the trigger on yet another. Things are a bit unsettled in the home right now so I've driven pitons into the ice and roped off with my banker to prevent any further slide into the madness. Oh but soon, so very soon I'll be experimenting again so keep an ear out for the sound of sirens and court process servers as the summer heats up right in sync with my escapades in air gunning.
 
Upvote 0
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back
Home
Forums
Resources
Menu