In the three days of ownership of my Brocock Ghost Carbine .22, I can say that so far my experience is a positive one. I think three days make for sufficient time to assess the build quality by sight and feel of the gun’s exterior only and share my impressions here, and share a few thoughts on its power capabilities.
The build quality of the Ghost in one word is this: superb. Now that I'm able to hold it in my hands—after waiting for its arrival at AoA and viewing the available videos of it online—to get a feel of the finish and texture of the materials used, there is nothing I can say to downgrade what I’ve stated above. I’ve said it in another post that its build quality is like that of a fifth-generation fighter (yes, I've seen one up close in the metal at an open-house event at the Air Force base close to me). From the screws, which are appropriate in size for the torques to which they’re subjected, to the muzzle, to the rear end— fit and finish are excellent. Even the entire power adjuster unit itself has quite some heft to it because of the metals used—no plastic can be found on it. If you’re that type of dude, you’d consider it a jewelry piece! Now that’s what I call attention to detail.
The only nonmetal components, again on just the outside, are the cheekpiece and the shoulder pad, both of which seem to be made of ballistic polymer. To put it simply, should I ever run out of air while out on the field with a coyote after my tail, I’d have no problem holding the Ghost from its rear end to use it as a club to whack the animal and have the confidence to use it the next day for a competition.
Now for the manner in how the Ghost hurls pellets. Though the balanced valve is nothing new to the PCP scene, the one used in the Ghost (post-plenum) makes it possible to use an extremely light striking force to knock open the valve. It's also why the power wheel doesn’t provide major velocity adjustments because even at its lowest setting the discharge of air or the length of open-travel of the valve is already close to maximum. The reason for this is that unlike in a conventional valve, there is no high-pressure air behind the valve seat during the closing stroke of the cycle in a balanced valve because behind it is a chamber that is vented to atmospheric pressure; instead, it’s only the tension of the valve return spring that shuts the valve. That said, the OEM hammer spring rate is too high to allow any significant drops or increases in velocity for my intended application, which is to shoot at a low power level (for backyard plinking), and to increase shot count. In a sense, the OEM spring is too stiff to allow it. Even at a very low regulator pressure setting, e.g. 60 BAR, the velocity only drops by about 14 percent from the previous setting of 100 BAR! What’s that look like with a 14.3 Crosman Hollowpoint, you might ask? At 100 BAR with the power wheel set at its lowest setting the average velocity is 825 FPS, and at 60 BAR with the power still at the same setting the average velocity is 726 FPS. To get a wider adjustment range, therefore, I’d have to either swap the OEM spring for an extremely light-tension one or replace the OEM valve spring with an extremely stiff one (or do either of the two and put in a lighter hammer as well). This is also why the Ghost in its stock configuration isn’t very efficient with air if wanting to shoot at low power levels as are some of the conventional poppet-valve-type-equipped PCPs in their stock forms. But if you’ve been paying attention and reading in between, you’d understand clearly the reason for its design, and the one word to sum that up rhymes with “SHOWER.” This rifle is a beast, I tell yah!
It’s so easy to get the Ghost to put out super-magnum velocities because of its balanced valve system, and I think that it has been purposefully designed to allow it to do just that. Now, with the correct hammer/valve spring rate to shoot at medium- to low-power levels, just imagine the shot count one would have that doesn’t require smacking the Ghost’s valve really hard, and with a very low plenum pressure, all with a carbine having just a 300cc bottle. That’s what I’m going after with this gun.
In terms of power capabilities, the Ghost, in my opinion, might be a game changer.
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