Perhaps this thread would benefit from some further clarity around what "best gun for the money" means in this context.
For me, it makes me think about excellent rifles where you get more than you pay for but not necessarily the cheapest no frills one available. Unless there is a budget limit of $650 or something like that, the Sumatra, Marauder or any Airforce or Hatsan gun does not belong on any list of best air rifles.
To some extent it will depend on how you define "best" but to me, the best air rifles are the most accurate, consistent, high shot count, efficient, regulated, premium barrel, well machined, quality fit and finish, light if a hunter / pinker or heavy if a BR rifle, nice stock (rigid and chunky if synthetic or nice figured walnut if wood), repeating action with high capacity mags, an effective LDC or shroud so they can actually be used where you can't use firearms, premium barrel like LW, ST, CZ, TJ or BSA etc.
I would expect most if not all of this stuff to be there out of the box on any air rifle that belongs on a "best" list. If you have to send it away to a tuner or invest significant funds in upgrading a bunch of components then you aren't talking about the same gun anymore.
Great air rifles like the Cricket, Wildcat or Mutant are all or most of those things without spending another dime. A 25 Cricket or Wildcat isn't just accurate for a 5 or 10 shot group. You get 60 consistent, powerful and accurate shots from the factory from a single fill. They are in a different league to the other guns mentioned here.
I started out with rifles like the Marauder, AT44 and Sumatra. They are good beginner guns. I still enjoy using my Career 707 occasionally but they certainly aren't the best anything except entry level guns.
A person could buy a Marauder for $500 and make it perform almost like a premium rifle by making the following investments:
- $315 for the bottle upgrade
- $85 for the SSG
- $319 for the aluminum chassis / bottle stock (the factory Marauder stock is appalling)
- $210 for the Marmot Militia barrel upgrade
-$100 for a Huma regulator (assuming you for it yourself)
Plus, if I have bought all that stuff, I would want to send it to a tuner to get it all running right which is another $200 min by the time you have included insured shipping both ways. Now you're close to $1,700 into it but, it will be impossible to sell it for anything close to that unless you get very lucky. Personally, I can think of better ways to spend $1700 on air guns but that's me.
If a person doesn't have the funds to treat themselves to a nice PCP then you live with what you can afford but my experience has been that it is best to buy the best one you can afford straight away and you will spend a lot more in the long run trying to slowly turn that Crysler into a Ferrari.
If the baseline for comparison is a BSA R-10 MK2 then we need to up our game with the recommendations IMO. That is BSA's top of the line regulated bottle gun. A Marauder, condor or Sumatra would feel disappointing as a chaser to that rifle.
