This has been a long time coming... After I won (Sportsman) EBR in October, one of my prizes was a trip for two to England, a tour of the Daystate Factory, and my choice of any Daystate gun that they make. Well of course I want(ed) the new Delta Wolf, but with Covid-19, and travel restrictions, plus the serious troubles in Italy (where some of the parts are made), I decided to take Robert Buchanan up on his offer of a custom .22 Red Wolf (safari power) HP in the gorgeous blue laminate stock. Thanks AoA, Daystate, and Robert!
My reasoning for this is that I wanted to shoot the .22 RD Monsters this year in competition, since I have shot them side by side with the .30 JSB Exact in my .30 Bobcat Mk2, and the RD Monsters (in my EDgun R3 Long at 960 FPS) were more predictable and less affected by the wind, especially up drafts and down drafts. So as a favor, Robert sent the gun to Bobby Corcorran, the Yoda of Red Wolf tuning, for a tune and make over. Bobby installed new high performance orings, polished and waxed the barrel, bedded the action, and tuned the gun for approx 995 FPS on Medium power with the RD Monsters. On High, it shoots the JSB Beasts at 935 FPS, but they aren't nearly as accurate as the RD Monsters. On Low power, he tuned it for the 18.1 JSB at 880 FPS as per my request, since I shoot in a monthly 25M BR tournament at LDs Club, the Temecula Airgun Club. He also installed a pic rail, since I was hesitant on this gorgeous stock... Thanks Bobby, its PERFECT!
I received the gun on Tuesday last week. Its as beautiful as any gun I've ever seen. I ran it over the chrony to confirm speeds, and they were exactly as I was told. I had planned on waiting until the weekend to shoot it, but went out Wednesday after work. Prior to that, I installed a Vortex Golden Eagle 15-60x52 that I had bought from a Team Centercut member, Dave @dwilson050 Awesome scope by the way...
Well, I zero'd the gun at 50 yards, and since the elevation range on the GE is only about 55 MOA, I set the elevation one turn (10 MOA) from the bottom, and zero'd it using the adjustable rings. This gives me about 45 MOA elevation for dialing longer distances, and can get to about 240 yards with slugs just by dialing. So I shot some at 50 yards, and it was pretty much 1/2 dime size groups, cloverleafs. Then I moved back, and shot a few groups from the prone position at 97 yards (as far as I can go). Here are the first couple of 5 shot groups on EBR size targets, 9 ring is 1.2 inches. These are the first two groups I shot with Bleu.
Obviously I was pretty happy with this, but the proof would be to shoot a 25 shot EBR type card and see how the gun really does. I didn't shoot anymore that day becasue the mirage had gotten so bad I couldn't even see the pellets hitting the targets. Saturday moring I drove to a different permission, where I could shoot off a sturdy picnic table. Distance was the same, 97 yards. I shot the first card and scored 225-4x (5 shots per target,5 targets per card). Good, but not any better than I had been shooting with the Bobcat. Then I realized (doh!) that I had the scope on 15x. Hmmm, lets ramp that up to 40x, and hang another target. This is what Bleu did, on only the second card I ever shot with her... About 75 to 80 degrees, wind fairly consistent at 8 MPH from left to right, approx. a 2 to 3 MOA windage but not varying by more than 1/2 MOA, so reasonably easy conditions. I was using a AccuTac WB-BR4-G2 bipod, and for a rear rest I used my hand.
Yup, 233-3x, and that's not plugged to .35 caliber as is done at the major 100 yard championships (EBR, RMAC, PAC). The Daystate Red Wolf HP with the G2 (Safari) board shooting 25.4 grain RD Monsters at between 995 and 1003 FPS. Even my one sighter wanted to be in the 8 ring!
The gun is very easy to shoot, trigger is perfect and there is almost no motion (unlike a .30 caliber air rifle) when it shoots. Four out of those five targets are MOA or better (as are both groups I shot Wednesday). Oh, forgot to mention. This was shot with the standard Daystate ten shot magazine. and a gorgeous blue Zero dB (0 dB) Moderator, which made the gun super quiet, and didn't affect the accuracy or precision one bit. I'm stubborn. I was told by more than one person to use the SST, and to not use a moderator. But I don't like shooting with a SST, and the horses don't like a louder gun (I was shooting next to a horse corral at a ranch).
I was shooting from 250 bar to about 205 bar, and getting about 3-ish magazines prior to re-fill. This is the "sweet spot" where the ES in less than 10 FPS. As I become more familiar and shoot this gun more I'm sure it'll only get better. This gets the highest thumbs up on the Centercut stamp of approval.
My reasoning for this is that I wanted to shoot the .22 RD Monsters this year in competition, since I have shot them side by side with the .30 JSB Exact in my .30 Bobcat Mk2, and the RD Monsters (in my EDgun R3 Long at 960 FPS) were more predictable and less affected by the wind, especially up drafts and down drafts. So as a favor, Robert sent the gun to Bobby Corcorran, the Yoda of Red Wolf tuning, for a tune and make over. Bobby installed new high performance orings, polished and waxed the barrel, bedded the action, and tuned the gun for approx 995 FPS on Medium power with the RD Monsters. On High, it shoots the JSB Beasts at 935 FPS, but they aren't nearly as accurate as the RD Monsters. On Low power, he tuned it for the 18.1 JSB at 880 FPS as per my request, since I shoot in a monthly 25M BR tournament at LDs Club, the Temecula Airgun Club. He also installed a pic rail, since I was hesitant on this gorgeous stock... Thanks Bobby, its PERFECT!
I received the gun on Tuesday last week. Its as beautiful as any gun I've ever seen. I ran it over the chrony to confirm speeds, and they were exactly as I was told. I had planned on waiting until the weekend to shoot it, but went out Wednesday after work. Prior to that, I installed a Vortex Golden Eagle 15-60x52 that I had bought from a Team Centercut member, Dave @dwilson050 Awesome scope by the way...
Well, I zero'd the gun at 50 yards, and since the elevation range on the GE is only about 55 MOA, I set the elevation one turn (10 MOA) from the bottom, and zero'd it using the adjustable rings. This gives me about 45 MOA elevation for dialing longer distances, and can get to about 240 yards with slugs just by dialing. So I shot some at 50 yards, and it was pretty much 1/2 dime size groups, cloverleafs. Then I moved back, and shot a few groups from the prone position at 97 yards (as far as I can go). Here are the first couple of 5 shot groups on EBR size targets, 9 ring is 1.2 inches. These are the first two groups I shot with Bleu.
Obviously I was pretty happy with this, but the proof would be to shoot a 25 shot EBR type card and see how the gun really does. I didn't shoot anymore that day becasue the mirage had gotten so bad I couldn't even see the pellets hitting the targets. Saturday moring I drove to a different permission, where I could shoot off a sturdy picnic table. Distance was the same, 97 yards. I shot the first card and scored 225-4x (5 shots per target,5 targets per card). Good, but not any better than I had been shooting with the Bobcat. Then I realized (doh!) that I had the scope on 15x. Hmmm, lets ramp that up to 40x, and hang another target. This is what Bleu did, on only the second card I ever shot with her... About 75 to 80 degrees, wind fairly consistent at 8 MPH from left to right, approx. a 2 to 3 MOA windage but not varying by more than 1/2 MOA, so reasonably easy conditions. I was using a AccuTac WB-BR4-G2 bipod, and for a rear rest I used my hand.
Yup, 233-3x, and that's not plugged to .35 caliber as is done at the major 100 yard championships (EBR, RMAC, PAC). The Daystate Red Wolf HP with the G2 (Safari) board shooting 25.4 grain RD Monsters at between 995 and 1003 FPS. Even my one sighter wanted to be in the 8 ring!
The gun is very easy to shoot, trigger is perfect and there is almost no motion (unlike a .30 caliber air rifle) when it shoots. Four out of those five targets are MOA or better (as are both groups I shot Wednesday). Oh, forgot to mention. This was shot with the standard Daystate ten shot magazine. and a gorgeous blue Zero dB (0 dB) Moderator, which made the gun super quiet, and didn't affect the accuracy or precision one bit. I'm stubborn. I was told by more than one person to use the SST, and to not use a moderator. But I don't like shooting with a SST, and the horses don't like a louder gun (I was shooting next to a horse corral at a ranch). I was shooting from 250 bar to about 205 bar, and getting about 3-ish magazines prior to re-fill. This is the "sweet spot" where the ES in less than 10 FPS. As I become more familiar and shoot this gun more I'm sure it'll only get better. This gets the highest thumbs up on the Centercut stamp of approval.
.
, how many fps did they add?
