I had an incident last night with the Marauder SAM that is making me consider returning it and also share my experience with the boards.
In short, the rifle fired off a pellet during the reloading process without the trigger being pulled and with the trigger safety on. I did not adjust the trigger in any way whatsoever fyi.
In long, the rifle is reloaded by pulling back a spring loaded pellet probe [it does not lock back] and inserting the magazine and then releasing quickly allowing the probe to spring into place and load a pellet. You then push the bolt handle and pellet seater forward to make sure it's all clicked into place. I had done this about 10-15 times in test shooting and testing pellet accuracy. I observed that of the box it was set up to shoot 14-15 grain pellets. Then last night I increased the hammer tension with a 1/4 hex key as the manual directs to shoot some heavier pellets. The HST was not maxed out or within at least two full rotations of being maxed out. I turned it about 4 times from stock to increase the velocity of a jsb 18 from 763 to 813 where turning the spring stopped increasing the velocity. I backed out the spring tension until the velocity started to drop. I loaded about 5 magazines during this process without incident. I was really excited at this point because the rifle was getting 50 shots with the jsb 18 at 28 ft lbs so it stayed quite air-efficient. At this point I'm reloading the final time, the rifle is de-cocked and on safe. I pull back the probe, slide another mag in, relea-POP!!!! I was home alone at the time- which is the only time I shoot anyway so no injuries, pellet ended up on my kitchen floor after bouncing off this and that (I am shooting from inside my house out the back door). The rifle did not auto-cycle to the next pellet but rather the probe got stuck forward in the magazine so it did not cycle. I removed the mag, made sure the barrel was empty, de-cocked and then went looking for the box.
*Edit - As you can see in the thread below Crosman reached out and to connect with me and discuss the mechanics of what happened with that they believe likely happened. I'm just a guy who bought an airgun but ended up on a conference call with two of the inventors/designers of the rifle- pretty neat. The issue was pretty quickly determined to be a "slam fire" that, due to the nature of the hammer, had enough juice to launch the pellet out of the barrel. It was not a full discharge. This explains why the pellet probe got stuck in the mag, there was no gas from the discharge to propel it back. One thing they explained at length is that this can only happen when the rifle is de-cocked. Over the phone I got walked through the trigger mechanism to demonstrate how to feel whether the rifle is cocked. Basically the point is that when the rifle is de-cocked you need to pull back on the charging handle until you hear an audible "click", and this requires a good amount of force compared to a standard marauder, once it clicks you can feel the pressure let off, Crosman said that this is the engagement of the trigger sear- and after that nothing can happen unless the trigger is pulled. If you didn't hear the click and aren't fully cocked, you will notice that sliding the handle forward has a distinct two-stage feel, where if the rifle is cocked property the handle will slide forward smoothly like floating in oil. So there's nothing wrong with my rifle and nothing unsafe about this platform, which these guys took two full years of their time to develop and you can hear their pride in it.
I would just advise people looking at this model that when it is loaded from the de-cocked position, it can slam fire with decent enough force to propel a pellet out of the barrel, so either pay special attention to the full motion of the charging handle, don't decock the gun, or better yet cock the gun and THEN load the magazine. When its cocked, this can't happen, no matter how many times you sling the charging handle forward.
I hope this was helpful to everyone and they appreciate that a cool tight-knit community where the guys who make these rifles are so responsible and accessible.
In short, the rifle fired off a pellet during the reloading process without the trigger being pulled and with the trigger safety on. I did not adjust the trigger in any way whatsoever fyi.
In long, the rifle is reloaded by pulling back a spring loaded pellet probe [it does not lock back] and inserting the magazine and then releasing quickly allowing the probe to spring into place and load a pellet. You then push the bolt handle and pellet seater forward to make sure it's all clicked into place. I had done this about 10-15 times in test shooting and testing pellet accuracy. I observed that of the box it was set up to shoot 14-15 grain pellets. Then last night I increased the hammer tension with a 1/4 hex key as the manual directs to shoot some heavier pellets. The HST was not maxed out or within at least two full rotations of being maxed out. I turned it about 4 times from stock to increase the velocity of a jsb 18 from 763 to 813 where turning the spring stopped increasing the velocity. I backed out the spring tension until the velocity started to drop. I loaded about 5 magazines during this process without incident. I was really excited at this point because the rifle was getting 50 shots with the jsb 18 at 28 ft lbs so it stayed quite air-efficient. At this point I'm reloading the final time, the rifle is de-cocked and on safe. I pull back the probe, slide another mag in, relea-POP!!!! I was home alone at the time- which is the only time I shoot anyway so no injuries, pellet ended up on my kitchen floor after bouncing off this and that (I am shooting from inside my house out the back door). The rifle did not auto-cycle to the next pellet but rather the probe got stuck forward in the magazine so it did not cycle. I removed the mag, made sure the barrel was empty, de-cocked and then went looking for the box.
*Edit - As you can see in the thread below Crosman reached out and to connect with me and discuss the mechanics of what happened with that they believe likely happened. I'm just a guy who bought an airgun but ended up on a conference call with two of the inventors/designers of the rifle- pretty neat. The issue was pretty quickly determined to be a "slam fire" that, due to the nature of the hammer, had enough juice to launch the pellet out of the barrel. It was not a full discharge. This explains why the pellet probe got stuck in the mag, there was no gas from the discharge to propel it back. One thing they explained at length is that this can only happen when the rifle is de-cocked. Over the phone I got walked through the trigger mechanism to demonstrate how to feel whether the rifle is cocked. Basically the point is that when the rifle is de-cocked you need to pull back on the charging handle until you hear an audible "click", and this requires a good amount of force compared to a standard marauder, once it clicks you can feel the pressure let off, Crosman said that this is the engagement of the trigger sear- and after that nothing can happen unless the trigger is pulled. If you didn't hear the click and aren't fully cocked, you will notice that sliding the handle forward has a distinct two-stage feel, where if the rifle is cocked property the handle will slide forward smoothly like floating in oil. So there's nothing wrong with my rifle and nothing unsafe about this platform, which these guys took two full years of their time to develop and you can hear their pride in it.
I would just advise people looking at this model that when it is loaded from the de-cocked position, it can slam fire with decent enough force to propel a pellet out of the barrel, so either pay special attention to the full motion of the charging handle, don't decock the gun, or better yet cock the gun and THEN load the magazine. When its cocked, this can't happen, no matter how many times you sling the charging handle forward.
I hope this was helpful to everyone and they appreciate that a cool tight-knit community where the guys who make these rifles are so responsible and accessible.
