Just curious what you think. 1050 price tag. Looks sweet. Not sure a reg is really necessary?
New AEA challenger elite big bore
- Thread starter Trucker3573
- Start date
Trigger and stock upgrades look nice. If that's what you're into it looks reasonably priced. I would rather the long stock or a new-and-improved version of the HP Max.
I certainly would not be resting my cheek on that "cheek pad" that's directly behind where the magazine goes. If the breech o-ring blows out that seems risky. Air guns should be able to be used without eye protection IMO. I had a 357 Challenger long stock and o-ring blow outs do happen. Easy to fix but its a major blast of air and some people have reported broken magazines.
I certainly would not be resting my cheek on that "cheek pad" that's directly behind where the magazine goes. If the breech o-ring blows out that seems risky. Air guns should be able to be used without eye protection IMO. I had a 357 Challenger long stock and o-ring blow outs do happen. Easy to fix but its a major blast of air and some people have reported broken magazines.
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Yeah didn’t think of that and their mags don’t have the best rep. Love it aesthetically though. Not sure I would care about the reg. This would be a big game gun for me and would only be looking for a couple good shots anyway. Plus when you put an easily adjusted reg on a gun it is imperative to have an adjustable hammer spring. The two go together like peanut butter and jelly. Lol. I’d be in un regged at 800.
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I still love the Pro. My .35 does 200fpe anyway and is a freakin tack driver with fx hybrids
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That's a whole lot of gun! The element max 510 would be my choice over this one. I'm just not into gigantic bullpups. Had a bullboss once and hated it.
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I have the 357 big bore and i have never had any trouble with the mag and i will say there not all plastic like most. But It's a tank, I don't carry it around, i shoot from a blind with a tripod or my portable shooting table. I also shoot tethered and have a inline regulator set for 3800 psi
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Sure, it happened with my long stock. But I'll take the extra few inches between my eyes and the breech. I guess this could happen with many bullpups. I don't own a bullpup and no immediate plans for one.
That 357 Big Bore right above this post is a beauty. I had the original Challenger 357 SL. Wish I didn't sell it but I know the newer models are much nicer as well.
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I have a AEA Challenger bullpup 50 cal, I've never had any problems out of the magazines, it's a beast. Puts the Lucky seven 311gn Maxi Velocity slugs out at over 400 ft lb of energy. I've put over 50 slugs through it now and not had any jams or bad cycling out of the gun or mags.
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You're right the mags are fine on Challengers. It's the possibility of an o-ring blowout if you fail to lock the bolt forward completely. On the "big bore" sidelever models the chance of this is reduced significantly, I would imagine, depending on user error.
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I have the Challenger 50 cal and I have a HP Max 357, both of those I have no problem with the mags. I did have a HPSS 25 cal semi-auto, that one I had two mags go bad. To be fair I have put a lot more pellets through that than I have my Challenger, but still I think the semi-auto mags is what gives AEA it's bad name. For some reason the AEA guns that you actually have to cock every shot, the mags seem to do just fine. Maybe it's because they're not getting wound as fast as they do with semi-auto and getting caught up and hammered.
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For $1050.00 it needs to have a carbon fiber 4500 psi 0.5 L tank. And a quality barrel... I'd like to start seeing airgun reviews with digital bore scopes videos of the interior finish of rifling and lead. Chicken thief received a Zeus with a terrible lead cut in the barrel.. No excuse for that
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I happen to be right there with ya on a bullpup. Thank you for the nice comment but, I think this and the modified 25 cal Avenger is going to be the only 2 chinese pcp i'll ever own. American all the way!!!
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Well the magazines have not been a problem on the challengers. Terminators are semi-automatic and they break the magazines all the time. Why anybody would want to waste the air to cycle a round seems counter productive. I think it's just the wow factor and doesn't lend itself to actually hunting anything larger than a raccoon. I seen a couple of them Chrono pellets and only be outputting 115 ft lb. I can shoot 130 grain slug at over 200 ft lb with my Challenger.
Side lever is very nice. Fox air powers new elite version with a regulator shoots 250 ft pounds all day. I will challenge anybody who says you don't need a regulator and I'll see you at the target range. At 80 yards I can have almost all the shots touching because the regulator keeps the velocity within five or six fps. You look at an unregulated version and you probably only get two quality shots. The spread between shots can be over 100 ft per second! 900, 910, 872, 847, 821, 796.... I can shoot 12 shots with an extreme spread of 12 ft per second
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Did you see my recent post on my upgrade challenger bullpup? Over 6 shots, my velocities were 1144, 1145, 921, 1149, 1136, and 963.
That's unregulated. Generally I'd agree with you regarding regs and distance accuracy, maybe I'm just lucky here. Total agreement on aea semi autos and mags. Had a terminator and hated it, did break some mags. Mostly love my challenger bullpup, never broke a mag. If you want a semi auto, go hammerless IMO, then there's no bolt to cycle violently
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You mentioned the velocity but not the grain weight of energy but that's gotta be loud enough to kill just by the sonic boom!
That spread is over 220 fps !!
(Grains) | Velocity (Feet Per Second) | Energy (Foot Pounds) |
| 75 probably | 1140 | 216.38 a bit more with 81 grn |
| 130 Not likely | 1140 | 375.06 |
| >>> Mine 130 | 810 | 194.05 <<< |
I get 12 shots at 195 lbs which is almost 2400 ft lbs. Now if you added a regulator and had it tuned to 950 fps every shot would have
the same point of impact and the wasted air for 1100's is 200 lbs X 4 or 800 lbs saved air and no misses due to velocity change.That air would probably
give you more shots. for example lets assume each shot uses 155 psi. 4500 fill down to reg setting of 2850 = 1600 divided by 155 gives 10 shots.
You could up the reg/hammer settings for more... say 3100 psi and use 170 psi per shot. so 1400 psi to work with divided by 170 psi gives 8 shots.
that's how you setup for big game and 125 grain hollow point moving at 864 FPS gives over 205 ft lbs of consistent shots. Western Rattler and challenger elite's are both great but that hammerless dude rules. I'm selling my seneca eagle claw 22 despite the decent shot count. 18 grain pellets go 920 with the power wheel on 3rd click. the 4th click goes 990. so 33 to 40 lbs. Put a 25 grain slug and click 6 gives about 58 ft lbs. on the low end I get about 50 shots and about 10 up high. because of velocity variance 80 yard groups are a joke. So I got an avenger and while 40 ft lbs is near max power, soda cans at 80 yards all day! The only unregulated shooter I'd consider for a one shot one kill would be the 58 cal Element.
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