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Springer pellet weight confusion

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JoeWayneRhea

JoeWayneRhea

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Apr 5, 2015
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OK help me understand this without using big words which I won't know , or physics which I will tune out to ....
So I've read several times over the last years that shooting a say 10.3 grain pellet out if my springer is harder on the gun than 7.33 pellets ??!! 
Is this some old wives tale like No such thing as an ugly Baby , or is it actually based on something ? 
I'm convinced that certain stuff just gets regurgitated enough over time till it becomes fact online . I can see how a dry fire could potentially damage a spring rifle by the piston slamming home with no air cushion of any kind ....Then how does the pellet weight being heavier make it a bad thing ? 
I had a guy tell me that shooting 10.3 grain pellets out of my FWB will wear out the spring in like 2000 shots.....WTF ? My springs have no less than 10,000 shots on them and they shoot fine . 
PS I know because I save the empty tins so that's not a guess.
Just curious if any of this makes sense ...Thanks in advance.JWR 
 
Pellets fall under the heading of "Voodoo" Joe you know that. I have found out that almost everyone can hit a quarter at 50 yards with every shot. ;) I did read that here. And why would a pellet that weights more, and we are talking very little more matter? It seems to me that the spring going a little slower and slamming to a stop a little less hard would be a good thing? I won't even use a cleaning pellet in a springer because of how hard it lets the spring hit. Maybe I'm looking at backwards? But mine shoot lighter pellets better anyway so if you tear your up rifle Joe I've still got a box of 300s springs lol.
 
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This is what I was told and the source was one of the founders of GTA. He said that heavy pellets took more energy to get moving and because of that the spring would rebound and might even get over stressed in the rebound and break or bend. He also said that very light pellets let the spring "bounce" off of the bottom of the cylinder because it was not slowed down enough by the resistance of the pellet. He also thought the best way to tune a springer was to stick ten pounds of glop on the spring.

As far as I am concerned, I'm not qualified to speak to the problems caused by excessively heavy pellets in a springer, maybe he was right. If you take it to the logical extreme and load three or four heavy pellets it simply has to be bad for the mechanism. I'd expect a blown breech seal before damage to the spring though. If you go to the other extreme and dry fire the weapon, I can vouch for the fact that it can break a spring. Been there and seen that done... Now as for gloping the spring with goop to make it shoot smooth, the only gun he ever tuned for me would shoot all pellets at the same velocity. It was amazing. Crossman Premier? 625 fps. Barracudas? 625 fps. Any pellet? 625 fps. It was amazing the gun was so encumbered by the goop that the pellet weight made no difference. It also was shooting two fpe less when I got it back from him than it was when I shipped it to him with a broken spring.

So I dunno, Joe, there is so much myth (much of it perpetrated by so called experts) in the AG world that it is sometimes hard to figure out what is real and what is BS.

Things I don't do:
1) Dry fire springers
2) Shoot really heavy pellets in springers
3) Glop my springs with tar
 
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I have taken guns apart that literally couldn't hold another ounce of grease ...I'm thinking slop on the grease was another old school myth that became fact . I wouldn't want to shove 5 or 6 pellets down the bore just to see what happens . But my very firm belief is that Every gun is different . And a lot of the HARD rules are just guidelines . 
Just like asking what's the best airgun lube ...You will get at least a dozen different answers , probably none are wrong ....Just as long as you take into consideration that it OFTEN works ...Not ALWAYS . 
The one and only absolute in springers is this . The more power , the more harder to shoot :)
 
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More piston bounce will cause more spring stress. When using pellets that are much heavier than optimal, more piston bounce will occur. Whether it's heavier than is acceptable depends on a lot of things.

The moving spring coils have momentum. The coils achieve near maximum coil velocity with either pellet. With a heavier pellet in the way, the coils must slow down faster than they would with a lighter pellet. The momentum of the subsequent coils could cause them to "crash" into the coils that are slowing down first. Result is localized coil bind and maximum spring stress. Coil bind may never happen with the lighter pellet.

Most commercial pellet guns shoot midrange pellets optimally. But as long as the FPE of the heavy pellet is acceptable, I'll shoot them and not worry about it. I shot a .177 Diana 54 for two years and I only used 10.3gr pellets. It shot them well. The spring might have lasted longer with lighter pellets, but that's not reason enough to give up the accuracy. 3000 shots @1MOA is better than 6000 shots @2MOA.

Springers have a lot of variables that can determine the optimal pellet FPE. Spring energy, piston mass, transfer port diameter, lead-in, pellet mass, pellet fit.

If the FPE of the heavy pellet is a lot lower than with the lighter pellets, I would probably avoid using the heavy pellets.
 
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I'll add one last thing to the pellet voodoo light verses heavy pellets. I could care less what a pellet weights that goes into my guns............I just care which one is the most accurate and if something in the gun breaks ill fix it. I guess for those that have worry about a heavy pellet hurting something just change over to a gas piston when a spring breaks. ;)

Or buy a PCP?
 
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I don't believe the heavier pellets are harder on a spring gun. They use the same power plant in .177 and .22. Nobody has an issue with 18 grain .22 pellets. I had a Ruger .22 from one of the box stores for a spell and even after a tune the only pellets I had that would group out of it were H+N rabbit Magnum 25 gr. Ended up giving up on it because those are pricey pellets and only moving 500 fps out of that gun.
 
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I'm Like everybody else , just want the best accuracy and decent performance . Maybe its something that comes into play with the super powerful springers ? Can't say because I don't own any . 
I am all ears to people who contact me or post on a forum with information that starts out with " This is what happened to me " I love hearing first hand experiences . And appreciate guys who would take the time to share them with me !!
BUT when I hear " This is what I heard " or worse " I read this online " I tune out FAST. 
That kinda " information " gets filed right along side the guys who contact me to let me know that I shouldn't change the way guns look from the factory look , like I'm destroying some national monument ...Lol... 
Thanks guys for all the replies ..Sincerely appreciate it !!!
 
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"c_m_shooter"I don't believe the heavier pellets are harder on a spring gun. They use the same power plant in .177 and .22. Nobody has an issue with 18 grain .22 pellets. I had a Ruger .22 from one of the box stores for a spell and even after a tune the only pellets I had that would group out of it were H+N rabbit Magnum 25 gr. Ended up giving up on it because those are pricey pellets and only moving 500 fps out of that gun.
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Very good point.
 
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I was told this too, Joe, and I challenged it too.

Enough experienced old-timers told me not to do it (except on magnum springers) and they also told me they had experienced broken springs. These guys shot springers in field target matches. (they're all old now, so they shoot only PCP) Their guideline is that, except for magnums, shoot 7.9, 8.4 or 8.7; nothing heavier. Of course that assumes they all shoot accurately.

I found shooting different pellets weights in my old Diana 56th that lighter ones felt like dry fires. medium felt good, but were not as accurate as the heavies. Heavies felt OK and shot the most accurately. 

My TX200 (a .177, at 14 FPE or so) shoots 7.9s and 8.4s equally well. I bet it would shoot heavies well too.
 
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"c_m_shooter"I don't believe the heavier pellets are harder on a spring gun. They use the same power plant in .177 and .22. Nobody has an issue with 18 grain .22 pellets. I had a Ruger .22 from one of the box stores for a spell and even after a tune the only pellets I had that would group out of it were H+N rabbit Magnum 25 gr. Ended up giving up on it because those are pricey pellets and only moving 500 fps out of that gun.
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For the sake of argument, take a .177 cal. barrel and a .22 cal. barrel of identical lengths, block one end of each and fill with water. Pour the water out into equal size glass tubes an see which contains more water. The .22 contains more of course, and by a fair margin. So the .22 barrel is a larger vessel receiving the pressure where it is dispersed over a wider area. This is how it was explained to me. I'm no physicist so I can't say for certain with any authority. Still, I've shot 16 and 18 grain pellets out of 15 ft/lb springers because they were the most accurate pellet. They did wear the springs out quicker but I didn't care. Springs are wear items and made to be replaced. Also, one of the replies above was by brother member Scotchmo. Go to the GTA and look at the gas piston builds and others he has done--he knows spring guns.

Cheers
 
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Joe,

I don't know about damage, but the shot cycle in my short-stroked TX200 (0.177") (11 ft/lb with 7.87 gr, JSB Express), is awful with the JSB Heavy (10.34 gr.) and absolutely atrocious with the JSB Monster (13.43 gr.) :(

The rifle becomes very 'boingy' to shoot, and the energy is well down compared to pellets in the 7 to 8.5 gr. range.

Have fun & a good weekend :)

Best regards

Russ
 
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Do any manufacturers warn against using 'too heavy' of a pellet? It's interesting that none of the after-market spring manufacturers market replacement springs for 'light' or 'heavy' pellets.

The absence of real evidence on the subject suggests to me that common pellet sizes do not induce higher failure rates. Anything other than data is just anecdotal, I don't care who the source.
 
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