What did you do to improve the POI of your rifle?

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Robransom

Robransom

Member
Jul 28, 2018
70
3
Nevada, United States
Here is what I have done in the last year to improve on POI! When I started I was getting 5" groups at 100 yards. Note: I have not shot a rifle in many years since I was young and dumb. I took up the sport of Air Rifle shooting last Aug. 2018 and here a few thoughts for those new to the sport! I shot over 14,000 pellets last year. Yes, I am retired. 😊

  1. Clean the barrel: I am not talking about getting your new gun and running a cloth thru it! Get a proper mop and JSB bore cleaning compound and “Polish the barrel”. Get any of the little things that could cause pellet damage.
  2. Weigh and sort your pellets! Know that your competitors are doing it. If you don’t; know their POI will be more consistent than yours.
  3. Get a scope that you can see your POI and watch that pellet fly! When using lighter weight pellets the wind moves them.
  4. Barrel Harmonics: I found this to have a minor difference on POI. I have also tried Air strippers and my preference moderator. (Improved the POI by ½ “ at 100 yards)
  5. Programing / Tuning your rifle. My Daystate Red Wolf to me 3 months of trial and error just to program the high power. Thank you “the other Mark” for allowing me to borrow your programmer for so long! (Improved by 2” at 100 yards)
  6. Kips Pellet Stabilizer!  Big improvement sold platform to shoot from. Easy to adjust for the gusting wind days at 100 yards. (Improved stability, led to consistency in POI). This setup is on my gun in the picture.
    [/LIST=1]

    These are some of the many things that I tried to improve performance over the past years. I hope you find at least one of theses tips helpful.

    Keeping my eye on what matters to me: Improving the POI for my competitors, forcing me to get better each and every day / in every way!

    Rob
 
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Hi Rob, thanks for sharing your recipe. I find a lot of agreement with it and when I see a list like that, it reminds me that a frequently path to success is to simply embrace the concept of experimentation. Change something and test it to see if it made things better, worse, or no difference at all.



A good one you brought up is harmonics because there are lots of options to try that are easily reversible. Try it with and without the barrel band, with and without the shroud or LDC. Even if you can’t leave it that way, it may reveal a problem or a hidden potential that would otherwise go unnoticed. For shrouds, try wrapping the baffles with tape until they are a slip fit…same with the muzzle spacer if it has one. Try it with and without the air tube tightly coupled to the stock. For liners supported by O-rings, experiment with the location and quantity of them. Try a substantially higher or lower durometer.



Basically the idea is to identify anywhere two parts meet and then think of ways to either couple them to each other or decouple them from each other. If it has a barrel band that is supposed to snug against both the tube and the barrel when you tighten a screw, invariably it will hold well to one but not the other. Try shimming it to a slip fit for both. Try sandwiching small bits foam weatherstripping between the stock and action.



Then of course we have the non-reversible things. The one holding the greatest potential is the barrel, especially if you are working with models in the sub-$500 space. Under $300? Roll up your sleeves because chances are it can be radically improved with attention to the right spots. Deburr the barrel port, break the sharp leading edge of the rifling, polish the bore, and touch up the crown. The good news is you don’t need a machine shop or fancy tools, and the hardest part is probably working up the courage to get started.

https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=130555.0



For what it’s worth, I’ve gone through this process with dozens of barrels and while there have been a small number of hopeless cases, the vast majority have shown substantial improvement…and exactly zero were worse for having tried. So if you’re reading this and have contemplated working on your barrel but couldn’t find the nerve, now is the time!
 
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Get a really good barrel, attach it to the action with no other stuff; i.e., no shroud, no moderator, and definitely no liner/sleeve system. The current trend is towards building in as many adjustments, bells and whistles as the maker can devise. This may sell rifles to folks only interested in tinkering and shooting a wide variety of pellets. And there's nothing wrong with that, but, if you look at serious BR rifles, simplicity rules. When you think about it, assuming a consistent delivery of air, it's all in the barrel.
 
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Take it down and follow time proven tuning procedures with the proper lubricants at just the right levels. Trigger work to make it light and crisp and fit it with a good scope and mounts.

The rest is pretty much up to the shooter to experiment with the way the gun is rested and different holds to determine which one works best. That even goes for PCP rifles but with a little less influence on them vs. spring guns.
 
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1577542149_675487135e076205185b53.69393900_EBR final.jpg


Here is a picture of my EBR card.
 
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Centercut,

No that was my 5th shot and the one that made me mad. That was when I decided to shoot like I had been practicing and started to shoot better. The top line was the last line I shot: 10x; 10; 10; 8; 10.

By the way - I really appreciated you sharing your clip loading technique with me prior to the speed silhouette! That was a great tip!!!

Enjoy your trip to England in March and the tour of the factory!

Rob 
 
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