.22 RD Monster's Instability Issues

The Taipan Veteran I guess doesn't have the horsepower to utilize them, which is a shame. Thankfully the 18 grain JSB's do well out to 200 yards.

Just out of curiosity, what's the max fpe you can get out of the Veteran Long? I have the Short and it'll do 32 fpe with 18.1s and 34fpe with some 20gr pellets that I cast. That is with the hammer tension adjust absolutely maxed out to the point that the lever wont catch if I go in any further. It also sounds horribly inefficient at that power with the short barrel-I can HEAR the wasted air. I was thinking the longer barrel would be getting quite a bit more than my short, just didn't know how much.

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The Veteran Long does up to ~1010 fps with 18 grain pellets, which is about 40-41 fpe. That's with hammer spring tension maxed. I leave it at about 930 fps for the 18 grainers. 

The Taipan Veteran I guess doesn't have the horsepower to utilize them, which is a shame. Thankfully the 18 grain JSB's do well out to 200 yards.

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200? WOW! how are the groups?

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I don't shoot for groups at 200 yards, I shoot steel targets. This is my one setup at 200 yards:





It's approximately 2" wide by 5" tall. With little to no wind it's very easy to hit with the Taipan, but becomes much more challenging once any wind picks up.

I've been impressed with how predictably the 18 grain pellets fly out to 200 yards. I setup steel targets at 250 and 273 yards, but did myself a disservice by placing them in an area where they are partially covered by foliage, and it's damn near impossible to spot misses. I will have to relocate them today, to an unfortunately shorter distance. Was really hoping to see how they would do out to almost 300 yards.

IMO I think it's a design flaw for a pellet to be stable at a specific velocity.

If I get a power tune to get the RD monsters to shoot well at 100 yards - where will they fall apart next? 150 yards? 175 yards? 200 yards? 

Hard to justify these new RD monsters if at some point they become unstable. Great for shooters that shoot at known and set distances of say 100 yards, but for those looking for a high BC projectile to poke at the distance limits of these airguns - the RD monsters are not it.

I've been impressed with how predictably the 18 grain pellets fly out to 200 yards. I setup steel targets at 250 and 273 yards, but did myself a disservice by placing them in an area where they are partially covered by foliage, and it's damn near impossible to spot misses. I will have to relocate them today, to an unfortunately shorter distance. Was really hoping to see how they would do out to almost 300 yards.

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Very interesting, what velocity are you pushing the 18g JSB at if I may ask? my RW std gets them to 880FPS.

I was considering having my RW std converted to HP by Daystate just to shoot the 25g Monsters (I have loads of them) my std put them out at about 750FPS, way too slow I think.

Also how much holdover do you need at 200yds?

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I'm shooting the 18 grain JSB's at 930 fps. My scope is zeroed at 10m, and I have to dial the full range of elevation available in my scope (10 mils) and holdover an additional 0.5 mils for 200 yards.

IMO I think it's a design flaw for a pellet to be stable at a specific velocity.

If I get a power tune to get the RD monsters to shoot well at 100 yards - where will they fall apart next? 150 yards? 175 yards? 200 yards? 

Hard to justify these new RD monsters if at some point they become unstable. Great for shooters that shoot at known and set distances of say 100 yards, but for those looking for a high BC projectile to poke at the distance limits of these airguns - the RD monsters are not it.

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You certainly don’t have to shoot them. Maybe your barrel doesn’t like them. I also tuned a few Crickets to shoot them. They shoot them great at 880 fps and have the same twist rate ~ 1:17.7” as your barrel.

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Interesting. Maybe it is a barrel thing.