AirMax Targetmaster carbine deforming pellet skirts.

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buckyusn

buckyusn

Member
Mar 25, 2017
271
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TX, United States
Howdy. I have been trying to sight in my Mrodair Targetmaster .22cal carbine for pesting, and it doesn't seem to settle down at all. Whether I use the single shot tray or the magazine, there is a lot of initial resistance to seat pellets, then they seat in the chamber. I've tried wiggling, different pellet brands, etc., and it is always the same. At 20 yards, the shots are scattered all around...I cannot get a decent grouping. It appears that either the barrel isn't lining up perfectly with the breach, or the breech is too tight. Either way, seating the pellets appears to be shaving off tiny bits of the skirt off, which is negatively impacting accuracy.

Has anyone else had this issue? I really like the carbine, and want to use it for close in pest control, but I need it to be accurate enough for humane kills. I have thought about lightly machining the rear of the barrel with a round stone in a Dremel tool to smooth the chamber so the pellet skirts are less likely to get damaged.

Any other ideas? Thank you up front for your help.

Bill
 
The most likely causes are:

1. burr left behind from drilling the barrel port
2. sharp edge where the rifling begins

Example photos and solutions can be found in this writeup:
https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=130555

I have 3 SPA guns and all of them had a crown that was cut with an old rusty drill bit running backwards. so be sure to have a look at that too. One of them also had damaged rifling at the muzzle. Before and after:


 
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Nervoustrig,

Thank you for the advice and links to the relevant posts. I didn't see any obvious burrs, but there was a sharp edge to the rifling at the lead (lede?). I was going to tackle the job with my Dremel tool, but decided to go with the manual method using fine grit sand paper and a wooden dowel. I'm not finished yet (life gets busy at times, especially with kids), but there is a noticeable improvement in how pellets are feeding into the barrel, and there is definitely less skirt damage when I manually push a clean test pellet through the barrel. A bit more time with the sand paper and I will re-test my grouping. More to follow soon.

Best regards,

Bill
 
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Hi Bill,

Great, that’s encouraging. Hopefully it’s just the leade and that will clear up the problem.

Returning to the crown...when you push a pellet through, is there any hitch at all just as the pellet emerges from the muzzle? Maybe I just had bad luck but all 3 SPA guns I received would snag a pellet. Others have reported similar findings. Like I mentioned in the guide, some guys like to use a cotton swab to check the crown but I find it much easier to detect a problem by feeling how the pellet responds. I know I’m sort of harping on this topic but my experience tells me there is a high probability that is also contributing to the poor grouping.
 
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Nervoustrig,

Update. OK...it's been a while since I wrote this thread. Life gets in the way. I finally tested the carbine after working on the barrel leade..and it seems to have greatly improved the accuracy! 👍👍👍

I could probably do a little more work to the leade, but for my purposes (plinking and pesting) the carbine appears to be accurate enough. Using the magazine to feed pellets, there is still some resistance when working the action (pushing the pellet into the breach). Using the single shot tray, there is no resistance (which is different than before). Single fed pellets appear to be more accurate than magazine fed, but I have to shoot the carbine some more.

Thank you again for the advice!

Cheers,

Bill
 
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