RTI Prophet .22

Hello guys,

I bought a new Prophet Performance from RTI,the regulator pressure was set to 130 bar,okay I want to say that I was amazes by this tool shooting JSB 18 gr pellets at around 1000 fps the group up on the right was damaged by the rebounce of the pellet.

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VERY good shooting when a 5 shot group isn't much bigger than the pellet, even more so when the distance is 50 yards. 

Congrats on picking up a sweet shooter. 

Tuning Follow-up

I finally had some time for another go at it late tonight after work. 

The goal--->greater consistency (as indicated by a smaller extreme spread)

The general plan was to use RTI's suggestions (per Robert) for settings for the JSB 25.4gr MRDs. That meant a reg pressure of 170-180. So, first order of business, increase the reg from 160-170 bar. Easy enough, about 1/8th of a full revolution (clockwise) with a 5mm allen in the reg adjustment. I also gave it one full revolution on the hammer tension (6mm allen key), as a complete shot in the dark, why-not starting point. 

60 shots/5 mags with above settings



Hey now! those numbers look much better (above) than what I had a few days ago. BUT, I was curious if I could come down on the hammer tension a bit, hoping for easier cocking and greater air conservation. So I did just that (same reg pressure as above but 180 degrees/0.5 full revolutions LESS hammer tension). Here is how that looked:



And a look at the gauges at the beginning of the above string:



That ES is not so great again, SD is also higher.......hmmmmm did I get lucky with my previous settings or were those parameters truly a good place for a consistent string?

Back to the original settings from this evening (same reg pressure but hammer tension back in 1/2 turn to be 1 full revolution from where I had it when the reg was set at 160 bar.

Another 3 mags over the chrono with duplicate settings from the first string from tonight's testing. This was mostly a test to see if the consistency could be replicated. 

This is how that looked:



Gauges at beginning of third string:



Dang, very similar numbers to the first string. It seems like the gun wants to live in this area, at least at this high of a reg pressure. 

I do believe I'll leave it right here and see how it shoots at 100 yards. 

Thoughts

We're talking about 1025-1030 fps on the first and third (identical) tunes, and about 985 for the second tune. That's right under 60fpe, and right under 55 fpe, respectively. 

From 250bar down to reg pressure of 170ish, it'll get 48 shots (4 magazines). The gun is a 300bar rated pcp, so, shot count is going to increase as a guy gets closer to that max fill of 300bar. My tanks are needing a top off so testing tonight was with fills starting at 250. For folks that are relying on a commercial location to fill their tanks, these 250bar and down fills are actually probably a lot more realistic than false hopes and dreams of filling it to 300bar on a regular basis. 

The gun's firing characteristics are so much more crisp with tonight's higher reg pressure and hammer tension than it was with the 160bar tune. And there was a noticeable difference between the tune with the lower hammer tension ("1/2 rev") tonight than the tune I'm calling "1 full revolution." Everything felt more balanced with the tune putting out the better numbers, 1st and 3rd strings above (maybe placebo effect, but I noticed it before I crunched the numbers too). 

I feel like trying to restrict fps with the hammer tension on this gun is a good way to get wider spreads of fps during a shot string. It SEEMS, that for a given reg pressure, the hammer tension has to be just a little less than the max fps that reg pressure will produce. Which is a pretty generic guideline repeated in forum posts for the last couple years. This gun seems to agree with that principle (despite my preference to go light on the hammer tension when possible, this gun just doesn't like to do that). 

The dang near requirement of having a pretty heavy hammer tension equates to a significant cocking effort. It's now somewhere higher than it was when I was hanging water bottles and dumbbells off the cocking lever to arrive at that 10-13lbs required guestimate. I'd bet its above 15lbs of force required to cock it now. There's always a trade-off. The gun will really launch the 25.4gr pellets, and do it consistently and with a crisp shot cycle, BUT it's gonna cost you stiff cocking. Nature of the beast I suppose, again, always a trade-off, no free lunch, etc.

The gun CAN be double loaded. I've accidentally done that a time or two with it so far. 

The reg gauge isn't just PINNED on the exact reg pressure. You can see it's a bit over 170 in one of the above pics, and maybe closer to 176 or so in the other pic. So, it moves around a bit. Frankly I don't care what the gauge says so much as I care that it's spitting pellets out consistently enough to hit what I'm after, and it seems like the consistency is there now.

I was excited to see the numbers VERY similar on the third string after I reverted back to the settings for the first string I posted this evening. It was nice little confirmation that the gun truly seems happy there, evidenced by decently consistent numbers and the impression of a nice crisp shot. 

Now it just comes down to whether or not this slower twist rifling can shoot em accurately going this fast, out to 100 yards. We shall see. (I'm off work for about a week and planning to get out and do some long range shooting on paper. I'll report how it goes.)

Gonna try to drag myself outa bed in the morning to go out on the ranch for some 100 yard shooting. Decided to pull a few patches through the barrel to start with a semi-clean bore. 

Those lines on my patches from the rifling were NOTICEABLY less tightly wrapped than a standard 1:18, so, the 1:28inch twist rate claim from RTI is highly believable. 

I also had to shine a light in there out of curiosity of RTIs specs listing a 6 groove LW barrel. As suspected, it sure looks like a poly profile to me, which agrees with the 6 land and groove LW since that's how my LW poly on my field target gun is configured. I was originally thinking that a 6 land and groove traditional rifling LW would indeed be an odd beast. Turns out though, that it's a poly with a slow twist rate so more in line with what I've generally seen with Lothar barrels. 



Hard to see the rifling here but looking at the dark edge of the bore it's got that gently dented in circle effect that poly's have (vs a harsh, clearly defined circle within a circle appearance of a 12 land and groove traditionally rifled barrel. 

This is all promising news for 100 yard accuracy. The Daystate Red Wolf HPs have poly barrels and they've lately been at the top of the heap for the EBR challenge paper game going on over in the benchrest section of AGN. 

Tbh,I thought that this pcp has got a 12 grooved barrel which contributes to accuracy,but it turns out the opposite,the fewer the grooves,the more accurate the airgun !?

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I double-checked the specs on RTIs website to make sure I hadn't invented something. Found this:



As for your other question about fewer grooves being more accurate....no, I'm not going to make that claim. Completely my opinion here, but I feel like every particular barrel is a very unique entity, with a preference or distaste for certain projectile at specific speeds/distances/wind conditions/etc. This Prophet I've been testing/reviewing appears to have a Lothar polygonal rifled barrel. Poly barrels are much more gently rifled than traditional 12 land and groove rifling. The rifling in a poly is so shallow that it is almost hard to discern where the lands and grooves start and stop. Polys are also much more gentle on the pellets than a traditional 12 land and groove. 

Here are some pics I took and included in a past review for a different gun. Just for illustration purposes here and THESE ARE NOT FROM THE PROPHET.

This pellet (below) was pushed through a .177 poly barrel. I added arrows to help readers see the imprint made by the "lands." 



This pellet (below) was pushed through a .177 traditional 12 land and groove LW barrel.



The side profile of the above 12 land and groove is no the greatest illustration because the head size of that particular pellet was pretty small compared to the rifling/choke size. 

Here (below) is a better side profile of a pellet pushed through a LW 12 land and groove, .22 this time.



The general idea I'm trying to show with the above pics is that there are fewer sharp edges and angles cut into a pellet from a poly barrel than from a 12 land and groove. For some reason this concept always make me think of the "fins" on a propeller. The larger and more aggressive the "fins" are, the more that propeller is going to interact with the water, pushing against it, displacing it, and overall making it's presence known. Basically DISRUPTION. 

So, extrapolation of those concepts to a pellet flying through the air........(again my opinion here) logically, the "smoother" projectile, in this case, the one shot from a poly rifled barrel, should be able to make it to it's intended target without being influenced as much as the "rougher" sharp-edged projectile fired from a 12 land and groove. 

In my personal experience, I have a poly barrel in my field target gun that is just phenomenal in the wind. Competitors will be talking about how much hold off they need on a windy day, and I'm over there snickering to myself at needing sometimes 1/3 less hold off than them. 

Other airgun manufacturers are also using polygonal rifling in their guns, but RTI must have also concluded that it is a very high-performing long-range barrel if they put it in their most feature-laden model, the Prophet.

102 Yards, and Some Pesting, and Review Conclusion

I had a chance to get out for some long range testing with the Prophet a couple days ago. I was set up and shooting at 7am.



Conditions

Clear sky, winds started about 3-5mph from about 4:30-5:00 with occasional shifts to make it coming in from 9:00 but about the same speeds for the first card, which was also the highest score. Winds increased to 8-10 and continued to shift back and forth from about 5:00 to 9:00. No wind flags. Pellets straight from tin. Freshly cleaned barrel. Temp started around 75 but warmed up to about 85 by the time I was done shooting. Bipod and plastic table, left hand under rear of gun. 

Some of the guys shoot a ton of sighters when shooting these EBR challenge papers. That's not me. Once I start a page I usually shoot all 25 shots, without taking any more sighters. And I typically crank them off pretty quickly. Low patience level individual I suppose.

Shooting the JSB Monster Redesigned 25.4gr at the 1025-1030fps (59-60fpe) arrived at during the last tuning session.

Used Centercut's EBR challenge target (head on over to the benchrest section if interested, quite the lively discussion has ensued over the past few months around this target and shooting pellets for groups at 100 yards).

Results

The best 5 shot group: (might be a 47, ripped paper kinda hard to see exact pellet impact point-47 or 48 on the score but group measures 0.952 with calipers so sub-MOA)



The best overall card (also the first one that I shot, before the wind kicked up):



The three other cards, when the wind was more difficult:



Thoughts:

On the third card I forgot to refill so had a low hitting pellet on the 5th shot on the third bull and 1st shot on the 4th bull, so I took another (6 total) shots on that 4th bull, after I filled up the gun. 

These are all the cards shot from the gun at paper this morning. There were about 10 more shots, not shown here that I used to get the scope zeroed for this distance, other than those zeroing shots, you're seeing everything the gun shot (at paper) at the 102 yards this morning. 

Oh, there was one other shot while sitting there, at a COYOTE!!!! Yeah, unbelievable. I was sitting there scoring one of the groups, having just walked back after collecting it, and caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. There was a half-grown pup about 70 yards out, directly in between me and the targets. I'm not sure which of us was more surprised, but of course we both scrambled, me to get a couple pellets in a mag, and him to get the heck outa dodge. By the time I was ready to shoot he was out around 130 (guessing?) yards. I whistled and he stopped and turned broadside like lots of critters will do. I had no idea on dope, or windage, or even how far he really was, but I knew if I connected that 60fpe pellet had enough to do him in, since he was a juvenile. BUT, alas, it was not to be, pellet hit the dirt about 6 feet short, dust flying. He found another couple of gears after that little scare, and was gone for good.

Back to the paper.....

That first card I shot, the 220 has two sixes, one for the second bull (barely hitting paper, at the top edge) and one for the third bull (also barely hitting paper, right edge). Man, if it wasn't for those two crappy shots, that card would have been in the high 220s. 

I measured all 20, 5 shot groups and the average group size was 1.73 inches. Remember, this was my first time shooting this gun at distance. The pellets were not sorted, the winds weren't kind, and I had no wind flag to tell me what they were doing. Overall I was impressed with how it shot, considering the conditions.

The gun is simply built for power. It does not have as much pulse/recoil as other small caliber/big fpe airguns. I think there is a lot of potential here for somebody to extract much more impressive accuracy than these results suggest. Getting to know the barrel's preferred cleaning regimen, perhaps finding a batch it likes better, and maybe even playing with the tune some more to find the most accurate speed for this pellet from this barrel, would all likely improve the results. I'm surprised the pellets shot as well as they did. Conventional wisdom all over the forums says pellets don't shoot accurately that fast, but these didn't do too bad. The gun is certainly capable of absolutely LAUNCHING them, and fairly accurately

Pdog sniping

There is a small town of pdogs on the way back to town. It requires a little bit of a walk and scrambling through some brush, but it's one of the few places where I shoot at them that I don't have to be careful about high fpe and what's downrange of the intended dead pdog. It's also a place where most of the shot are 125+ yards. In other words, perfect place for the 59-60fpe Prophet. 

Before I get into that, this is the highest FPE airgun that I've ever used to get after pdogs. I usually kill them with pretty low fpe guns, sometimes even sub-20fpe due to being in irrigated pastures around livestock and houses. Up til now, about 42fpe was the highest fpe gun I've shot them with. 

The first two were on the same mound at a lasered 78 yards. Strelok consulted quickly. WALLOPED the first one, "DAMN" I think to myself. Other one still standing there, "ha ha I already got the dope figured.....SMACK, "GOOD HELL!!!!" Alright, these two dogs were lifted off their feet and carried backwards by the impact of the pellets. They were literally rolled off the hill. Have only seen that happen before with the 42fpe Red Wolf Standard that I reviewed a while back, but the extra 18 fpe over that RW, made the effect even more impressive. Usually the pellet impact can be heard, and sometimes they'll kinda jump up/hump up their backs a bit, and then roll over dead. But to literally KNOCK them off their feet, WOW. 

I only got a few more shots at other pdogs, the furthest dead one was a 168 yarder, and yeah, it took a couple shots to walk it in, but it was a dead right there dog once I hit him.

Sweeeeeeeet gun for pesting. enough pop to really increase shot:kill ratio, plenty accurate, nice and compact (can you say "truck gun?"). Durable enough to get dragged through the brush and dirt without ceasing to function or losing its zero. 

Review Conclusion

My thoughts and opinions

Much smaller footprint gun than I thought it would be, it is in the ballpark of my Veterans so I'd classify it as a bullpup. For whatever reason I had not thought of it as belonging to that realm of compact sized airguns before spending some time with it, but it is. 

Very cool hard case, partly because of quality, but mostly because of it's size. Just so cool that such a powerful gun can go into a slick little case like this one. Even scoped, the gun, in its case, just doesn't take up much room. Very desirable feature. 

Lots of power for such a small package. 

Left-handed cocking was new to me, and pretty convenient for a righty shooter. For a lefty shooter, you're right there where all of us righty shooter, right cocking guns have been for years (cocking with the same hand you pull the trigger with). 

The pressure for the adjustable regulator is easily changed. 

Hammer tension is also a very easy external adjustment. 

I was impressed with the shot count/fpe output ratio as well. Lots of high power shots (more than expected actually). 

Trigger is SUPERB. I'd never heard or read that the Prophet has a good trigger, it doesn't. It has a GREAT trigger. One of the high points really, a good trigger can make or break a gun for me. The Prophet is lacking nothing in the trigger department. 

Magazine is a composite (plastic), and although I complained that it feels kinda cheap, it functioned flawlessly, never had any sort of jam or misfeed. I put almost 4 tins of the 200ct Monster RDs through it, so about 750 shots, and didn't have any magazine issues. 

On that note, I didn't have ANY problems with the gun, magazine or otherwise. The only stumbling block I encountered was self-inflicted. By trying to keep a low hammer spring tension and a relatively high regulator pressure, I caused some wide extreme spreads. Once I learned that the gun's design needs to have a pretty high hammer tension relative to regulator set-point, those large ES's went away. 

I was also able to single feed pellets, not quickly, but it can be done, even without a single shot tray. I don't see any reason why a single shot tray couldn't be used. There may actually be one, either OEM or aftermarket and I'm just unaware of it.

I honestly am not a fan of the cocking effort. It requires a pretty decent effort to get it cocked. And some of that is just the nature of the beast, a non-electronic 60fpe gun is going to have to compress a substantial spring to produce that high fpe. Probably my biggest gripe would be the cocking effort. 

Another gripe, minor in this case, as someone commented earlier in the review: sharp edges. I initially responded that I had not experienced the sharp edge problem, but I did when I was all hugged up to the gun trying for those 102 yard groups. My left (non-trigger) hand was used to correct elevation, under the rear of the gun. Those thick, heavy-duty side plates have some sharp edges when shooting in this manner. 

The 1:32inch twist poly LW barrel is very intriguing. I think somebody with serious intent and dedicated time could make this gun be a 100 yard EBR/RMAC/PA cup contender, and likely winner, partly due to that barrel, and partly due to the gun's ability to be shot at high fpe without much felt recoil. It just makes it easier to shoot when it's not jumping around on you. 

The sheer power this gun is capable of is just begging for some wildcatter to launch slugs with it. For the twist rate, it might need a different (faster twist rate) barrel, but the potential for this to be a 200 yard slug MONSTER is there. My ears perk up a bit when I see discussions about casting slugs and using something like a .224 or .257 barrel to launch those bleeding edge innovator self-modified slug mold creations. This could be that gun, which leads us to..........

Where does this gun fit in the market? (my review so my opinion )

With it's price-point, this is a gun for a serious airgunner, we're talking FX Impact, Daystate Red Wolf, Brocock Commander XR, Edgun R5M, etc territory. This gun does offer some things that the others don't and also lacks some features that some of the others have. That's the cool part of having options, finding one that fits our needs (read "WANTS"). The Prophet is a gun for somebody interested in a HIGH power, long-range, durable, tough-as-nails, accurate, user-friendly (adjustable) airgun. Of all of those I listed in it's price range, it is probably most like the Edgun, in that the cocking effort is high, and not incredibly smooth like it is in the RW and Brocock XR series. I'd put perceived durability and low likelihood of chasing leaks and replacement parts (a la Impact) up there with the Edgun too. So, think Edgun but with a greatly improved trigger and more easily adjustable regulator and hammer tension, but with Impact styling, and that should give you a pretty good idea of what to expect from this gun. 

As mentioned a paragraph ago, I see a pretty serious potential with this gun of being a slug shooter's wet dream, either commercial slugs, or the self-caster, slug-mold modifying INNOVATOR. I know lots of those self-casting types turn to the Air Force guns for the capability of producing such high power output, I think this Prophet could have a niche market there too. High power output capable, while retaining a very good trigger (that the Air Force guns DON'T have), while avoiding a 5 foot long boom stick, yeah, if I was the mold-modifying, slug-casting wildcatter, this Prophet would get my blood pumping. 

Much thanks to Airguns of Arizona for lending me the gun for a few weeks. I've had a lot of fun with it and, as always, appreciate their willingness to let me review guns as I feel like all reviews should be, completely transparently. I'm kinda speaking for them here (again, my review, my opinion) and I've mentioned it before but the team (staff and ESPECIALLY the owner) at AOA are die-hard airgunners, just like the rest of us. They seriously want their customers to be happy with any guns they purchase. They know first-hand what it is like to be excited for a new gun, or to be excitedly researching the next fix. And I feel like that is why they agreed to let me review guns in this way, an informed customer is a happy customer. 

(I'm needing to end this review a little earlier than I typically do. We're under contract to sell our current house and buy another one right now. And the new one needs quite a bit of remodeling, much I will try to do myself. So, lots of stuff going on in my life right now and the Prophet is getting mailed back to AOA tomorrow. I may not have a review gun for at least the next six months. Good news though, once things are all set up at the new place, I'll have 135 yards off the back porch to shoot all the airguns I want, safely too cuz nobody lives back there, the only reason the distance is limited to 135 yards is the tall wall of brush at the creek that backs the property, after some brush clearing I might have 150 yards, yeah pretty stoked for it). 

Thanks for reading.