Why doesn't FX "do" .177 as well as the other calibers(.22, .25, .30)

As pointed out in the video and pictures in an earlier post a Daystate 177 shoots heavy pellets and slugs just fine, time for FX to put out a barrel we can shoot them with.

As pointed out in the video and pictures in an earlier post a Daystate 177 shoots heavy pellets and slugs just fine, time for FX to put out a barrel we can shoot them with.

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I agree!!! We need a superior barrel with 1:16 twist rate instead of the current 1:18 and then 1:14 or 1:12 heavy barrel. 

Update, I've been shooting the Jsb 13.43gr slugs for almost a year, they shoot fantastic.
Here's a target I shot a couple of days ago at 50yds, not say'in it'll do it every time but wow.
7 shots .222, 8th shot went wild up and right.

i seen a post they are in the devolopment mod for the 177 - Hien new barrel guyb spelling not sure is gonna make a winner 177 barrel

douger said:

i seen a post they are in the devolopment mod for the 177 - Hien new barrel guyb spelling not sure is gonna make a winner 177 barrel

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In english please.

From a marketing standpoint, the demand for .177 cal rifles is miniscule because everyone wants bigger calibers with more power. That all started with the EBR a few years back. That generated a huge demand for guns that could shoot slugs at 100 yards and longer. I got sucked into that too, but where I live, there is only a couple of 100 yard matches conducted a year. Soooo, I have Impact 22s and 30s that shoot lights out at 100 yards, but what else do I do with them? Ammo cost more and I don't hunt. I used to shoot FT and USABR with .177 cal rifles. Just as challenging as long range. The American mentality is big, powerful, noisy stuff. That's why so many people drive $80K dually 4X4 diesel pickup trucks that never go off road or carry a chain saw and shoot 300 Win Mags at the range. Pardon me for being facetious.

BTW, I just bought an Air Arms HFT 500 12 fpe .177 cal rifle. This thing really shoots and I love the traditional quality. There's another one for sale on the classifieds in case you may be interested.

jps2486 said:

From a marketing standpoint, the demand for .177 cal rifles is miniscule because everyone wants bigger calibers with more power. That all started with the EBR a few years back. That generated a huge demand for guns that could shoot slugs at 100 yards and longer. I got sucked into that too, but where I live, there is only a couple of 100 yard matches conducted a year. Soooo, I have Impact 22s and 30s that shoot lights out at 100 yards, but what else do I do with them? Ammo cost more and I don't hunt. I used to shoot FT and USABR with .177 cal rifles. Just as challenging as long range. The American mentality is big, powerful, noisy stuff. That's why so many people drive $80K dually 4X4 diesel pickup trucks that never go off road or carry a chain saw and shoot 300 Win Mags at the range. Pardon me for being facetious.

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I'm sorry but I have to call bs on this one, every discount store, big box sporting goods, farm store and regular gun shop in the country carries and sells millions of break barrel 177 guns every year. The percentage of pcp guns sold is miniscule as you would say, most people think pcp is an illegal drug from the 80's. If you want a pcp gun and slugs to shoot your looking at maybe 10 online stores, most without storefronts.
I live 40 miles from Denver, a huge western city, as far as I know there's exactly two shops dedicated to pcp airguns in the entire city/state, the only places that stock slugs for airguns.
I know hundreds of gun people from shooting competition, running matches and belonging to nearly every private range in colorado at one time or another. I can count the people I know who have a pcp and shoot slugs on one hand, that's including myself!
Last spring I put together an air rifle tournament that included silhouette and target for score, advertised on airgun nation and everywhere else I could think of, 6 people showed up, four people with pcp guns, two were 177, one .22 and a 25
Maybe there's a big following for large caliber pcp guns somewhere but it surely isn't here.
As far as guys with 300mags, I see alot less of those these days, guys with AR's, bolt guns in 6.5cm and 6.5prc are all the rage here.
On another note you nailed it, there's so many dang pavement queen 4x4's around here it's ridiculous, my work/hunting truck is a Ranger, hauled more and been offroad more than a dozen of these jacked up blacked out window decaled pos trucks combined.

Kevinbear said:

I'm sorry but I have to call bs on this one, every discount store, big box sporting goods, farm store and regular gun shop in the country carries and sells millions of break barrel 177 guns every year. The percentage of pcp guns sold is miniscule as you would say, most people think pcp is an illegal drug from the 80's. If you want a pcp gun and slugs to shoot your looking at maybe 10 online stores, most without storefronts.
I live 40 miles from Denver, a huge western city, as far as I know there's exactly two shops dedicated to pcp airguns in the entire city/state, the only places that stock slugs for airguns.
I know hundreds of gun people from shooting competition, running matches and belonging to nearly every private range in colorado at one time or another. I can count the people I know who have a pcp and shoot slugs on one hand, that's including myself!
Last spring I put together an air rifle tournament that included silhouette and target for score, advertised on airgun nation and everywhere else I could think of, 6 people showed up, four people with pcp guns, two were 177, one .22 and a 25
Maybe there's a big following for large caliber pcp guns somewhere but it surely isn't here.
As far as guys with 300mags, I see alot less of those these days, guys with AR's, bolt guns in 6.5cm and 6.5prc are all the rage here.
On another note you nailed it, there's so many dang pavement queen 4x4's around here it's ridiculous, my work/hunting truck is a Ranger, hauled more and been offroad more than a dozen of these jacked up blacked out window decaled pos trucks combined.

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I dont know if theres a single store in MT that sells pcp rifles. The firearms industry went thru the magnum craze and now people are starting to realize how good smaller cartridges do the job. The pcp world has gone thru a magnum craze as well. I think most of the craze comes from people pushing limits to see how big of an animal can be humanely taken or trying to get better long range performance for paper or animals. I dont see anything wrong with using larger caliber and heavier hitting airguns if thats what the shooter likes. I also know a .177 thats stupid accurate and shooting 12 fpe will humanely kill pretty large animals if the shooter can shoot that .177 and put the pellet where it needs to be. I said this in another post about fx .177 rifles. They must be working cause the guys across the pond buy them and they like the .177. I have seen some stellar .177 groups from fx pcp rifles anywhere from sub 12 fpe to 950 fps.

The reason I like slugs in my 177 FX is the versatility, I use the Strelok pro app just like I do for 22lr in NRL22.
The wind and trajectories can be calculated very quickly and are spot on if using the app and a meter.
With a muzzle velocity of 933fps the 13.43 jsb slugs have 26 ft lbs of energy at the muzzle and 766fps/17ft lbs at 100yds.
Just by turning the power wheel all the way down and switching to 13.43 pellets the gun can be turned into a great backyard gun. On power setting one the mv is about 450fps, is super accurate at that speed and barely makes any noise in the bullet trap.

Here's what my reticle looks like in Strelok pro with a 47yd zero and the desired target at 100yds, the dots and horizontal hash marks are all labeled with the correct distances. I have a Hawke Amax 4x12.

To say FX 177 barrel doesn't shoot well is a bit of farce.

LDP said:

I said this in another post about fx .177 rifles. They must be working cause the guys across the pond buy them and they like the .177. I have seen some stellar .177 groups from fx pcp rifles anywhere from sub 12 fpe to 950 fps.

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Yup, to say FX 177 barrels don't shoot well is quite the farce, it is quite possible someone jacked up the tune since it is easy to do. I have/had 6 FX 177 barrels in every length except for 700mm and all of them shoot better than I can shoot.

I have no complaints about the 500mm FX .177 STX Superior liner on my DreamTac. 10.34gr and 13.43gr JSB pellets do very well in stock trim. Could probably push heavier pellets and slugs by upping the reg and hammer weight or using a longer barrel liner. But when you have a mountain of 10.34 ammo that shoots this well... Why mess with it?

That's a 7 shot group at 45 yards with JSB 10.34gr Heavies doing about 900fps. I can typically land all 7 shots on the bottle cap at that distance. This is an admittedly cherry-picked group, but I do seem to shoot similar sized groups fairly frequently with this gun. This performs well enough that I would definitely consider a 600mm barrel in .177 if I could find one...

vmaxpro said:

.177 isnt cool on youtube?

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This!


My .177 compact shoots amazing, Id argue these groups would look better if I were using a conventional scope as well.
First group is 38 shots at 70 yards
Second group is 20 shots at 35
All shooting 13.43 jsb pellets

I would like to see some of the FX .177 owners join us to shoot the 30 yard challenge. So far there are only two listed but both of them did really well. Maybe this would debunk the claims that FX .177 barrels don’t shoot well. Link to the challenge below along with a picture of the leaderboard. You can download the target from the first page of the 30 yard challenge thread.

Finally, some scientific testing of an FX barrel vs a LW demonstrating that the FX .177 cal barrels do not shoot slugs well.

I know it’s not every group and it’s only 3 shots and I did hold for wind but it is 0.54 inch C2C at 100 yards with NSA 12.5 grain slug. Maybe the aim small guy was aiming too small?


That being said it is far more difficult to tune for the super light weight 177 slug as they are extremely sensitive to muzzle blast. I still think the statement of FX 177 barrels don’t shoot well including slugs is farce from my personal experience/results. Can FX 177 barrels be better? Absolutely! But they are far from bad.

I did a lot of shooting with a maverick in 177 had good results and bad but came to the conclusion that some of the problem was the pellets i was shooting at the time ( during covid ) and part of the time i think the problem with the maverick was minor shifts in the stock causing harmonic changes that caused it to shoot poorly during temp changes. I’ve noticed that crown, dreamline and m3 owners seem to complain less than some too

I also think that just as with “runs” of pellets, some being much better than others, FX experiences the same thing with their liners. I know from personal experience that last Summer they had an inferior “run” of .22 Superior Heavy 600mm liners. I experienced it with threee different liners and a good friend with six. NONE of those 9 total would shoot any heavier NSA 31.2 grain slugs inside a half dollar at 50 yards. Maybe they have experienced the same with .177 a while back and have corrected that issue?

Centercut said:

I also think that just as with “runs” of pellets, some being much better than others, FX experiences the same thing with their liners. I know from personal experience that last Summer they had an inferior “run” of .22 Superior Heavy 600mm liners. I experienced it with threee different liners and a good friend with six. NONE of those 9 total would shoot any heavier NSA 31.2 grain slugs inside a half dollar at 50 yards. Maybe they have experienced the same with .177 a while back and have corrected that issue?

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Production defects can NEVER be ruled out from ANYONE!

I have tested two different 500mm FX barrels, and one 700mm one. I got better result with the 700 mm one, and not so good with the 500mm. I am not gonna deny that the Lothar Walter barrel shot better in this test. But in my opinion picking only five different speed settings, where on some of them there was 40fps apart is not a very precice test.
Either did he try to tune the gun for the best groupings. Had he picked the best groupings on both barrels, and worked around that particular speed area by more fine adjustments, and maybe tried different pressures, he probably could have improved groups on both barrels. So a slug test with no or litle fine tuning involved is not a very precise test.