.177 or .22?

[Matt-Mate 0]

I've recently bought a .22 air rifle however I was wondering does .177 have any benefits that I'm missing out on? My gun is a springer and was told this is great for all year round shooting for beginners, I know Co2 can lack power in the colder months but are there any other clear cut advantages to other styles or is it purely down to preference

 

Thanks guys

Edited March 5, 2011 by jasper65
Wrong Section.

[hunter1989 91]

hi buddy

 

well there will be some mix opinion on this question

 

he short answer is that its kinda complicated. In general .22 caliber guns shoot a larger, heavier pellet at a lower velocity producing a more pronounced trajectory and a larger exit hole .

 

In general .177 caliber guns shoot a smaller, lighter pellet at a higher velocity producing a flatter trajectory (which aids accurate shot placement for most people) and a smaller exit hole.

 

There's a lot more, and I do mean a lot more, to picking the right caliber than that, , both calibers would work fine., if I had to make a recommendation, I'd probably recommend .177 caliber, since accurate shot placement trumps things like the size of the wound channel.

 

atb steve

 

 

 

 

 

atb steve

[secretagentmole 1,701]

A springer means you never run out of power whilst shooting, simple as! Every time you cock it it is ready to fire. Downside, some can go off with a twang that sounds like a crash in the percussion section of a large orchestra. This can be overcome to some extent by lubrication of the main spring and fettling of the internals. Gas rams overcome this to some extent but the crack of the piston moving can still be very loud!

 

CO2 means that power is there for a limited time (until your gas cylinder empties), however shooting all year round it means that in the coldest months of the year your 12 ft/lbs can drop off quite dramatically (some reports put the temperature needed to do this as high as 6 degrees celcius). Also the refills are not exactly cheap either! However due to having no piston to come to a dead stop at the end of a chamber means they are quieter and recoil less, they also generally tend to be lighter.

 

PCP means that you do not have the piston of the springer or gas ram, so they are quieter and recoil less. You charge with air, not CO2 so they are cheaper to run and perform well at most temperatures you will encounter whilst shooting. However the downside is you need to charge them. This can be done by a pump (downside effort required and cost) or a divers tank (downside lack of portability and cost but no effort in actually charging). PCPs also tend to cost more than springers. They are however generally lighter and like the CO2 guns quieter!

 

Edited due to fingers of clay again!

 

Further edit, just realised mate you have posted this in the wrong section, this should have been in Rifle Review, Technical Help and Tips. Other than that, welcome aboard! :thumbs:

Edited March 5, 2011 by secretagentmole

[zini 1,939]

Mate,

 

You havent said what you want the rifle for.

 

If it's for general hunting with the odd bit if garden plinking i would stick with your .22 mate if your happy with it.

 

It's you want to do HFT more seriously, night time rabbit lamping and general hunting I would choose .177.

 

For me I would say

Learn to shoot and master a more pronounced trajectory of your .22 and you will achieve a full game bag

[pianoman 3,584]

Hi Matt. Welcome to the section.

 

The honest answer is NO!

 

Both are just as accurate as each other. Both have qualities that are both useful equally. It really is more of a shooter's personal preference and how he prefers to hunt than actual advantage of pellet properties.

 

You need to shoot .177 with greater accuracy precision to place that shot clean into the brain of your quarry. Anywhere else will likely result in a slower lingering death as, this calibre carries less concussive shockwave energy but a higher degree of penetration than .22'

 

Personal experience has taught me that for Rabbits only, the best calibre to use is .22. There is far less chance of causing a slower death with .22 than a deeper wound but less mass energy transfer of the .177. No .177 shooter here will ever admit to the numbers of rabbits they have shot, that got away to die out of reach. But I've had more of those than I want so, I use .22 for my rabbit hunts. That' my preference thing.

 

For all else, .177 is superbly effective. Especially bird quarry.

 

To combine all of the best properties of the two calibres in one, you would need an FAC!

 

One thing for sure Matt. You are to be congratulated for starting out with a .22 spring rifle. You will learn far more about the art of shooting from this than a top dollar PCP ever will show you.

 

Simon

[secretagentmole 1,701]

Hey guys did I do a good job on the various pros and cons of the various types of air rifle as he asked?

[BASE JUMPER 18]

i had owned and only shot .22 for 15 years that i have been shooting and the beginning of last year my bestmate rossy08 lent me his .177 to have ago and after a couple of hours shooting the .177 i was hooked so sold all my guns and went and purchased a .177 daystate air ranger and i absolutely love .177 now glad i changed over and never looked back :yes:

[Matt-Mate 0]

Thanks guys I really appreciate your time and efforts to explain to me. Sorry zini, I use my rifle to hunt, birds, squirrels and rabbits, I've yet to get my first kill though as I've only been out on my friends land once or twice and it's not very big, it Is woodland but it doesn't seem to attract many birds other than small songbirds. I've really dived into this head first and spent about £300-400 on my rifle and clothing, a jack pyke rucksack, jack pyke waterproof camo suit, knives, gun bag etc. I really want to carry this on and get a fac rifle in a year when I've gained a bit of experience.

 

Also one more question: I use a .22 calibre rifle, but what is the vest type of pellets to use for hunting at the moment I use H & N sport, field target trophy (dome headed) and was told these were very good for hunting, any opinions?

 

Thanks again

[zini 1,939]

Hi mate yes they are a very good pellet.

 

The general rule is try various kinds of pellets in your rifle mate to see which group closest together on a target board.

 

Clean your barrel between pellet brands and then shoot around 15 to 20 of the new brand through your rifle to re lead the clean barrel with the new pellet properties before shooting a well aimed 5 shot group taking into consideration all the shooting principles.

 

Then the brand that groups best is the one you normally stick to.

 

Your .22 will serve you very well for what you use it for mate so don't feel pressured into quickly changing calibre in the hope that a miracle will follow as it won't.

 

Try a .177 and see if you like the flatter trajectory and deeper penetration mate first before jumping in feet first. If you like what you see then that's when you should change calibre.

 

I shoot both calibres and use them for pacific jobs and both will kill cleanly if the shot is well placed.

 

If I was only allowed to own 1 calibre rifle though it would be a .22 calibre rifle.

 

What lots of people forget to mention when the calibre debate comes up is that they rarely shoot more than 40 yards, with most shot taken between 10 and 35 yards.

 

I do shoot sometimes further than 40 yards but 99% of the time my shots are much closer as why shoot a rabbit at 40 yards when you can sneak within 20 yards and shoot it standing a much better chance of making a cleaner kill due to less wind effects and staying within your point blank range?

 

With a well calibrated and zeroed scope and rifle in .177 you stay within a 1 inch kill zone if you zero at 35 yards from about 9 yards to 40 yards so you can get away with what I call lazy kills

 

These are kills that are not reticule true and you can just use the cross hair and be some where within a inch of your aim point if you do your bit in regards to wind and not wobbling etc.

 

With a .22 you can't do this between those distances as you are only looking at a 1 inch point blank range from 6 yards to 32 yards, so need to shoot more reticule true, i.e. pick the right aim point on your scopes reticule to get within a inch kill zone.

 

Reticule true is when you use your scopes reticule to shoot accurately down to about ¼ of a mildot.

 

My advice is stick for now with your .22 mate and learn the ballistics of shooting and know instinctively where and what your pellet is doing at each stage of its parabolic trajectory. Once you know this and you have calibrated your scopes reticule there is no benefit what so ever really that a .177 will have over a .22 in the day time unless your range estimation is madly off.

 

The night time is a lot different though pal and range estimation at night is very hard even for a experienced night time shooter.

 

I would use .177 for this task if I had the opportunity but it's not written in stone and I used .22 for almost 20 years for lamping before changing to .177 for night time.

 

I hope this helps as I've tried to give you a honest account if my own preferences.

 

In summary both calibres are very good at filling game bags; the .22 just requires more practice and understanding to be accurate with it.

 

Once mastered though the calibre is awesome and is just as accurate as the .177.

 

I have now attached 2 trajectories to back up my above statements.

 

Si

Edited March 5, 2011 by zini

[rossy08 33]

Thanks guys I really appreciate your time and efforts to explain to me. Sorry zini, I use my rifle to hunt, birds, squirrels and rabbits, I've yet to get my first kill though as I've only been out on my friends land once or twice and it's not very big, it Is woodland but it doesn't seem to attract many birds other than small songbirds. I've really dived into this head first and spent about £300-400 on my rifle and clothing, a jack pyke rucksack, jack pyke waterproof camo suit, knives, gun bag etc. I really want to carry this on and get a fac rifle in a year when I've gained a bit of experience.

 

Also one more question: I use a .22 calibre rifle, but what is the vest type of pellets to use for hunting at the moment I use H & N sport, field target trophy (dome headed) and was told these were very good for hunting, any opinions?

 

Thanks again

 

hi there matt and welcome.

 

the pellets you have listed are very good pells, many of the regs on hear use them,

 

what you will find or learn is....every gun is different in what pellets it likes..

 

you could go to air arms and stand at the end of the production line and take two guns off it, one will love and shoot very good tight groups with say h&h feild target and the other will spit them out shotguns style, its a case of try a few and see what suits your gun.

 

in regards to your .177/.22 question, it dont matter what cal you have, its all about where you put the shot, any cal in the right place..ie.. kill zone will drop you quarry.

 

targets targets targets till you no your putting the shot in the right place...and dont forget to learn your hold over/under....animals are not in the habbit off sitting waiting for lead at bang on your zero range.

 

Andy

[pianoman 3,584]

What's your make and model of rifle Matt? If you shoot with a German rifle like a Weihrauch spring rifle, you should be fine with H&N Field and Target Trophy. For instance I shoot with a Weihrauch HW77 and two HW80s in my collection and they all love the H&N FTTs. My 77 particularly, can put any number of them through the hole of the first.

 

However, spring rifle accuracy is only achieved by correctly holding it lightly at the shoulder. The most accurate rifle in the world will be just so much dead metal and wood if you do not know how to handle her in the aim, and control your breathing properly. How much experience do you have shooting with air rifles mate? If you give us specific details in your questions, it will help us get a bearing on giving you the precise answer you need to know.

 

As you can read from the answers posted here, there is an awful lot more to air rifle shooting than shoulder the rifle, sight the target in the scope on the crosshairs and pull the trigger.

 

Simon

Edited March 5, 2011 by pianoman

[Matt-Mate 0]

Thanks guys, I seriously appreciate this as you probably explain this regularly to newcomers and it probably gets boring. Yeah I can get a good grouping on a target all within the inch wide bullseye. I'll stick with my .22 for now and see how I get on, i will ofcourse keep you informed and up to date as to when I get my first kill. Thanks again lads x

[Matt-Mate 0]

Simon I have a .22 SMK rifle with a fairly good scope (sorry I couldn't give you a model name) if it helps you identify it it cost me about £160. Dont know if anybody could give me a model name by those details? Simon I have a small amount of knowledge and experience with air rifles but not too much, I love using it in the garden at the moment when I'm not out hunting with my friend who has the same rifle, before I bought this rifle I bought (about a year ago) a co2 powered 177. Bb gun with was a good bit of fun.

 

In short I've loved weaponry and guns in particular all my life but have only just got round to owning one for myself.

[lurchermania 25]

Did u just leave all the boys a kiss there matt haha

[Big Paul 0]

Did u just leave all the boys a kiss there matt haha

I'm within 1 mill dot of my cross hair at up to 46 yards in .22 zero set at 30 yards , in .177 using the same pellet manufacturer and pellet model and zero both lubed I'm within 1 mill dot of the cross hairs at 55 yards where as my .22 would be 1.5 mill dots , so if you can deal with range estimation there should be no problem what pellet size you shoot.

 

Even out to silly ranges say 70 yards its just over 1.5 mil dots for my .177 and just over 3 mill dots for my .22 so the drop on my .22 is double I guess at 70 yards.