We all know that it is imperative to test a lot of ammo to find what shoots the most accurately in our big game rifles, right? We test different manufacturers, bullet weights and designs. We must do the same with our air rifles.
A while back I was setting up a Mossberg Patriot Revere .30-06 with a Riton RT-S MOD 5 4-16×50 WIDE FOV scope. I planned on this set-up to be a shooter. But, after testing several brands of ammo, I couldn’t get the results I wanted. Finally, the 13th load I tried hit paydirt. Accuracy! The point of this little story is to remind you to persevere and test as many pellets as necessary to get accuracy in your air guns!
Like I said in the first article in this 9-part Airgun series, in the beginning I could not get my air rifles to shoot better than a 1 ½” group at 15 yards. Switching to a higher quality rifle improved things significantly, but precision accuracy didn’t come until I’d also tweaked my pellet selection. As the photo above suggests, there is no shortage of air gun pellets! So you don’t have to buy and try all of them, here’s what I’ve uncovered…
Based on my extensive tests, JSB makes the most accurate pellets. Sig Sauer and Crosman fight for second place. But not all pellets shine in all rifles. And pellets from some manufacturers just never seem to toe the line. Why? Weight, shape, and consistency.
Airgun Pellet Designs
Dome tipped or Diabolo pellets shoot the most accurately for me. Looking at them you wouldn’t think that they are aerodynamically stable, but the skirt stabilizes them in flight much like the fletching on arrows. I’ve found that whatever pellets shoot accurately for me in one gun do so in my other guns. So, pellets 1, 2 and 3 rate the same in all of my airguns. This suggests the pellets have more to do with accuracy than the rifles. More reason why you should sample many.
Source
Choosing the Proper Airgun Pellets — Ron Spomer Outdoors is written by Tom Claycomb for www.ronspomeroutdoors.com
