Air Gunning

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Mike71
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Air Gunning

Post by Mike71 »

Anyone else utilize air guns for training?

Aside from the joy of shooting I've really improved my long gun skills with air guns. Same principles apply to shooting an air gun as anything else from what I've experienced - trigger control, sight picture, breathing, etc. Sure is easy to replicate tactical situations in your own backyard. Plus, grabbing a tin of 250 pellets is no more expensive than a gallon of milk at wal mart. Heck, my son and I shoot in the basement when the wife is away and it's cold out :D

I could go on and on. Such a fun hobby/sport that really translates to better performance with any firearm.

I'm no expert by any means so feel free to share info and stories!
lrp3rd
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by lrp3rd »

I too think that air gunning is as accurate a learning experience as firearms. I use a Beeman P-1 in my basement. However it is confined to approx 15' which takes some of the fun out of it. I've tried to outfit myself with a scope and red-dot of which I think I prefer the red-dot. Due to my confined space I am looking for the smallest dot size red-dot. Would you have any suggestions? I am also thinking strongly about getting a PCP pistol of some sort so that I can shoot without having to pump. I am still in a tizzy about what to get and if I really want to invest so much in a PCP and its accessories. More feedback please and if there are other air-gunners out there please comment.
Mike71
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Mike71 »

I personally don't care for pistol scopes, but that's just me. I'm strictly open sights on pistols. As far as pcp, every year I ponder the investment. Part of the fun for air guns is low maintenance and cost. Getting tied up with pcp really changes that. It's that initial upfront cost that gets me. It's just not for me.

When I use my crosman 2240 and 1377 I really focus on trigger control. For short distances like 15 feet set yourself up with tiny targets like a Cheerio or a piece of hard candy. Fun when you hit em. That will replicate shooting at greater distances.
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Sevens »

I wish I could pile on as a big fan of air gunning these days but the truth is that I don't do it currently and haven't in a long time. Because of my living situation, there's no good way to do it at the moment. It's certainly always been on the "to do" list. However... I started air gunning with a decent pellet rifle way back when I was around 11 years old or so and unlike so many that are this deep in to the shooting sports hobbies & lifestyle, I didn't actually shoot my first firearm until I was 15, so I started kind of later in life than most.

But the amount of BB & pellets I expended in my youth was so large that it would be hard to accurately share. I'm talking about SEVEN days a week in the basement. This is what I would do daily as soon as I got home from school.

I'm absolutely sure that it was a very large part of the skill I have shooting today. MY first air gun was a Winchester break-barrel piston rifle. It was a very nice rifle and I've still got it. IIRC, it wasn't actually produced by WInchester but it was fully branded by them, may have been made by RWS or Diana. I also had a small collection of handguns, some BB and some pellet, CO2 guns. That's pretty much what I did those days. There wasn't much I wouldn't shoot at in the basement! :twisted:
I like to swap brass... and I'm looking for .32 H&R Mag, .327 Fed Mag, .380 Auto and 10mm. If you have some and would like to swap for something else, send me a note!
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Brian D. »

I used to shoot the heck out of a Beeman P-1 magnum for practice. Would take it along on short road trips if I didn't think there'd be a conventional range handy.

These days I'm more a fan of the Airsoft guns. I prefer the ones operated by "green gas" but some of the CO2 models seem to be pretty slick as well. The low end non repeating spring powered ones are very inexpensive, and better than nothing I suppose.

My collection of green gas Airsofts includes clones of the 1911, Glock 19, and Beretta 92. They feel and handle pretty much like their live ammo counterparts, and fit the appropriate holsters perfectly.
Quit worrying, hide your gun well, shut up, and CARRY that handgun!

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Mike71
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Mike71 »

Sevens, that's awesome. I remember blowing through bbs and co2 carts as fast as i could get them. I was always out of ammo as a kid. Check out the izh 53m. Low power quiet fun. Pyramyd Air out of Cleveland area is hands down the place to shop.

Brian I have little experience with air soft. Sounds like fun! Does the gear and performance reasonably duplicate shooting a firearm? I know you touched on it, just curious to hear more.
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by TSiWRX »

Mike71 wrote:Sevens, that's awesome. I remember blowing through bbs and co2 carts as fast as i could get them. I was always out of ammo as a kid. Check out the izh 53m. Low power quiet fun. Pyramyd Air out of Cleveland area is hands down the place to shop.

Brian I have little experience with air soft. Sounds like fun! Does the gear and performance reasonably duplicate shooting a firearm? I know you touched on it, just curious to hear more.
I wrote a little about airsoft a while back:
Airsoft is a toy and a game to some.

I went to airsoft from paintball back in the late '90s/early-'00s as paintball had gotten way too commercial by then: the focus on speedball had taken the game too far from its roots and no longer provided for me the escape that I wanted as a game. Airsoft, on the other hand, was like a live-play video-game. Legality as well as safety are the biggest concerns of airsoft gaming, particularly at the grassroots level - but in more recent years, even the Midwest has seen some really nice commercial airsoft/paintball fields come to the forefront of training (i.e. Steel City Airsoft, PA).

Airsoft can also be a very valid training tool for some.

Airsoft can be utilized for Force-on-Force with much less technical expertise and expense than Simunition, lasers, or other types of devices. Yes, there are technical limitations to the "realism" that can be achieved with airsoft, but that can be said for any of the other training tools as well. The use of airsoft in civilian training (I cannot speak to military or law-enforcement, as I have no experience in those areas) dates well back to the 90s, but even today, guys like Travis Haley (I don't think he can be classified as a hardcore Call of Duty gamer :P :wink: :) ) still see it as a valid tool (REF: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87uj5_2hEGk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; - Haley Strategic "Airsoft X Training" video, dated November, 2011). Similarly, it's hard to argue with quantifiable results: Tatsuya Sakai (his YouTube channel ---> http://www.youtube.com/user/machsakai/videos" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;) of Japan won the 2004 Steel Challenge after having only had minimal cross-training with a real-steel firearm directly prior to the competition, beating out some names anyone in the shooting hobby would instantly recognize. And as TKshooter demonstrated, airsoft can also be very effective training tools simply for the average-Joe/Jane at a "DIY" level as well: the replica's relatively low energy output combined with the relative safety of the low-mass plastic BBs means that anything from indoor target practice to self-guided Force-on-Force (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syxrpLbaEuY" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; <--- that's limalife's examination of the Tueller Drill scenario) can be safely undertaken by common citizens, without the expense and technical knowledge necessary for specialized equipment.

Like FlyinCedar mentioned, western firearms enthusiasts should realize that in more recent years there's been an influx of airsoft replica accessories that have made its way into the US for the ill purposes of some: specifically, to make a quick buck by deceiving those who do not know better. Clones of virtually any and all popular firearms accessories - from optics to holsters to lights to rails - exist aplenty due to the fact that it is otherwise very, very expensive for our far-eastern counterparts (sadly, due to laws in their native lands, their access to firearms is either forbidden or simply too expensive for "the everyman/woman" to be able to afford) to obtain such items (furthermore, they simply have no need for accessories built to the precision and reliability/durability standards of those that must withstand the recoil and abuse of true firearms use). Back in the early 00s, when VLTOR first stepped onto the scene with their Modstock, I was a very active member of the airsoft community, and I remember speaking with Eric Kincel about his concerns of far-eastern knockoffs and just how fast such items can be cloned and brought to market in mass numbers overseas. Fast forward to today, and you'll see that companies like EOTech even have their own official press releases to help consumers spot clones/fakes - http://www.eotech-inc.com/counterfeit_notice.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; . Corrupting the desire of our far-eastern shooting-sports enthusiasts to seek more realism in their re-creation of what they so lust after is both sad and unfortunate, however, it is easy to see why there's an examination of the durability/reliability/performance of airsoft-specific accessories if you can keep in mind their intended use in what is actually a rather physically demanding gaming atmosphere.

Also, I feel that it is important to point out that not all trainers/instructors feel that airsoft is helpful. Some do not use airsoft as a training tool, and that is just fine, too - there are also those who feel that dry-fire firearms training is a waste of time. It's just personal preferences, and there's many different ways to skin a cat. :)
Specifically in terms of what you're asking, Mike71, as what I mentioned of Mr. Sakai's success in real-steel competition, it is still important to properly frame the context. At most/at-best, these replicas provide sub-caliber-equivalency training. The hardest that my replicas (and I've got 1911s/2011s - both for skirmish play as well as for BB-IPSC - built by a top "airsmith" in Hong Kong, replicas that cost as much as a real Wilson Combat :oops: ) will "kick" only comparably to a .22LR trainer. In terms of manipulations, most of the replicas will not allow for much realism outside of magazine changes: they do not suffer stoppages in the same manner that their real-steel counterparts will. In terms of the trigger, while you can get a very, very nice 1911/2011 airsoft trigger, the rest of the breed suffers from the fact that the replicas do not share the same parts: dry-fire of your actual firearm is still a much better bet, particularly as the airsoft replicas also will not have the same mass distribution as their real-steel counterparts (short of you actually fabricating the parts you need in order to shift the weight balance). Due to the limitations of the typically 0.20 to 0.25 gram 6 mm spherical plastic BBs and the muzzle energy of most replicas, you'll also need to adjust the range and scale of your targets.

If your goal is recoil mitigation, there are compressed-air recoil-simulators out there that can be a better training tool.

Similarly, there are also advantages and disadvantages to other training devices such as the RAP4-series of CO2-driven training guns and the laser-based SIRT, or say, fitting a Glock with one of those specific-for-training "resetting triggers" and using a laser-targeting chamber insert.

What is airsoft good for? It's really good for literally duplicating your firearm for "live fire" training where and when you otherwise cannot. It can also be excellent for Force-on-Force. But it's the absolute context that's going to determine the success (or lack thereof) of your final outcome. :)

Overall, I think that airsoft is still somewhat misunderstood by the masses of the firearms community simply because it is found in the "toys" isle in places like WalMart and because they see YouTube videos of kids running around in the woods or a deserted building, hosing each other down. :lol: Yes, it can be a game - a wonderful, fully-immersive first-person-shooter that will literally beat the pants off any videogame experience now available - but with the right group of participants, with the right mindset and the right setup, it can also be a wonderful real-world training tool that is much more affordable than a military laser setup and more accessible/safer than Simunition.

That said, it is what it is, and it has its limitations as a training tool. Yes, there's going to be instructors/schools who do not like airsoft because they do not see value in the device - there's also very respected trainers/schools who disapproves of everything from dry-fire drills to the other extreme of shooting high round-counts. That's just individual preferences, and that's a totally valid take. However, there are very concrete reasons for which airsoft may be a very good training tool - or a sub-optimal one.

:)
Allen - Shaker Heights, Ohio
tdeal823
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by tdeal823 »

I have a Nitro Trail NP with a GRT gold trigger. It is a very nice pellet gun for the money. I feel it helps me with breathing, trigger control and stance. I try to practice with natural objects to rest against.

Brian D. wrote:I used to shoot the heck out of a Beeman P-1 magnum for practice. Would take it along on short road trips if I didn't think there'd be a conventional range handy.

These days I'm more a fan of the Airsoft guns. I prefer the ones operated by "green gas" but some of the CO2 models seem to be pretty slick as well. The low end non repeating spring powered ones are very inexpensive, and better than nothing I suppose.

My collection of green gas Airsofts includes clones of the 1911, Glock 19, and Beretta 92. They feel and handle pretty much like their live ammo counterparts, and fit the appropriate holsters perfectly.
I found an XDm counterpart in air soft. Would these be a good indoor trainer? I see it is "green gas" also. Could you elaborate on the gas system. What all would one need to setup a green gas air soft pistol? Thanks
tdeal823
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by tdeal823 »

TsiWrx. Great reply. I did not reed your reply till after I posted. Great links and info. My only confusion is how the green gas system works and how I refill the gun.
Thank you
Tony
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OhioPaints
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by OhioPaints »

If ammo prices keep going up and availability down, air guns may be the only option :(

How is the availability of pellets?

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Re: Air Gunning

Post by TSiWRX »

^ You have officially created the new shortage on airgun pellets and BBs. Congrats!


:lol:

-----
tdeal823 wrote:TsiWrx. Great reply. I did not reed your reply till after I posted. Great links and info. My only confusion is how the green gas system works and how I refill the gun.
Thank you
Tony
No problem. :) I'm not Brian D., but I thought I could help. Hope you/he doesn't mind my two-cents, too. :oops:

"Green Gas" is what the Far-Easterners call common propane. The bottles were either intentionally or unintentionally mislabeled - for reasons that none of us knows (but we all know it caused tremendous confusion in the earlier days of airsoft here in the US...I know I was one of the ones duped, as I wrote a bunch of early info. about the various airsoft gasses based on the R22/HCF(C)22/HFC134a/etc., as the way the bottles were labeled, without having had access to independent analysis of the chemistry). This post on the Airsoft Innovations website is very informative ---> http://www.airsoft-innovations.com/green-gas-propane" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; .

I don't do large-volume airsoft shooting anymore, so I'm happy to simply buy commercial "Green Gas" (compared to my shooting hobby expenditures, it's just a drop in the bucket :P ) or to pick up "duster gas" (HFC134a), since I still have one of those "duster gas canister" adapter nozzles from the old-days, mainly due to the ease of dispensing (into the replica). If you're going more high-volume shooting, the propane adapter - given how common American household has a large propane tank in-residence :) - will definitely be worth its minimal cost.

In terms of how the replica operates, in most cases of "Gas Blow Back" replicas the magazine is the heaviest single component, which is a metal ("pot-metal," as we Americans know it) pressure-vessel that contains the low-pressure liquid-gas propellant. The mechanical cycle is explained well in this old write-up by my friend and noted UK airsoft enthusiast Just Pistols - http://www.justpistols.co.uk/terms.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; - which bases his expo. off of the renowned Western Arms "Magna Blow Back" system of the '90s-early '00s.

As to how to fill up the magazine, YouTube videos such as these - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4v2v3GEHL4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; - show the technique. I'm old-school, so I just blast away at the magazine until I get "backwash" out of the valve, and I stop. :lol: I still have all of my magazines - and they're all perfectly functional - from when I was active in airsoft (starting in '99), so you do the math. :lol: Some magazines have the fill-port/nipple exposed, others hide it away under the floor-plate of the magazine, which can be moved out of position to accomplish the fill. Although metal, you'll need to realize that these magazines are first made of "pot metal" that is not nearly as durable as higher-grade metal. Similarly, their weight approaches or exceeds that of a fully-loaded firearms magazine, so a drop to your home's hardwood floor is not recommended, if you want to keep your spouse happy. At the same time, dropping it onto the concrete of the unfinished portion of your basement or your garage is also similarly not advised for fear of damage to the magazine: at costs that typically equal or exceed that of their real counterparts (well, back in the days when you could get a high-capacity Glock magazine for less than $20 :lol: ), damage to the pressure-vessel walls will mean that you'd have to obtain a new magazine outright or even try to source appropriate o-ring/gasket seals (not always easy, given that some of the seals are squares/rectangles).

tdeal823, if you want to practice trigger control, you'd do better either with an established dry-fire regimen or with a dedicated trainer gun that more closely approached or mirrored the trigger of your firearm (i.e. for Glocks, the SIRT or the aftermarket resetting trigger). My airsoft Glock 18C is highly modified, and it nowhere even approaches the trigger feel of my real Glock. Although I've gotta say, the only thing I real difference I noticed when shooting a real Glock 18 on full-auto this summer? recoil. :lol: My years of skirmish play with the airsoft G18C prepared me well for the cyclic violence that's the Glock 18. :lol:
Allen - Shaker Heights, Ohio
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Brian D. »

To add to Allen's posts above...thanks for posting all that while I was out on the town cavorting, then home sleeping. :mrgreen:
Quit worrying, hide your gun well, shut up, and CARRY that handgun!

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OhioPaints
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by OhioPaints »

TSiWRX wrote:^ You have officially created the new shortage on airgun pellets and BBs. Congrats!


:lol:

Actually after I asked, I checked Midway. They seem to be okay on pellets as low as $6/500.

I guess we had better start stocking up and create a new run...maybe it will relieve the pressure on .223 :mrgreen:

I haven't looked closely, does Feinstein want to ban airguns with "one military characteristic"? :?
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by TSiWRX »

^ I lost track of the hobby after about 2004 (increasing school/professional obligations - I hope to re-enter when/if my daughter gets interested), but at that time, things were getting pretty bad for our UK friends.

----
Brian D. wrote:To add to Allen's posts above...thanks for posting all that while I was out on the town cavorting, then home sleeping. :mrgreen:
Hey, bro, I do what I can to help! :lol:

Ah, Thursday-night cavorting. How I miss those days.

Maybe after Anna's out of the house - in 11 years!!!! :shock:

:lol:
Allen - Shaker Heights, Ohio
Mike71
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Re: Air Gunning

Post by Mike71 »

Good stuff Allen. I've been naturally steered away from air soft due to how it's presented and marketed. It's easy to not look past the surface of the adolescent zombie crap that seems to be attached to a lot of products. They always seemed like toys to me. After reading what you wrote its nice to see that there's far more beyond what's on the package of an air soft gun. In the proper context, I think training is better than no training at all.

As to a pellet shortage, I could see it happen if 22 lr doesn't get back on the shelf soon. Lots or hoarding going on out there.....says the guy with over 10,000 pellets in a tool box. At 1-2 pennies per shot its pretty easy to build up a stash :)
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