RAW MicroHunter.
Part 1
P8 prismatic optic P8-Part 1
Part 2
P8 prismatic optic P8-Part 2
This report covers:
- MicroHunter is accurate
- The test
- JTS Dead Center 18.1 grains
- Surprised
- Trigger is perfect!
- Air Arms Falcon
- H&N 0.218 slug 23 grains
- H&N Baracuda 15
- H&N Baracuda 18
- Air Arms 16-grain dome
- JSB Exact Jumbo 15.89-grain
- JSB Exact Jumbo Heavy
- Last test — the silencer
- Summary
Today we shoot the RAW MicroHunter and start the accuracy testing. I told you yesterday that this really is not an accuracy test, but more of an extended sight-in. We get to see how accurate the MicroHunter is with different pellets. Once that is known we can select the very best pellets to test at 25 yards.
MicroHunter is accurate
I’ll cut to the bottom line right now. I know the MicroHunter is accurate. I learned that at the Pyramyd A.I.R. Cup two weeks ago when I dropped a field target with a one-inch kill zone, shooting offhand at 30 yards. Was it luck? Probably. But the MicroHunter feels like a rifle it’s easy to be lucky with.
The test
I shot eight different pellets today, and I shot the most accurate pellet a second time with a DonnyFL Ronin silencer attached — to see if it made any difference to accuracy.
All groups today are five-shot groups because I’m not looking for the best accuracy — only trends. I’m also testing the Lucid P8 sight that I told you yesterday I didn’t expect to do well. That was incorrect, as we’ll soon see.
I shot off a sandbag rest from 10 meters. The rifle was rested directly on the bag and the P8 reticle was illuminated. I did not adjust the scope after this first group. Let’s get started.
JTS Dead Center 18.1 grains
First up was the JTS Dead Center 18.1 grain pellet that I sighted in with. Five of them went into 0.079-inches between centers at 10 meters. And — shut my mouth — the P8 sight is deadly! And the RAW? Well, I want one!
The MicroHunter put five .22-caliber JTS Dead Center pellets into a 0.079-inch group at 10 meters. The Chuckram comparison coin next to the group is 5.34mm on its short side and 5.81mm on the long side.
These are my 4 comparison coins. The dime on the left is 17.91 mm. The silver three-cent piece (trime) next to it is 14 mm in diameter. The gold dollar is 13 mm and the silver Chuckram on the right is 5.34 mm on the short axis and 5.81 mm on the long one.
I shot all five shots without looking through the spotting scope. Since the P8 is only 4 power and all these shots are in the black bull I could not see the group until after the last shot. But when I did look — wow!
Surprised
I mentioned yesterday that I didn’t think I could shoot that accurately with the P8 sight. That was just proven wrong. Also I wasn’t sure how accurate the MicroHunter could be. Now we know.
Trigger is perfect!
The trigger of this rifle is perfect! The rifle fired every time when the reticle was centered on target. It went off by itself.
I have to tell you that this first group was the smallest group of the day. But several of the others are also good. Let’s see.
Air Arms Falcon
Next up was the Air Arms Falcon pellet. Five went into a 0.425-inch group. It’s considerably larger than the JTS group but that’s a good thing because it tells us this is not the pellet for the MicroHunter.
The MicroHunter put five Air Arms Falcons into 0.425-inches at ten meters. Not the pellet for this rifle.
H&N 0.218 slug 23 grains
Next up was the 23-grain H&N 0.218 slug. I didn’t have much hope for this one, but once again I was wrong. Five went into 0.219-inches at 10 meters.
The MicroHunter put five slugs into 0.219-inches at ten meters.
That group tells me the MicroHunter is accurate and that first group wasn’t a fluke. I expect to see more good groups along the way.
H&N Baracuda 15
The fourth pellet I tried was the 15-grain H&N Baracuda. The MicroHunter put five into 0.376-inches at 10 meters. Another pellet this rifle doesn’t like.
Five H&N Baracuda 15s went into 0.376-inches at ten meters.
H&N Baracuda 18
Next I tried five H&N Baracuda 18s in the MicroHunter — at 0.137-inches it’s the second smallest group of the test!
Air Arms 16-grain dome
The next pellet I tested was the Air Arms 16-grain dome. Five went into 0.576-inches. Nope!
Five Air Arms 16-grain domes went into 0.576-inches at 10 meters.
JSB Exact Jumbo 15.89-grain
The next pellet I tried was the JSB Exact Jumbo 15.89-grain dome. Five made a 0.275-inch group but four are tighter. I will probably try this one at 25 yards.
Five JSB Jumbos went into 0.275-inches at 10 meters, with four in a smaller cluster.
JSB Exact Jumbo Heavy
Five of the 18.1-grain JSB Exact Jumbo Heavy pellets went into 0.422-inches with a clearly smaller four-shot group. This is another pellet to try ay 25 yards.
Like the Jumbos, the Jumbo Heavys also had a tight 4-shot cluster in the 0.422-inch five-shot group.
Last test — the silencer
As a final group I shot five more of the JTS Dead Center 18.1-grain pellets with the DonnyFL Ronin silencer attached to the MicroHunter. This time five went into 0.3-inches at 10 meters. It’s many times larger than the first group that was shot without the silencer, yet it is still smaller than five of the other groups in the test. I think I will try it at 25 yards, as well.
With the silencer attached the JTS group was 0.3-inches between centers. It’s still smaller than five of the eight groups.
Summary
The RAW MicroHunter is a wonderful precharged pellet rifle. It makes me a better shooter. I have to try one in .177 caliber!
B.B.
Stop playing in the kiddie pool. If the gun is as good as advertised it needs some groups at 75 yards and 100.
Even, 25 and 50 is chump change. Stretch it’s, and your legs…
-Yogi
Distance is where PCP’s shine. Let the RAW MicroHunter sparkle.
Yogi, the Micro Hunter is only shooting at about 20fpe from its 8.5″ barrel. That kind of muzzle energy will not perform well at anything past 50 yards or so. I agree we should look at groups at 25 and 50 yards!
“The MicroHunter put five .22-caliber JTS Dead Center pellets into a 0.079-inch group at 10 meters.”
BB,
Wow! That speaks well for the MicroHunter AND for the P8. 🙂
It’ll be interesting to see how that combination holds up at 25 yards…or more. 😉
Blessings to you,
dave
Yogi,
DITTOS!
Wrote: “Distance is where PCP’s shine.”
So do Bullets (Slugs) especially if there’s WIND…
FOR B.B.: You do know what happens in kiddie pools… don’t you!?
shootski
shootski,
The serious PCP guys at the range say that pellets are for 100> and slugs are for further….
-Y
Ummmm, you are going to need a smaller coin……
With the way we have seen accuracy improve in many airguns over the last 5 years, if you continue to shoot 10m groups, you will need to get a smaller reference point.
Great shooting, I want one as well.
And this is yet another gun that shows the potential of the JTS pellets.
Ian
Tom,
I’m curious about the head sizes of the various pellets you shot. It might reveal how much truth is there to the fit of head size to the bore diameter for accuracy.
Siraniko
Siraniko,
From my modest experience: there is a difference. It makes sense to test it, especially if you are able to get the tester like H&N slug or JSB Exact, where you can try all cal. variations in one test series.
My custom HW50 does it’s best only with 4.52 Exact. The difference at 50yards is like “not bad this 4.50 cal. pellet, let me try the 4.52 cal. – what?! It can’t be… “.
Siraniko,
Head size does matter. Years ago, when I was shooting a .177 Gamo CFX, she was a super accurate air rifle with 4.51mm H&N FTT pellets. Later when I tried the same pellets in 4.52mm heads, she was horrible. She went from ten shot groups at 25 yards that would hide under a dime to groups you had to use a quarter to hide them. Yeah, I know that is really not that bad for a sproinger, but I was used to better from her.
Siraniko,
I should have mentioned that the slugs chambered hard.
BB
Nielsen .218 slugs chambered hard in the .22 Maximus when FM tried them out earlier this year.
Tom,
Then does knowing the diameter of the accurate pellet make the selection of possible accurate pellets any easier?
Siraniko
Siraniko,
It does seem that a tighter fit helps accuracy to a point. But as RidgeRunner pointed out, sometimes it works the other way.
B B
BB, Guys,
What is you experience with silencer and accuracy? Does the silencer only change the POI? Or is the best grouping without silencer always better than with one attached?
The most accurate sproinger I’ve ever tried is my full custom HW50 and it makes 0.04inch group in 10 shots from the bench at 50 meters (with 4.52mm JSB Exact pellets) . It has a silencer attached “for life” – the barrel was very cold, the silencer very hot, after both combined reached the ambient temperature you are not able to remove it or move it at all. So I’m not able to test it without it (and I doubt I would be able to shot better than this group ever more). But would it be better without the silencer?!?
This year I discovered slugs for the first time (I mean for myself, I never tried them before). I was delighted. My PCP powerplant delivers 35FPE in .22 cal and it was amazing to see what the 21grain slug is doing. This is a compeletly new kind of long range shooting. There is the essence of the BC theory vs. practice you can really follow! From theoretic BC=0.04 for the pellet to BC=0,1 (slug) there is a huge practical difference. I think there is no better way to explain the BC to somebody – just let him shot BC 0.014 vs. BC 0.1 at 75 yards.
tomek,
My experience with a silencer is they USUALLY decrease the accuracy of a rifle or pistol. I’ve tested a .22 rimfire with this for articles in Shotgun News.
That said, I have seen instances where they increase the accuracy, but never in the guns I was shooting.
BB
BB,
That is what I would say from the “first simple feeling”: best case it will not affect the accuracy, otherwise it may only make it worse.
When I think about it deeper I see two mean situation:
1. The air behind the pellet is still under high pressure and will affect the pellet strongly directly after it leaves muzzle.
2. The air behind the pellet is on low pressure level (example: 7.5J match rifle with long barrel) which will not affect the pellet at all / only mariginally.
What we are dealing mostly with is the situation 1. – WOW, why? Who needs a silencer on a weak and already silent rifle / pistol? What is making this big bang is the air decompressing rapidly (I don’t even consider hypersonic shot) which is still under high pressure and there is a lot of it behind the pellet going out of the bore…
The influence of discharging air through the barrel crown (also a topic which is complicated – the crown shape and quality) at a constant air pressure will be very similar each time. The influence of multi chambered silencer might be not so predictable and vary much more from shot to shot. Here I would see the biggest accuracy degradation potential of the silencer. We know one chamber simple silencer is mostly not good enough, you need more sophisticated contruction with 4, 7, even more chambers and cones inside.
Even if the barrel outlet is not symmetrical it will cause always very similar “mistakes” which you can correct and be accurate. Of course up to a certain level where there is no chance for pellet to stay stable if “kicked” too much on a side.
I would like to make a test using 35FPE .22 and 6FPE .177 PCP with the same silencers – shoot for grouping only with / without silencer. The only problem is that I don’t have enough distance inside :/ to avoid wind influence. 10 meter is not enough to see the impact.
*** The air behind the pellet is still under high pressure and will affect the pellet strongly directly after it leaves muzzle. ***
tomek,
With springers and other fixed power airguns I often wonder if finding the pellet of the right weight and tightness of fit is as much to match the power (to optimize timing and minimize turbulence/wasted air) as it is to suit the other “accuracy” factors.
In tuning my PCPs, the final (fine) adjustments are done (by ear and chronograph – a couple of fps) to minimize turbulence/wasted air by tweaking the regulator.
Essentially, I’m adjusting the valve timing and coming (slightly down to ~95%) off of the power curve to where the shot is less sensitive to slight variations.
That little tweak often makes a huge difference to the accuracy.
Hank
I am only pointing out a couple of the variables because I don’t have experience to go by. But two items that jump out for me are the short barrel (8.5”) and the sophistication of the silencer (adjustable “Bark Stripper”). I would think that the short barrel would have contact with the projectile for a much shorter time than a full length barrel would. So, it seems to me that when more of the projectile contacts the rifling inside the bore (ie: slug or tight fitting pellet head), it would impart more spin and therefore more stabilization onto the projectile. Also, a shorter barrel like this one would seem to me to have a higher velocity airflow exiting the muzzle than a barrel of normal rifle length would (if the same amount of air was used). Anyway, this sure shows me that a longer barrel isn’t necessary for accuracy.
tomek,
I have many LDC’s. Some improve accuracy, some do not. I find the Huggets improve accuracy the best.
-Y
BB,
Seems that everybody and their brother are making compact airguns theses days. Preferring full sized rifles, I don’t care for the style myself but then I said that about all-metal airguns and have become quite fond of the Impact and Panthera.
The RAW MicroHunter is shooting nicely – as expected for a pcp at that price point – but as Yogi said, 10 yards for this quality airgun is playing in the kiddie pool.
IMHO, serious testing for a pcp should be done at a minimum of 40 yards. The lighting on my range coupled with the dark backstop let’s me see pellets in flight and many that fly stably out to 30-35 yards go wonky after that. A good rifle/pellet/tune should group sub-MOA at 40 yards, a poor match will be obvious at that range.
Just my 2 cents.
Hank
B.B.,
I HOPE YOU ARE HAPPY!
You have generated a great deal of SPECULATING by the Readership which is what typically happens when airguns perform in UNEXPECTED ways.
A few redirect questions on some of my pet peeves:
1. TURBULENCE post projectile barrel exit. How is it that projectiles are understood (by most) to decelerate immediately on barrel exit but somehow an air charge of much lower unit MASS is somehow able to decelerate (or perhaps even somehow believed to accelerate by some few) less than a far more DENSE projectile?
Think about that and see how the physics just don’t match the SPECULATION.
2. Shooting some finite number of the same projectile, with and without, a suppressor is some definitive TEST for accuracy change. Think so!?
By installing a suppressor you have changed the barrel both in harmonics as well as the effective length of Internal Ballistic portion of the projectiles path.
The Bore is typically composed of some sort of Lands and Grooves along with a set length and TWIST rate.
For most projectiles the Lands are for the RIDE and the Grooves are to keep the projectile from smearing out of the rotation imparted by the TWIST. IF the Grooves are too deep they will impart engraving on the projectile which will cause all manner of problems in the External Ballistic portion of the projectiles path to the target. Choice of groove depth is typically more important than is commonly believed. I would ask you to SPECULATE how the ratio of LAND and GROOVE width might also be important as well as the total number of each….
I could go on but will keep it simple for today.
shootski
Shootski,
What about projectile bases relative to turbulence – flat, shallow cupped, deep skirt and boat-tailed. People have varying results (positive and negative) with all of them. I believe that it’s something to do with the timing and turbulence.
I’m wondering what sort of things happen at the moment the skirt/base of the projectile clears the crown and forms a venturi for the hpa escaping into an atmospheric pressure.
Thinking it would be a wild ride – sharp, short increase in (air) velocity followed immediately by an extreme drop in pressure.
Would a moderator help temper the rate of change?
Hank
Vana2,
Let first think about the situation from a time interval perspective. This is all happening in microseconds.
It IS a transition point from Internal to External Ballistic rules and as are all regime transitions most difficult to model.
Best I know is that the air charge behind the projectile base is not going faster than the projectile while in the bore. It is experiencing adiabatic cooling and losing energy simply by volume increase as well as total MASS increase IF (very poor charge management) the valve remans open until the projectile exits the Bore.
With the exceedingly short time interval the projectile base and muzzle interact there will be virtually no time nor energy to establish a venturi of any significance. IF the perpendicularity of the projectile base to Crown is imperfect it could potentially cause a thrust vector change but only minimally.
See my post below about R&D of Cold Propulsion Charge suppression that is needed. There is much to be learn particularly about transonic and supersonic shock waves which might be a greater issue than air stripping. I just don’t know the magnitude of what we are dealing with.
My Big Bores seem to shoot better with a suppressor. That may be because my Big Bores are very high power. Most are tuned to have the valve close when the projectile is 2/3 of the distance down the bore.
I believe we are just seeing the beginnings of AIR POWER.
Some real experiential knowledge went away into their graves with the original PCP builders!
shootski
shootski,
Yes, I am happy! 😉
BB
B.B.,
LOL!
shootski
Shootski,
An interesting thought exercise might use some input from examining the barrels produced by Harry Pope that were muzzle/breech loading, and still very accurate by modern standards. The barrels had wide grooves, with narrow round topped lands. The bullets were cast with the sprue on the nose and the base as square as could be made. When the bullet was loaded from the muzzle, and engraved by the rifling, the base was still flat & square, as the ‘deformed’ material was pushed forward. So, when the bullet exited the muzzle, it was uniformly acted on by the gases following it out of the bore. The results pretty much speak for themselves, if the information that I’ve read is to be believed.
As with all accurate shooting, consistency and attention to detail are of critical importance.
Just keep trying to make those teeny tiny groups. it can be a therapeutic, zen kind of thing.
Bill
B.B.,
Nice shooting!
I look forward to longer range testing.
Although a longer barrel would obviously equate to greater MV = range POTENTIAL as well as higher potential Spin Rates IF there is enough velocity to reach 10 meters then you probably have enough to easily get to 50 and probably 100.
It could be instructive for many readers; especially with the high BC bullets (SLUGS) at 50 to 100 using your LabRadar.
shootski
Readership,
MORE SUPPRESSOR information:
https://www.sigsauer.com/blog/sig-sauer-suppressors-silence-is-just-the-beginning. Wonder how doing some REAL Research & Design engineering could effect COLD SILENCE devices?
shootski
I learn something, every article that Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier) publishes. Often there are some educational comments too.
Today I’m thinking, what an interesting exchange of opinions, assumptions and other uncertainties to challenge ones own understanding of why airgun stuff happens. 🙂
My thoughts are that there is still considerable room for discovering in minute detail, what actually happens when a shot is taken, you know, before even attempting to make sense of it all.
For example, slow motion recording of the gasses somehow made visible, including inside the airgun. Other energies too, like temperatures, pressures, velocities, etc, etc…
I think, future understanding of airguns looks exciting with maybe some surprises too.
Would you agree that vortexes will become an aid in airgun technology?
———-
tomek,
despite it being clear that you achieve remarkable results with your customised Weihrauch HW50, I would like to be pedantic and observe that your 10 shot grouping over 50m cannot have measured “0.04inch” but probably 0.4inch, which, like I understood, is still very good! 🙂
hihihi,
Airguns were serious arms once upon a time, then they became TOYS in many peoples opinions….
It appears that they are moving toward being things taken seriously once again by many more people ;^)
Lesson on group size:
I have shot a group of 0.0 also known as a pinwheel by some; others require it to also be dead center on a bullseye. What Tomek shot was a group where the centers of each of the the impact points varied no more than 0.04 units from each other.
If the projectiles are n units in diameter then the size of the hole can be measured as being n+ 0.04nths in the largest axis. The beauty of that technique is you can compare the accuracy of projectiles of any caliber.
Tom has covered this process any number of times: /blog/2022/03/measuring-the-sizes-of-groups/
His blogs are more honest about the topic than most other writers on the topic.
hihihi if you want more information just enter “Measuring group size” in the SEARCH BOX.
shootski
PS: This one is one of B.B. Pelletier’s best on the topic in my opinion.
tomek, I was wrong with my previous comment. I offer you my apologies for falsely accusing you of incorrect reporting.
Egg on my face embarrassed and SORRY!
shootski, oops! I forgot that measurements are centre to centre! 🙁
I just noticed a grouping size smaller than the pellet itself, ie I imagined a hole smaller than the pellet. Thanks for drawing attention to my error.
Hmm, I wish I had thought before typing (and that I could delete my awful comment). Sorry to all readers.
Don’t beat yourself up, Hihihi. We all learn from each other, here. I personally could not measure a group such as that with confidence as the imperfections in the torn paper around the hole would confound me, even with a digital caliper. Suffice it to say, a group like that is remarkable at any distance. We now have to merely convince Tomek to write a guest blog or a long comment on how his rifle is customized. If I recall, you have an HW 50….
Don’t beat yourself up, Hihihi. We all learn from each other, here. I personally could not measure a group such as that with confidence as the imperfections in the torn paper around the hole would confound me, even with a digital caliper. Suffice it to say, a group like that is remarkable at any distance. We now have to merely convince Tomek to write a guest blog or a long comment on how his rifle is customized. If I recall, you have an HW 50….
I shoot groups of 0.0 all the time. It’s the second shot that ruins them.
I shoot groups of 0.0 all the time. It’s the second shot that ruins them. ;o)
Hihihi – please relax, everything is fine 🙂 Sometimes I also do not communicate right – I was surprized, even amazed, to be able to shot 10 shot group in a circle of the diameter of 10mm at 50 meter, I should perhaps write it like this directly. Usually the groups were like 13mm up to 18mm diameter overall but once I had 10mm hole in the paper after 10 shots (all bench of course). To be able to do that I really went a long way with this HW50, which at the end does not really have that much common with the HW50 you can buy. So there is a looong way from out of the box to this level which I tested very deeply in hot and cold conditions. The pellets were also pre-selected before. There was no wind condition. That is the key to make it possible – but when do we have it shooting long range 🙁 It was the best group I shot in my life at all – now I’m not getting even close to this one hehehehe.
Actually there is something which I need to look at for the future – how to define the group size. I used to tell how big was the circle in diameter overall and this is not the best way to report, I realized. 10mm “hole” would be +-5mm from center. To be honest recently I’m happy to shot something like this at 25yards. Hard to belive but amazing groups happend – unfortunatelly not all the time 🙂
Long time ago I would never even think about what a PCP can do at a long range like 100 or 150 yards if the shooter is not disturbing 🙂 It is sometimes amazing, looking at the mathematics almost impossible – but it happens. Some guys are not even talking about the results because nobody believe them 🙂
hihihi,
I’m glad folks on the Blog are all kind souls. To make a mistake and admit it so publicly makes you a rare person indeed. But mistakes happen.
Too many Flight Instructors and their students have died when a Flight Instructor made a mistake and the student was too fearful to point out the error. I told my flight students to tell me immediately if i made a mistake; i showed them my pencil eraser that was used to make my point. Followed by the statement that when my eraser wore out before my pencil i would know it was time to stop flying.
hihihi your eraser is hardly worn the best i can tell.
shootski
PS: eggs belong in omelette.
Roamin Greco, shootski and most of all tomek,
thank you for your tolerance and kind words. I humbly accept your forgiveness, but please, always remember what I’m capable of, ok. 🙂
THANKS AGAIN
———
shootski,
I knew I had one.
Somewhere.
So I searched.
And found it.
How appropriate is it’s condition ?! 🙂