Beeman

What makes a winner?

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What makes a winner?

Last year’s Top 10 Selling air pistols

By Dennis Adler

Umarex and Glock walked away with 2019’s largest number of sales and guns from Pyramyd Air, with the Third Gen Glock 17 CO2 model (right) taking the number 1 spot in sales, the non-blowback Model 19 (back) taking the number 2 position, and the new Gen4 model placing 7th out of the Top 10 for the year’s sales leaders.

For what it’s worth, I picked and reviewed six of the Top 10 selling air pistols for 2019, and of the six I had written up over the last couple of years (yes, they were not all 2019 models), my top guns reviewed in Airgun Experience were in the first three places as well as 5th, 6th and 7th place as the most purchased air pistols of 2019. What is interesting, and perhaps a bit telling, is that they are all based on semi-auto pistols. I wasn’t so much surprised by that, as I was with the number 1 selling air pistol of the year for Pyramyd Air, the Umarex Glock 17 Third Gen. I would have expected the newer Gen4 to be the best seller, then the Third Gen or the G19X, which didn’t even make the list as a best seller! Instead, the first Umarex Glock Model, the G19 non-blowback slipped into the number 2 position ahead of the Sig Sauer M17, Beretta 92A1, and Sig Sauer P365, which came in an impressive 6th place for sales over the 7th place Umarex Glock 17 Gen4! read more

Target Pistols and Target Shooters Part 5

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Target Pistols and Target Shooters Part 5

Part 4 Part 3 Part 2 Part 1

Match Pistols – Shooting the Beeman P3

By Dennis Adler

There is both a sense of age and longevity in Dr. Beeman’s P3, which is one year older than the First Edition Blue Book of Airguns, (now in its 12th Edition). The P3 is one of those finely crafted German airguns that have withstood the test of time, while others have been discontinued over the same period. As a single shot Match Pistol it is also one of the more affordable at $230 ($40 less than the Air Venturi V10 and ten bucks shy of being half the price of the Weihrauch HW 75).

I know that over the last 18 months we have focused on blowback action air pistols and rifles, training guns matched to their centerfire counterparts, and classic single action revolvers, which is the primary objective of the Airgun Experience, but this little sidestep into single stroke pneumatics and 10-Meter pistols is also an integral part of handgun (and rifle) training. This is an approach established more than four decades ago by Dr. Robert D. Beeman with his first “Adult Airguns” imported from Germany. Thus the P3 plays a very important role in this story of improving one’s shooting abilities. The P3 breaks down the basics of target shooting by providing simple operation, exemplary accuracy at 10 meters, and the benefits of modern fiber optic sights (also used on many compact and full-size cartridge firing handguns). Like the Air Venturi V10 for 10-Meter training, this is also a short course compared to getting into comparable centerfire handgun and blowback action understudies, like the S&W M&P40. With single shot pneumatics the greater emphasis is placed on sighting accuracy and trigger control than on learning all of the handling skills such as slide and safety operation, magazine changes, tactical reloads, holstering, drawing, etc. The singular focus with models like the Beeman P3 is on learning to hit the bullseye with repeatable accuracy. No rushing from shot to shot; just timing and consistency. read more

Target Pistols and Target Shooters Part 4

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Target Pistols and Target Shooters Part 4 Part 3 Part 2 Part 1

Match Pistols – The Classic Beeman P3

By Dennis Adler

The big difference between the Air Venturi V10 and the Beeman P3 is their design purpose. The V10 is a 10-Meter pistol, which meets all the basic requirements for that shooting discipline, whereas the Beeman P3 is a Match Pistol that allows a two-handed hold. The V10 is also slightly larger overall, but both are overlever pneumatics that can shoot 4.5mm pellets at around 400 fps.

This is where it all began. We are talking about the history of Adult Airguns in America, and that history begins with Dr. Robert D. Beeman, the editor of my first airgun book, the First Edition Blue Book of Airguns published 17 years ago. But my history with Dr. Beeman goes further back to my role with the Blue Book of Gun Values as one of the contributing editors on black powder pistols and air pistols (along with fellow Pyramyd Air author Tom Gaylord). In 1998 Blue Book publisher Steve Fjestad and I spun off the black powder gun section into a separate book that is now published periodically (and currently edited by John Allen); along with a series of hard cover books that I have written on black powder arms. The reason that black powder guns were spun off from the regular annual Blue Book of Gun Values was simply that there wasn’t enough room in the Blue Book to properly cover them. The same thing occurred in the 2000 edition of the Blue Book and the following year the First Edition Blue Book of Airguns appeared. I was the author and Dr. Beeman was the editor and co-author. By 2001 when the First Edition appeared the number of airguns available had grown exponentially and like the black powder guns needed to have their own dedicated book. That was 17 years ago. Today, there are so many more airguns (than black powder guns) that the latest airgun book (12th Edition) has grown from the original 160 pages to 840 pages! And much of that growth over the years begins with Dr. Beeman and the founding of Beeman’s Precision Airguns in 1972. read more