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BSA Comet breakbarrel air rifle: Part 1

May 5, 2018July 27, 2011 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Before we start, I wanted to let you know that there are two new videos on Airgun Academy. We’ve started a series on airgun maintenance. Episode 27 is about properly maintaining pneumatics, and episode 28 is CO2 gun maintenance. It’s medium-sized and lightweight. The velocity in .177 is 825 f.p.s. The BSA … Read more

Sterling HR-81 .177 underlever air rifle: Part 2

January 8, 2012February 22, 2011 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Part 1 Today, we’ll look at the velocity this Sterling HR-81 underlever air rifle produces. You’ll recall that this airgun started out as a UK rifle, so the power was limited to 12 foot-pounds. Benjamin-Sheridan didn’t change that when they took over manufacture in 1994. The U.S. production ended in 1994 when … Read more

The Walther LGV Olympia – Part 3

January 20, 2011 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Part 1 Part 2 The Walther LGV Olympia is a beautiful breakbarrel spring-piston target rifle from the 1960s. Wow! It’s been two-and-a-half months since I did the last report on this rifle. A lot has happened since then, plus I had to wait until I was strong enough to lift the heavy … Read more

To B3 or not to B3 – Part 2

January 12, 2011 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Part 1 This is the second part of Vince’s guest blog about the B3 air rifle he turned into a decent gun. If you’d like to write a guest post for this blog, please email us. Bloggers must be proficient in the simple html that Blogger software uses, know how to take … Read more

To B3 or not to B3 – Part 1

January 11, 2011 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Vince is an airgun fixit guru. He’s been on a roll lately and has sent me a number of great guest blogs about fixing airguns, taking junker guns and making them whole again, and making airgun parts. If you’d like to write a guest post for this blog, please email us. Bloggers … Read more

The Walther LGV Olympia – Part 2

November 5, 2010 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by B.B. Pelletier Part 1 The Walther LGV Olympia is a beautiful breakbarrel spring-piston target rifle from the 1960s. Today, we’ll look at the velocity of my Walther LGV Olympia target rifle. I told you in Part 1 how serendipity brought me to this rifle and what a find it was. Of course, this one … Read more

The Walther LGV Olympia – Part 1

October 22, 2010 by Tom Gaylord (B.B. Pelletier)

by Tom Gaylord, a.k.a. B.B. Pelletier Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 10-22-10-01-Walther-LGV-Olympia Walther LGV Olympia was a top-quality 10 meter target rifle from the 1970s. The weather cooperated yesterday and gave me a perfect day at the range, so I was able to shoot the Walther LGV Olympia at 50 yards. I also shot the Talon SS with the 1:22" twist barrel before the wind kicked up and stopped all airgun shooting, so I'm on the way to the final test of the different twist rates. I knew the LGV Olympia was never going to hit the target, no matter what I did to the rear sight, so I placed two 3-inch bulls on a 2-foot by 4-foot piece of target paper and used them for sighting. The shots landed far below these bulls, of course. How far is an eye-opener, so I took a picture of it so you could see. 06-22-13-01-Walther-LGV-Olympia-50-yard-groups The pellets landed about 18-inches below the aim point at 50 yards. The sights had the pellets hitting the center of the target at 25 yards, so this is how far they drop in the second 25 yards. Notice that the center of the group of JSB Exact Jumbos on the right is about 2 inches lower than the center of the RWS Superdomes on the left. I fully expected this to happen, so I stapled the bullseye targets to a huge piece of target paper, so the pellet holes would show. Knowing they could well go to the same point I used two separate bullseyes as aim point, and from the picture you can see that was a good idea. I selected the two best pellets from the 25-yard test for this. They were the JSB Exact Heavy, which was the best pellet at 25 yards, and the RWS Superdome that took second place. I shot off a sandbag with the rifle rested on the flat of my hand in the classic artillery hold. The flight time of both pellets was extreme. Although I couldn't see them in flight, the flight time told me they were dropping rapidly as they moved downrange. JSB Exact Heavy The first pellet I tried was the 10.34-grain JSB Exact Heavy. It is far too heavy for the LGV Olympia powerplant, but in the 25-yard test 10 Exact Jumbos went into a group that measures 0.354-inches between centers. So a novice might expect that since the range was doubled, the group size would be as well. That would give us something like a 0.70-inch group for this pellet. 06-22-13-02-Walther-LGV-Olympia-50-yard-group-with-JSB-Exact-Heavy The 50-yard group was larger than expected. Ten JSB Exact heavys went into 2.285-inches What I actually got was 2.283-inches between the centers of the two pellets that were farthest apart. Thats roughly 6 times larger than the 25-yard group and more than 3 times the expected size, if you simply try to extrapolate from 25 yards to 50 yards. This is why you have to be careful when making generalizations about accuracy. The shooting conditions were perfect for this test. There was no breeze to speak of and if I felt something I always waited it out. I also had no shots that were called as anything but perfect. So what you see here represents the best I was able to do with the LGV Olympia at 50 yards with this JSB pellet. RWS Superdome The second-best pellet at 25 yards was the RWS Superdome that gave me a 10-shot group measuring 0.695 inches. Multiply that by 6 and you get an anticipated group size of 4.17-inches. I'm doing that because of what happened with the JSB Exact Jumbos. 06-22-13-03-Walther-LGV-Olympia-50-yard-group-with-RWS-Superdomes RWS Superdomes opened up even more than JSB Exact Jumbos. This group measures 3.062-inches between centers. What Superdomes actually did was put 10 shots into 3.062-inches -- so it was better than predicted (if you use the 6-times predictor) but was certainly much larger than simply double the 25-yard group size. The lesson here is that group size does not simply increase linearly with distance. We hear that all the time. If a certain gun shoots 1-inch at 100 yards we say it should shoot 2 inches at 200 yards. I'm saying that rarely happens. Usually the group will open faster as the distance increases. Not always, but usually. Evaluation The Walther LGV Olympia is a remarkable airgun. Out to 25 yards it is extremely accurate, plus it is very easy to cock and quiet to shoot. Beyond 25 yards, though, the LGV Olympia quickly gets outside its comfort zone. There just isn't enough power pushing the pellet to hold the group size to what you might expect. These results are consistent with the results I got when shooting the FWB 300S at 50 yards. Installing a scope helped, but only marginally. So I'm not going to put a scope on this rifle. I'm satisfied with this test and that's as far as I'm going in this test.

by B.B. Pelletier The Walther LGV Olympia is a beautiful breakbarrel spring-piston target rifle from the 1960s. Well, the Roanoke Airgun Expo starts today, so while you read this, Mac and I will be buying, selling and looking at airguns. I will take pictures to show you, of course. So, there I was, on the … Read more

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