Stoeger Arms X5 Air Rifle

I received my X5 yesterday and I was immediately impressed with it's quality. The bluing of the steel and finish on the wood was flawless. The trigger pull although being a bit long was very smooth, much better than I expected, and doesn't take away from the gun's inherent accuracy. Within 5 minutes I was consistently hitting a 2 inch targets 20 yds away with an unsupported hold. Today I put a scope on was hitting the same targets at 35 yds, also unsupported. If you do your part the X5 doe's it's. My gun doesn't seem to be hold sensitive, but I'll know more when I shoot from a bench.

I agree with others that the comb is too high for comfortable use of the fiber optic sights, but works best with a scope.

The X5 is one smooth accurate fun all day shooter and would easily be a great deal at twice the price. If you like making small objects dance at 30+ yds buy this gun. You won't be disappointed with the X5 or Pyramyd Air.

Workmanship; quality look; bluing; fit & finish; ease of cocking; price; ergonomics; power and accuracy

Nothing, except for the plastic muzzle brake, sights and non-adjustable trigger.

Shooting the first 50-75 rounds with a CP 4x scope was testing as I had to refine sightings constantly. It finally came onto a tight target and I've not had a chance to give it more testing, but it may be the scope. I have a X20 S and that is very accurate tack driver, but needed a GRT trigger upgrade to achieve that accuracy. Most of these guns out of the factory have long trigger pulls without a discernible break point and for the second or so while you're squeezing the trigger, you have to guess the break point. This sometimes pulls you off target. With a crisp trigger upgrade, that becomes a non issue. I found that I can't get an trigger upgrade for this model and am looking for some possible fixes? Other than that it's a really nice gun for the money and would no doubt bring game to the table if necessary. I like the Stoeger/Benelli brand and the quality of their guns, especially the nice two year warranty. For this price you can't go wrong. Returned an X5 for it-too little power!

Size, weight, feel, ease of cocking, accuracy, and the fantastically low price. I agree with the observations made by others, it's just one heck of a nice gun. There are a couple of things I'd change but really, for the price, you simply can't go wrong.

The rear sight is hard for old eyes to see properly, probably because of the image mottled by the green dots (I have less trouble seeing the all black rear sights of my grandson's Grizzly). Locating the trigger further back would be a nice touch, as would narrowing the forward edge of the stock a bit.

When I first shot it, the gun dieseled a couple of times but has since settled down. Even with old eyes and a fuzzy rear sight image achieved a perfect cloverleaf at 30+ feet almost immediately. Later mounted a Hawke 2-7X scope on it. At first it performed fantastically, but in a short while the zero started shifting badly. I had used the same scope on an IZH 60 and a QB78 successfully before. I think the X-5's spring shock was beating up the Hawke scope, hopefully it hasn't destroyed the innards, haven't checked yet. Just a caution to others. At first the trigger was awful stiff, so I sprayed some lithium lube into the area where the trigger pivots and in a short while it has settled down.