Canadian Airgun Forum

What's next? A rubber band gun hunter division?

I know one American shooter that would likely protest that our targets would not go down when shot with his 500 fps Daisy 853. Frankly, at some point you must put down your foot and so far, 5 fpe at the target is more than fair right out to 55 yards. To make it so that a rifle that low in power would drop the target with a paddle hit, the target would fall with every single hit, no matter where it was struck on the faceplate. This is where you say, the power level has been set to reflect the power that is expected to take small game at the distances we shoot this sport at. Bring enough rifle to do the job.

_________________
Keyrigger
CAFTA Governor

When you are long winded, is that a sign of Wisdom or Old Age?

The lengths we go to keep Super happy

Seriously, any of the guys shooting sub 12fpe, with velocities in the range of 770-800 using JSB Exacts, will only find their pellet is retaining 5.5-6.0fpe at 55 yards (with a .0200 BC). So 5fpe is fair.

As Keyrigger alluded to, any lower we risk the chance of the short distance targets false falling (face or reducer hits) from 18-20fpe guns.

I think one will find that the factory Gamo targets will go down with only 2-3fpe hits.

_________________
Canadian Airgun Field Target Association (CAFTA)

Out at 40+ yards, I do try to put the targets that are the easiest to knock down, but will not fall with a face hit. Usually you have a few targets that fit that criterion. Some will fall with 3 ft/lb hits and will not fall with high energy face hits; they are the targets that should be placed at long distance. For shorter distances, the 5 ft/lb to fall idea should be fine.

So I get the idea of, "Bring enough rifle to do the job." But I would add, that if a target does not fall at long distance and you are sure you hit the kill zone, but you know your rifle is well below 5 ft/lb at that distance, that would be a miss. In the Hunter Class, if you hit the target, but do not knock it down, you still get one point. You can put a note on the score card to check that target and we will do so. If it passes the pistol test, the target is good and any missed shots will be just that, missed shots. So bring the rifle you have, but be realistic if you know the power of the rifle is quite low.

Tim

_________________
Tim
CAFTA Governor and lifetime learner

Wish I could be there but I have a wedding on Sat. and the game fare on Sun.

Have a good time guys and remember to get loads of pics up so I can see what I'm missing.

_________________
My shooting pix :- http://www.freewebs.com/fthftshootingpix/

http://www.freewebs.com/shootingpix/

http://www.freewebs.com/shootingpix08

You have to admit that the near target on lane one at Waterloo on the 26th was set up just a bit on the heavy side when even Canshooter's 10-11 FPE TX200 couldn't drop it at 10 yards with paddle hits. No wonder that my FWB 300S didn't take it down with 8.4 FPE (at 10 yards.) Oddly enough, all last year, the 50 and 55 yard targets didn't give me any problems with dropping on a paddle hit - it was usually some of the 30 to 40 yard, maladjusted targets that were the problem - requiring at least two consecutive paddle hits to drop them.

The 5 FPE benchmark that CAFTA has settled on is certainly reasonable, by any standard.
I just ran the numbers for my newer FWB 300S FT rifle on Chairgun 2, and it looks like it is right at the minimum you would want to use - at around 710 FPS (avg) muzzle velocity with 8.44 grain pellets - that equates to 9.2 FPE at the muzzle, 5.1 FPE at 55 yards.
The FWB 300S that I used last year, shot a bit lighter - at 695 FPS (avg), equating to 8.9 FPE at the muzzle, and 4.8 FPE at 55 yards.

Super,

Your right...that target was a problem. I'm not even sure it was a case of being set too heavy. It seemed to malfunction intermittently. There were three misses on the target, but eight recorded misses on the score cards. I was confident that target was problematic.

Target are mechanical, and will have their problems. Even when setup correctly, some part of it could malfunction during a match.

Canshooters TX actually recorded velocity readings in the 780-785 range with JSB Exacts after the match (11.55fpe).

_________________
Canadian Airgun Field Target Association (CAFTA)