I am looking at the RWS Model 34 for use by my 4H Shooting Education Club for air rifle silhouette. Does anyone have experience using this rifle. The rams are shot at 45 yards. I will be using the .17 version of this rifle. How accurate is this rifle and can the trigger be tuned? Any and all help appreciated.
Owen
No experience with the 34, but plenty with the 46 which is the same powerplant & trigger and is not as efficient. Yes the gun and trigger can be tuned. Yes, it can be competitive, although you must know that there are many other more expensive guns that will be slightly better. The .177 gun will propel pellets in excess of 800fps (a good speed for such events). If you zeroed at 36 yards, you would be less than 1/4" over at 20 and less than an inch under at 45 yards. I'm sure Larry can give you more precise data if he had crony info. The only thing going with lower power at the longer distances is your near misses probably won't knock that big guy over.....
Thanks for clarifying, I tried to say that the 46 is less efficient than the 34, but the English language got in my way and it was questionable what I said. The lesser power still applies to the 34 when shooting against other possibilities out there in the US.
I would have several questions for you, based on my observations that high powered springers are not easy to learn to shoot accurately (took me about four months to learn to do FT with my 52). Have you thought about CO2 guns (assuming the shooting conditions would normally be 'warm') like the RWS/Hammerli 850.
Don't know about there, but here, in Portugal, silhouette shooting sport is only avaiable with break-barrel rifles.
If money isn't an issue, the HW 95/Beeman r9, in .177 cal., is probably the best choice. HOWEVER, the new Diana model 34 pro-carbine is as acurate as the r9.
While I like springers over CO2 rifles, you are talking about, perhaps, some novice shooters. The main thing here is to find some guns that are easy to shoot accurately. Trying to learn how to hold a fairly powerful springer like the 34 (almost an art in itself requiring much practice) may discourage the kids, much like starting them off with a .30-06 instead of a twenty-two. While I don't know if they have the energy necessary to knock over rams, the QB78 series of CO2 rifles are both inexpensive, accurate and good starting guns to train kids on. Do a search and you will come up with Archer Air (?). He's about the best bet for one of these guns and inspects before selling.
Exactly what I was thinking about. To my knowledge, the 850 shoots about as strong as any CO2 on the market - stock. And they can be tuned to deliver even more. They might very well be able to work a good package deal directly with Umarex if they are looking at several guns. I recently got one of the Umarex refurbs for $158 delivered with 4x scope.
I also agree with Red on this one the 850Mag in .22 is powerful and accurate and has an eight shot clip that reloads real quickly and isn't hold sensitive. Tuned on Co2 it will shoot 700s and tuned on HPA it will shoot over 900fps, the .17 versions shoots around 100+ fps faster but doesn't deliver as much energy to target.