I had been eyeballing a lone Winchester 800x .177 spring piston air rifle at a local big box store for some time now. It looked like a decent air rifle but I was not willing to fork out $119 for it. The rifle is made in Turkey by Hatsan, imported by Daisy and branded with the Winchester name. I guess the Winchester name just does not mean as much as it used to. This series of rifles have been getting fairly good reviews as a decent entry-level spring piston airgun.
A few weeks ago I noticed it was on clearance and marked at $79 so I decided I would buy it. At the register they knocked off another ten bucks so with tax and a tin of pellets I was out the door for less that $75.
When I got it home the first thing I did was head out to the garage to fire it a few times. Here was my take at that moment my take on this rifle.
Power- very good, with more than enough punch to dispatch typical yard varmints. It easily punches a pellet through a 1/2 inch of clear pine.
Sights- It has a fiber optic front and a micro adjustable rear. Both are plastic and sub par. But I plan on putting a optics on it. It looks like I could mate up a Contender silhouette sight or a Swedish Mauser rear sight that I have in a parts box.
Stock- The stock is solid Walnut but nothing special. The plastic butt plate does not fit well and I will most likely replace it or make it fit when I redo the bulky stock..
Trigger- The trigger was supposed to be adjustable but the screw is far to short, There is about a mile of gritty creep and lots of side to side slop. The first thing I did was tear it apart add some nylon bushing to tighten everything up a bit and replace the trigger adjustment screw with a longer one that actually works. Lube and polish the internals, and made some better fitting pins. After a few hours of work the trigger now breaks cleanly at 3.5 lbs.
Fit and Finish- What do you expect for a $100 air rifle... It is built like a Russian tank, it ain't pretty, the welds are rather sloppy, but it is strong with a positive feel.
Accuracy- Unknown at this point, I need pick up a half dozen different pellet types and brands to test.
Bottom line;
with a little bit of tinkering I think I will have a decent plinker/squirrel gun.
I bought a fairly cheap Leapers 3x9 AO, illuminated rectical. I just followed the basic rule of spending the same amount of money on the optics as th rifle.
http://www.pyramydair.com/cgi-bin/ac...cessory_id=659
<img src="http://smith357.zoints.com/image/56923-airrifles" alt="airrifles" />
At first I could not get it shoot a decent group, then I looked down the barrel and noticed it was full of all manner of crud. I ran a bunch patches soaked in ER and they kept coming out black, after about 10-12 wet patches and another 20 dry they were coming out clean. For reference I have not cleaned my Sheridan for years, but when I punched the bore it only took one wet patch and 3 dry patches to get it like new.
I went the Champion Shooters Supply to get some pellets for testing. They were very helpful and steered me towards heavy pellets saying they work better in magnum guns; I got a few tins of 8-9.5 grain RWS match grade pellets. Then I proceeded to drool all over the 50 or so fine Anschutz rifles on the wall.
These heavy match pellets fit in the chamber much more tightly and need to be pressed into place whereas the Daisy, Gamo, and Crossman pellets just drop in. And the match pellets have no seams or mold marks of any kind. They shot some amazing groups from an inexpensive rifle. On the bench the Winchester is much more accurate than my Benjamin Sheraton 5mm, the 5mm was keeping 5 shot groups at 3/8 inch @ 10 yards, while the Winchester was shooting one ragged hole just over 1/4 wide. While accurate, the Winchester does not quite pack the punch of the bigger 5mm, the .177 can't go through a 3/4 inch pine board where the 5mm easily penetrates.
Once I got the bore clean and could see the rifling's it started to group like a champ. This darn thing shoots pretty well for a low end air rifle. I did a bit of ammo testing and found that it liked the RWS heavy target pellets, I will have to find a heavy hunting pellet that mimics the perfomence of the target pellet and I will be ready to roll. With just a bit of tweaking this rifle now shoots better than I can. The picture of the target is a ten shot group at 30 feet with two fliers where I defiantly jerked the rifle.
<img src="http://smith357.zoints.com/image/56898-t4" alt="t4" />
I put in a bunch of trigger time searching for the best pellets to use in the 800x pellet rifle. Shooting a springer from a rest is a tricky business. At first I could not hit a thing, I could shoot it better off-hand than from the rest. After much trial and error I discovered that the BR style of ultra light hold and lack of grip was the major culprit. Soon after I got to the point where I was getting the proper bench hold down and finding if I held too tight the shot was high, too loose and the shot was low. It took some time and about 300 shots but I finally got it right.
Notice the vertical stringing from different holds.
<img src="http://smith357.zoints.com/image/56893-t1" alt="t1" />
After a few shots I got it grouping adequately.
<img src="http://smith357.zoints.com/image/56896-t2" alt="t2" />
Bottom line today;
for the $150 invested in the complete kit and the time taken to rework the trigger it is a good airgun for informal target practice, and plinking. It's to heavy to carry through the woods, so the Silver streak still has a job.
