Friendly airgun vs rimfire competition
This morning I decided to do a little competition between my condor and my .22lr. I now have a rangefinder, so I could actually know how far away I was shooting, and try to get some groups with each. This actually didn’t start out as a competition, I was just shooting them both, so they shots per group are different, but the idea is there.
First off the guns. The condor is .25 cal, MM valve, shooting kodiaks at about 920fps (I started at the top of the curve so I wouldn’t have any weak shots to begin with) It’s wearing a leapers 8-32×56 and sitting on a harris bipod. Groups circled in black.
The .22lr is a cz 452 ultra lux wearing a leupold varixIII 3.5-10×40 tactical scope, shooting remington subsonic ammo. No spot for a bipod so I used an ammo box as a rest. Groups circled in red.
The black dots on each target are 1″
I started out at 75 yards for this, but in past experience, the condor has a slight edge in accuracy at 25 yards and 50 yards, very slight, but it is there.
Starting off at 75 yards. The condor and the cz are about even here, the condor doing slightly better. There are 4 shots from the condor and 6 from the cz on this target. They were both also hitting pretty hard, I have no doubt I could drop a squirrel with either gun at this range.
Next up stepped it out to 100 yards. 3 shots from the condor, and 5 from the cz. This was a little dumbfounding to me at first, the condor groups grew like they should, but the cz groups shrank considerably.
Finally reached out to 120 yards. 8 shots here from the condor, and 8 from the cz. Again, while the condor groups grew, the cz groups are extremely small, 5 of the shots going into a very very small group.
After scratching my head at this for a while, I finally figured out what I think was happening with the groups. The scope on the cz is made for tactical rifles, the parallax being set at 150 yards and not being adjustable. I think this made it hard to shoot closer, and explains why it became more accurate farther out. There was a substantial scope quality difference here, which I’m sure affected the results. Looking through the scope, it was hard to see a difference at 75 yards, but getting to 100 and beyond the leupold was MUCH brighter and clearer. This is also where the cz started to destroy the condor in terms of accuracy.
Despote the obviously one sided competition, I was surprised how well the condor can do at range. It can truly hold its own against rimfires. I’m sure it could hang right there with a remington 597 and the like. The cz is an exceptional gun, so it may not have been a fair .22lr to test against, but it’s all I have. Having shot other rimfire rifles though, I am 100% positive in saying the condor hangs right with them in accuracy.
Just for fun, I bought a bunch of clay pidgeons. This is me shooting at them with the condor at 120 yards. The first shot is obviously a hit. The second shot hits, third misses, and fourth hits. The last ones are almost impossible to see because all it did was chip off part of the clay instead of bust it completely. The camera was on 12x zoom for this.
The last two that it clipped:
I plan on retrying this soon. I should be getting my other leupold back from the custom shop within the next few weeks. I will put that on the condor so it has a fair chance. The leapers simply isn’t up to par here.
I also have to get more ammo for the condor. 😀
As a side note, the condor was quieter for all of this. 😀 😀 😀
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yea I know it was a limb sure looks like it could bit though 😆 😛 😈 🙄
Nice write up!
😆 Looks more like a branch that Lama chopped off for his range.
😕 What snake?
Nice Post lama hard to tell what is going on Condor should be doing better but to many variables also I can’t beileve you didn’t see the snake on the first 75yd target to the left of the tree good thing you didn’t get bit!!!!
I have no doubt some airguns can be just as accurate. I was just referring to the condor here.
However, go get a multi-thousand dollar rimfire rifle and you will probably outshoot the pellet guns as well. The condor and the cz have similar costs so I think they are good to compare. Comparing a $500 cz to a $1500 edgun wouldn’t be very fair IMO.
Just like I wouldn’t compare my old xr-100 .223 (which was a very good gun) to my blaser in .223. They are both good guns, but with $1000 in the xr-100 and much more in the blaser, they aren’t on the same level.
I agree with what you say Lama but I have a few things to add. First lets say we are talking about 100 yards or less, there is little to no wind, both the rimmy and pellet rifle are good shooters with there favorte ammo, and the shooter really knows his/her rifle. At 40-65 yards the size of groups for the pellet gun and rimmy is probably only a small fraction of an inch difference regardless of which is more accurate. I think the difference will still be very little between the two at 65+yards all the way to 100 on a calm day but the rimmy will win every time if it is windy. Quality rimmy ammo is also many times the cost of quality pellets. So on a calm day the pelletgun wins because it can shoot along side a rimmy for a fraction of the cost but the rimmy wins on a windy day because of the bullets ability to handle the wind.
Edit: Ok I just read what you said again. Even though you believe your CZ will outshoot the Condor at any range I know there are many airguns that will shoot right with your CZ on a calm day.
However, reaching out I think the .22lr takes it. 😉
For sure, the .22lr can hump a heavier round at a faster speed once past say, 100 yards which will always make the difference. But the fact of the matter is ultimately, the pellet gun is more accurate within its range limits. Logic dictates therefore if the pellet gun with its barrel could propel the projectile as far and as fast as the lr, it would still be more accurate. If the lr is more accurate out at the longer distance, surely it would also be at the shorter distance, but it isn’t. Its not as if the lr round magically ‘gets more accurate out at the longer ranges, its just that the pellet gun cant chuck them that far.
See I’m not so sure the pellet gun is more accurate, even within its range limits. I think with better ammo the .22lr is more accurate, at least mine seems to be. Sure, some guns are going to be more accurate than others, but I’d be willing to say that my cz is more accurate than my condor, at any range.
However, reaching out I think the .22lr takes it. 😉
For sure, the .22lr can hump a heavier round at a faster speed once past say, 100 yards which will always make the difference. But the fact of the matter is ultimately, the pellet gun is more accurate within its range limits. Logic dictates therefore if the pellet gun with its barrel could propel the projectile as far and as fast as the lr, it would still be more accurate. If the lr is more accurate out at the longer distance, surely it would also be at the shorter distance, but it isn’t. Its not as if the lr round magically ‘gets more accurate out at the longer ranges, its just that the pellet gun cant chuck them that far.
Well, here’s a video of me shooting clays at 140 yards with my .22lr. Believe it or not, every single shot was a hit. I had to modify my target to hold the clays tighter because they would all fall down when I shot one. However, this holds them so well that unless they crumble, they won’t fall. So some shots would simply put holes in the clay, others would chip off a section, but they all finally went away. 😀 No misses though! The second clay was a super clay- it actually took 3 hits before it would fall down!
Camera is on 12x zoom again. Wind was obviously blowing harder today. Took 4 clicks on the windage knob to get on target.
Someone needs to tell me how to crop the videos so I can zoom in better. Anybody?
Wow, that’s pretty darn good! They can definitely hang with each other.
However, reaching out I think the .22lr takes it. 😉
Lama, reading your thread made me go out and shoot my CZ Varmint vs my .25 Talon at 80 yards. Talon is a 24″ BSA shooting the JSB Exact Kings. CZ shooting Winchester subs.
The Talon won by a fair margin!
I was getting about .75 ctc with the Talon, about 1.0 with the CZ.
It took a while to get in the groove with the ‘pellet gun’ but once there, it was doing the biz’ 😎
I put alot of the sucess down to the awesome JSB Kings, they really are f*$kin’ accurate pellets, can’t big them up enough 😎
The Winchester subs are also very good bullets, my round of choice if rabbiting, but they just couldn’t beat the Talon with the JSBs
People need to start begging Walt in hawi… you know where, to start putting these barrels out with his special touch. A BSA done by walt absolutely will be the dogs nuts.
Trust me on this one.
I dont recall specifily , it was a while ago might have been my ruger 10/22 , I dunno. But I have seen that happen before.
Off the top of my head without looking , I think my drop at 120 yards was 18 inches. I have it written down in my logbook
and for a pelllet gun I think thats about it.
Now I ve seen guys on U tube shooting the s410 at 200 yards , But the drop has to be near 6 feet .
If someone wants to send me a .22 condor and some pellets to use I’d be glad to include them in the test. 🙂
What kind of gun was it that was getting accurate farther out? Very powerful firearms are like that a lot, they bullets don’t fully stabilize until they get out several hundred yards. My old 300 ultra mag shot 2 MOA at 100 yards, and 1 MOA at 200 yards. Just takes time to settle. Although I don’t think that’s what is happening with the .22lr.
I managed to extend my range out to 140 yards, but I think that’s as far as I can go because I’ll be lobbing the bullets through too many limbs. Tonight or tomorrow I’ll try to get some accuracy tests from both guns, as well as some more clay pidgeon shooting. 😆
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Nice write up lama. At 50 yrds or so, my R25 beat my custom Ruger 10-22. But, i honestly dont think i’ve found the BEST 22 lr ammo for the gun. Haven’t yet tried them all in that gun.
But out further like 100+ yards, the rimmy wins cause of better projectile design. Plus it shoots flatter and faster at further ranges.