Seems like .20 is the oddball caliber for Air Force guns…
The majority of posts appear to relate to .22 and .25 followed by .177 with rare occurences of .20.
Seems funny, just a few years ago, one could not ask for a better long range hunting/plinking rig than an AZ tuned Rapid MKII(.20).
I almost bought one but opted for a Tony tuned Talon(.20) with 24″HW barrel. The rifle was the bomb but I ended up giving it to my niece…
What’s your take, is the .20 the least popular caliber for an Air Force frame? Why do you think so? Lack of power or accuracy compared to the .20 and .25, cost of ammo compared to the .177?
Regards,
Tony
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In my mind the .20 will always be a compromise round for guns that arent powerful enough to shoot a .22 with a flat enough trajectory, but you need a bit more stopping power than a .177 – such as low power springers and multi pumps (Even in these situations I’d take a .22 and learn the trajectory)
No need for .20 in a high powered PCP – .22 will out preform it in every way.
I think the biggest reason is the Airforce guns can handle the larger calibers so well.
No matter what you do to a .20 caliber AF gun, pop in a .22 or .25 and it will pop your eyes out.
Probably most .177 guns are sold because they can shoot so damn fast. Velocity is the biggest selling point to newcomers who dont know better.
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Beeman toted the .20 as the ultimate long range round for their guns. And indeed it was. It was much better balistically than the .177, and approaching the knock down of lighter .22 pellets. But remember this was in springers. In the spring guns, you only have so much power to work with. So the .20 would still give much better velocity than the .22 which had a bit (lot),of a rainbow trajectory in them.
The Modern PCP’s have no such disadvantage. We can tune our guns to take the .22 and .25 to as fast as it can go before accuracy suffers just below the sound barrier. Or use bullet shaped slugs to go faster than the speed of sound. So there is no advantage in .20. Only lower FPE with much lower ballistic coefficient.
In fact, I have a 12″ .20 hand lapped bbl. here that needs a new home! 😀
Mike