Advise needed

a.j.m1981

Hi, thinking of buying a precharged air rifle. I have two in mind.Theoben rapid 12/250 .25 and the webley raider 10. Could anyone give me advise on which would the better rifle. Thanx

Tackleberrywho

a.j.m1981 wrote: »

Hi, thinking of buying a precharged air rifle. I have two in mind.Theoben rapid 12/250 .25 and the webley raider 10. Could anyone give me advise on which would the better rifle. Thanx

What do you want the rifle for?
hunting OR targets?

a.j.m1981

A bit of both i suppose

Tackleberrywho

a.j.m1981 wrote: »

Hi, thinking of buying a precharged air rifle. I have two in mind.Theoben rapid 12/250 .25 and the webley raider 10. Could anyone give me advise on which would the better rifle. Thanx

Ask you GS FO, as the .25 might cause you a lot of hassle as the GS might think it is a .25-06 Rifle which is a horse of a different colour.
The Webley get good reviews and i saw a guy shoot really well with one at 25yards, which is what i would like one for (rats in farm yard)

On a side note Someone asked last week the range of a break barrel 12ft/lb Air Rifle, tis ain't one of them, but it shows teh extreme effective range of a high powered airrifle

170 yards, but all elevetation almost maxed out on scope which means it has droped severly at that range.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2_Nc0R1T3g

Shooting taregts with an airrifle is normally done indoors with a different style of rifle.

I'm not sure what your background is in Firearms legislation here, but suffice it to say you are only allowed to shoot targets on an authorized range (outside of Zeroing, or checking Zero)

many who chose the sporter route chose .22lr as you have more options open to you.

having said that, for shooting Vermin an Air Rifle is ideal in very close quarters

Vegeta

OP you will get a better review of those rifles on UK forums as air rifle use is much more common. Big part of that is because air rifles under 12 ft/lbs are not licensed firearms over there.

Sparks

Tackleberrywho wrote: »

Shooting taregts with an airrifle is normally done indoors with a different style of rifle.

Or outdoors with a field target air rifle.

having said that, for shooting Vermin an Air Rifle is ideal in very close quarters

But we're not sure if that's legal to do or not.

Tackleberrywho

Sparks wrote: »

Or outdoors with a field target air rifle.


But we're not sure if that's legal to do or not.

ya gotta love Irish law.

Harder to licence a .25 air rifle than a .223

Sparks

There's no problem in the law with licencing a .25 air rifle Tack. You might find the AGS a bit slow because they won't have encountered one before, but (a) that's not the law, it's the AGS; and (b) you can make it a lot easier by stressing the "air" bit in "air rifle".
The legal issue is over shooting animals with an air rifle, which is kinda fudged in section 33 of the Wildlife Acts.

Tackleberrywho

Sparks wrote: »

There's no problem in the law with licencing a .25 air rifle Tack. You might find the AGS a bit slow because they won't have encountered one before, but (a) that's not the law, it's the AGS; and (b) you can make it a lot easier by stressing the "air" bit in "air rifle".
The legal issue is over shooting animals with an air rifle, which is kinda fudged in section 33 of the Wildlife Acts.

Perhaps someone should write a letter to the Minister asking for Clarification on the matter?

I did notice that the Derogations say Rifle or shotgun for shooting Corvids with air rifle

Like many things, not an issue until you are done.
Ask a farmer in Offaly who was fined €500 for asking two lads to shoot starlings:(

It's ironic that you can use poison on Rats but an air rifle is a grey area.
I have lots of people asking me to shoot rats and I'd love an air rifle for the job.

One of those super dooper airrifle would be the bees knees.

Sparks

Tackleberrywho wrote: »

Perhaps someone should write a letter to the Minister asking for Clarification on the matter?

Wouldn't do any good. A minister's statement in response to such a letter wouldn't really carry much weight in court, I strongly suspect.
What's needed is either (a) a rewrite of section 33; or (b) case law.

I did notice that the Derogations say Rifle or shotgun for shooting Corvids with air rifle

Yes, but derogations specifically overwrite section 33 for a limited time with a limited species.

Like many things, not an issue until you are done.

Yup

virminhunter

I had a theoban eliminator, it was a springer not a precharged rifle but the build quality an stock were beautiful if thats anything to go by:)

Tackleberrywho

Sorry previous post had a type error.

It meant to read Derrogation says Rifle or shotgun
But NO MENTION of Air-rifle for or against the use.

(Oh Common sense is not that common )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlxcFSq5k8c

This looks interesting :D:D:D:D

Sparks

Tackleberrywho wrote: »

Sorry previous post had a type error.
It meant to read Derrogation says Rifle or shotgun
But NO MENTION of Air-rifle for or against the use.

We've seen the NARGC point out legal advice that the word rifle on its own in the derogation means air rifles can be used.

Tackleberrywho

Sparks wrote: »

We've seen the NARGC point out legal advice that the word rifle on its own in the derogation means air rifles can be used.

So is it just shooting Rabbits is the issue with one then?
And Technically foxes (I know Technically)

Sparks

The thing is that section 33 says you can't shoot "any wild animal" with a "spring gun". But it also says you can't shoot "any wild bird" with an "air gun".

And here's the rub - there's no definition given of "spring gun", so you don't know if they meant any spring-powered airgun, or whether PCP and SSP airguns are considered to be covered by the term as well (which is possible since PCP and SSP airguns didn't exist when the law was written and a court could well take the belief that at the time of drafting, the two were synonyms for "airgun" in common usage and thus should be thought of that way now as well).

That said, I know of people who hunt rabbits with high-power PCP airguns, and frankly, I have no idea if that's illegal or not; and I can think of about forty thousand other things that are more important for the legal system to worry about for the moment. It's YAGA - Yet Another Gray Area.