Are we being ripped off with modern pellets? Testing the legendary 16 year old crosman premiers
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- Опубліковано 4 вер 2024
- The most infamous pellets in target shooting history... the boxed dieA crosman premier ultra magnums... made in the usa!
how accurate are they compared the modern versions? how consistent are they in the wind? were they the best field target pellet ever made?
they gradually became less popular since the arrival of the jsb exacts and air arms field pellets and the more recent H&N baracuda but are steeped in target shooting history as one of the most accurate pellets ever made.
the next few videos will also look into pellet prep for competition use and also sizing and barrel prep.
ive also just ordered a couple of new rigs for the channel the brand new air arms x200 series which is very exciting and a fresh new scope,the falcon endura s40i
Hi Tommy, short history lesson .... by 2008 prems were well past their best. Prems peaked in terms of accuracy mid to late 90's and had the lions share of FT shooters using them, certainly in UK. With the boxed prems, most shooters went with the 7.9's and not the 10.5 as the heavier pellet was renowned to be the hardest pellet known to mankind and zapped power terribly to the point if you adjusted to shoot them just within the limit virtually everything else would give you problems.
By 2000, Air Arms had started to bring in their own brand manufactured by JSB which was a game changer at the time, FT shooters migrated over to the AA branded pellets pretty much en masse and dropped the prems albeit from a few people who's barrels wouldn't shoot anything else.
Crossman were actually doing a few brand variants of the prems - Boxed 1250 which were supposed to be the premium, then there was the crossman Accupel, tins of 500 yellow label. Rumour had it that when the prem dies started to wear they were then continued to be used for the Accupels, which always looked to carry more flecks of swarf than the prems. Then there was the original Webley Mosquito made by crossman (not the later webley mossys made by JSB) Personally I found the Crossman made Webley Mossys to be the best of the lot on my barrels, slightly looser in the barrels, less drag and kept speed when the gun was set for other pellets.
I retried the current Accupel last year in my steyr when the JSB prices went silly. Basically in the tins were 2 distinct weights and 2 head sizes (and the seams down the middle of the heads!) After sorting the head size and weights, I shot one of the old park rounds just to see how they faired, ended up with a 58, so not too shabby, just a shame of the faff to sort the size and weight in advance as losing a couple of hours in prep for a tin is something I can do without.
H&N do seem to be coming to the party again though, the Baracuda 8's are decent groupers, but do seem to lose it when you try and push the range out. Limit the range to HFT distance and they are pretty good in the oldest pro target, but fairly average in the longer barrel pro target and not usable in the SCR custom. I did use them at the worlds last year and managed to redeem a reasonable place after personally not being on the ball on day 1.
Now being able to test at 50m indoors at the firearms club is a really good help. 50m without the uncertainty of wind gives sub par pellets nowhere to hide.
Awesome history lesson Dave thanks mate.ill pin this up top..
I've got a pal in the US that has some of the latest Benjamin single die pellets. They appear to be of a high quality like the Prems of old.
If we can get them into the UK,I'll send you some to try if you fancy it.. 😉
@@tillysgunstocks that would be great, cheers Tommy, always good to test new stuff 👍
Back in 1995 I joined a field target club near Peterborough. I recall that nearly everybody there (including myself) shot TX200's in 177 using Premier's 7.9 grains. The Premier pellets had a very flat trajectory, but suffered with a very noticeable wind drift. It was something you learned to deal with.
For quality and consistency they were unmatched at the time.
They were so popular amongst club members, that the club would buy in bulk from a supplier. This meant that you could buy several boxes with all the same die number, at a discount price. I remember paying £10.50 per box.....
The only down side to Premier was their tight fit. My TX200 after about 1200 shots (nearly 1 box), the groupings would expand rapidly, due to lead fouled rifling. Once cleaned and leaded back in, one ragged hole groupings were the norm.
The old premier pellets were great 30ish years ago and I think they would match what we have today.
Thanks for that mate, I love all the history of our sport 😉
I reckon if we could still get the boxed versions in the tolerances of old,and a lead mix similar to that of the jsb,they would still be one of the best available...
I'm going to pin your comment up top,as I'm sure loads of people would like to see it 😉
Your right we are getting royally ripped on pellet prices .
I'm still using the cardboard boxed 7.9 Prems , mine are stamped 2017.
They're still fantastic, I use them mostly in my springers.
One hole groups at 25m with my custom Pro sport.
I noticed the seam was very prominent on the newer tins. I hoped the spin rate would normalise this extra fin but it certainly doesn't breed confidence
I still have a box from 2014 die L. They were hyped a lot back then so I bought a box and tried them in my springers. As I still have the almost full box you can guess they didn't impress me in any of my .177 springers then and I still try them for fun each time I buy a new .177. They were all from the same die and supposedly the same head size so more consistent. That might stop the flyers or cut back at least from the tins of Crosman Premiers. Problem was Crosman's just wouldn't group as well in my springers as the popular JSB's and H&N's. They are still the best pellet for the price hands down here in the US when not trying to one hole 5 shots at 25 yards. When I'm just shooting with the grandkids or breaking in a new gun I use the CPHP's at 7-9.00 a tin of 500. PCP's tend to be less pellety picky than break barrels.
I had a whole load of Brocock branded 7.9g Crossman made pellets 3/4 years ago that ran very well in most of my guns, billy bargain at £5 a tin. Best heavy pellets I ever shot were FX 10.4g ones made by JSB, ran so well that I bought 10 tins, reckon Giles regretted the sale as they went oos in UK soon after.😀
Hi there great video as normal, I’ve always found that the old boxed 7.9g premiers would out shoot their 10.5 big brother.
The 7.5g give fantastic groups throughout most of my rifles but especially liked by my Air Arms 410 and my FWB 124 Sport. Regards Mick.
The boxed pellets used to all come from one die, so the weight consistency was great.
Before the Crosmans it was RWS Superdomes & H&N FTT's that were the biz in early FT days.
Funnily enuf, I have just bought a box of these to try... will be an interesting experiment to compare groupings. I also have some old H&N pellets to test
I've just received 2 new tins today, the tins are the newer design (a bit like a spitfire tin now) and they seem to be much better made than the tin design you have there. I wonder if they have given their machining a refresh with the new tins. 🤔
I have both crosman and Benjamin the Benjamin have smaller groups
I still have some boxes of the 7.9s that shoot very well in my Venomac mk2 TX200. The 10.5s also shoot well. Both are quite a snug fit and require frequent barrel cleans, but top notch consistency. You can still buy the 10.5s but the 7.9s are long gone.
I recently finished off a box of 7.9s, die 4. I found Accupells just as good in certain rifles but they're a sloppy fit in HWs. The prems worked better in my 90 and 98. After extensive testing inc JSB, SDs, Bisleys etc I found H+N FTT 4.52 work best in my 98 and S400. FWIW, I was using the Accupells in a Theoben Olympus and a Daystate Huntsman 2.
I wonder why they stopped making the cardboard box prems?
Great video tilly. One thing I would love to see you do is exactly same content but with sub £500 pound rifle to see difference in accuracy with pellets.plus it would be interesting to see comparison between high end rifles and lower end. Just think it would be really interesting to compare. Regardless love all your content.
Hi mate, I'll be doing exactly that very soon. I've got a few affordable rifles on the way. The channel budget is quite limited so it's taken a bit longer than I'd like to get some new gear in but it'll be fascinating to see where the money goes in the high end stuff.
Plan is to attempt to make the cheaper rifles match the posh ones... It might not even be possible but it'll sure be fun to try it out 😉 and ofcourse I'll film it all...
Got a box of these in .20 from June 1999, straight to my collectibles.
You can still get the boxes for under 40 in the USA wich people always claimed to work better than the tins (some claimed it was a single die a bit like the new Benjamin option) but I don't know if the molds are getting old which might explain the extra flashing
The fact that they are easier to load might because of the oxidation but lead tend to get harder with time so who knows
The old boxed Prems always looks grim, they have a dusting of graphite at factory which makes them look worse than they really are 😉
The older boxed ones are still yet to be bettered by any of the modern stuff. Super frustrating mate as the new Benjamin are better in weight and surface finish but i can't get a clean group out of them ☹️
@@tillysgunstocksI did not seem to see any super impressive results from them yet (so I might not buy some any anytime soon if they don't perform much better than the regular ones) but it can vary alot from a barrel to an other and also from a lot to an other
_JTS pellets are great looking and did great in my stock 2240 but the new barrel prefers the pellets that the stock barrel hated haha_
In the old days I think the pellets had more lead content they seemed softer and gripped the rifling better I’m going back to the 70s in my bsa mercury all we shot as kids was marksman or if we had a bit more money bulldogs all in .22 nice comparison
Hello, really nice idea and amazing you found some old Crosmans. We can get Benjamin branded pellets here in France, will try some soon. Just been pellet testing with the Gamo 10x Magnum .22 and the Crosman Ultra Mags have so far come out the best at around 25mtrs. Surprising and pleasing as they are half the price of JSBs.More testing to come at 40mtrs or so, but the pellets look well made and no ridge lines or deformations so far, at least in this batch. Keep em coming. All the best Keith
If you do try the new ones ,let us know how they look mate. It would be great to get a crosman made pellets that kept up with the jsb and h&n 😉
Great video as always... Nice comparison shame the new prems not as good as the old ones 😢 great video though
I'd love to have crosman give us a viable alternative to the jsb.. although I didn't have time to cover it in this vid, I've used loads of crosman made pellets a few years back with very good results. The 7.9gn accupel were phenomenal especially in cz barrels.😉
I have a very old tin of Premier Magnum in.22. Not sure when I bought them but they were £1:66 so they must be a good age.
I’ve only had 3 .22 rifles during that time and they have been rubbish in all 3, that’s why I still have them 😂.
They have just been in a screw top tin and there is no oxidation on them whatsoever and they look very well made but sadly don’t seem to perform in my guns.
😆😆 £1.66 ... We never knew how good we had it eh mate..
When I first started getting seriously into my shooting I was paying about 4quid a tin of jsb 😭
An excellent post 👍 I found this particularly interesting as I have some very very old .22 pellets eg. Bisley Pest Controls etc and wondered whether they might do more harm than good to use, as in tucking up the barrel or whatever.
For the hell of it I might now just give them a go. Cheers
Now you've done it!😮 Got me thinking about jury rigging a slow speed media tumbler( tin can,bolt,play sand and drill) blooming 'eck👌👌👌👌👌👌🥴
Well then ... That's the subject of an upcoming video mate.. at olympic level the pellet prep is incredible.. they actually rumble pellets in large tubs,many thousands at a time 🤫. 😉
Very interesting video. I agree that the consistency of the pellet manufacturing is one of the big keys to consistent shooting and for me that is where the 'innovation' will be in improving the quality of the pellets being supplied. People are easily sold a gimmick though, so that seems to be where the pellet manufacturing is heading, and to some extent rifle manufacturing itself. I have always wondered about getting something like a presslug and forging my own pellets to see if there is any improvement in quality.
It seems like the majority of pellets have peaked in terms of outright build quality...🤔
When I look back at all the stuff I've used over the years and all the decent batches I've stashed ,there's not many that are super consistent in the last few years. Probably h&n have had the longest run of outright build quality,but try as I might they just don't suit many of my barrels.
The older crosman made stuff was phenomenal especially in the cz barrels. They always had a preference for a harder pellet and even the latest cz barrels run the harder h&n very well (broad generalisation granted but you know what I mean)
Whoever can make us something super consistent at a sensible price will do very well in the coming years. We've hit a platuea in terms of downrange performance from the actions.the ammo has to keep up... Interesting times really .
Crossman, jeezzz zzz remember my son buying me 2 boxes of them ( qty1250) a few Xmases ago.. Wouldn't probe into the breach from the magazine (. 20 cal in weihrauch) had to size every damn one of them ( £10+ for sizer) finger kept getting pinched when sizing, was throbbing like a blind cobblers thumb when I'd finished.. Was snipping crescent shaped slithers off the skirts.. Ain't shot em all yet, still got box and an half.. Mediocre groupings at best even after sizing..
That's savage mate. What you reckon they were .22 badged up as .20 😆😆
I didnt realise that your prems were 10.5 grains till right at the end of the video .i thought they were both the 7.9 grn ones and wondered why you were comparing them to jsb heavies and they had the same drop .
I didnt even know 10.5 grn used to be available in boxed prems .
I should have probably made it a bit clearer really mate. But yeah 7.9 and 10.5gn options for the original Prems. The 7.9s historically for me were the better bet, the original Webley branded acupels were fantastic especially through the cz barrels in the AA s200. 😉
Also struggled with those 10 crosmans
I tried the crosman premier piranha .22 as local shop out of JSB hades , big mistake , all over the place ,certainly not going to hunt any greys with them
I had the .177 piranha on here a while ago... Not too good in my barrels... 😞
Excellent comparison Vid...Keep up the great work
Always a great watch. 👍 Thanks
Thanks for watching 😀
I'll get the hang of the cameras eventually 😆
A good comparison I have played the video back at the start. And the ink on the old box of pellets looks like it is (4.6) is that possible. I have also seen on the Wasp pellets in .22 the ( blue tin of old number 2 is for 5.6) and the new one's in the purple number 3 tin is 5.5 are different . SO OLD SCHOOL 177 thou = 4.4958mm and if it is 4.6mm = 181.102 thou which is close to 3/16th fraction old school well it's 3 1/6 is 6 1/2 thou more but with shrinkage when being made if HOT would make it correct. So next rifles of old would they have had more pronounced rifling.
Got about 10 boxes of Exact from 2008 aswell, but wasn't testing them yet :P
I've got loads of jsb from the same period. They are all very good indeed . If you find the early jsb heavies they are way better than the recent ones.
Yessir your are right. Here in the states Benjamin and cromsman pellets are basically the same. However i e had much better results eith the crosmsn and yes they both way the same fourteen point three. Hope this helps. Cheers!
Hi mate, have you heard anything about a new model of pellet? I'd really love to have a viable alternative from crosman(or their brands) to match the jsb.
@@tillysgunstocks I know jsb has got some new coming out very soon. Other than that I really don't know. My rifles do great with h&n once I find something that works I tend not to change.
I bought crossman premier and crossman domed. The domed were cheaper and better
I see u using a compressor .I am going to by the hills compressor soon .I am unsure about how much Moisture goes into guns on a fill even with an external Moisture trap. best to have a day carbon bottle and fill that . cost is another 200 on top.I use a cheap compressor to top up and it works but the water is a pain and sadly my metal bottle date stamp is unreadable
At this point I'm fairly certain that all of the home compressors will have a degree of moisture in the air. Unless we run filters like dive centres do,it's a given.
However, I filled my 510 for years off a hand pump with no real filtration and it showed no signs of damage or corrosion inside the cylinder.it looked brand new when I pulled it apart in the vid I did on the compressor 😉
@@tillysgunstocks thats good to know. I was looking at a official hills UA-cam video and loads of water came out of the water trap it made me stop and think how much gets into a rifle or dose it stop it all u can never be sure as u cant see inside?
Nice vid, thanx
Hi after your review of that compressor i bought one (with the same issues but no problem for me), do you do any maintenance on yours & if so what?
Morning mate. So far I've not touched it other than the odd little dob of silicone on the probe orings. It said in the paperwork it wasn't user serviceable (which I find hard to believe) so I'll run it,as is for the moment . If it starts to give issues then I'll strip it and we can all see what's going on inside it. Aside from the exposed wiring it's holding up ok so far 😉
@@tillysgunstocksmine did slow down once but you you can guess what i was doing with it at the time! 😱😱😱 Other than that it’s been fantastic.
Great channel great content
first mistake was running .177 bore in the first place...unless youre in the uk where the airguns have to be under 12fpe as long guns i guess 177 becomes a bit of a workaround but its just such nightmare ballistics with 177 compared to .22 and .25 for other common small bore airgun sizes
Hi mate, yep sub12 here on the channel. That gives us a range of speeds from say 710fps with a 10.5gn heavy to the high 800fps range with the lighter stuff.
It's all relative really, and on a level playing field such as international ft and hft competition being all now run sub12 we all have the same workarounds. It is quite amazing though what a sub12 rifle can do ,even at the longer ranges . The wind is the biggest factor really but this spring I'll be aiming for sub moa at 100yds and further. The gear is capable,it's all down to me to point it the right way 😉
@@tillysgunstocks alright Tilly did you see the interview with Lothar Walther at iwa 2024 someone upload to youtube yesterday? it's in english and very interesting he spends 10 mins talking about there barrels and different cal....shooting at 100 meters with .30 .35 .50
A 16 year old pellet better than modern day stuff...😮 how the hell does that figure?
Its fairly common nowdays... Most the jsb exacts I use (bar the shorts) are from around 2010. They were significantly better in terms of weight and size variation 😉
Die 2 ?
These are die A. If I remember right the 7.9gn dies were numbers , 2 and 4 being the holy grail..
I think the heavies were all letters?
Maybe someone can confirm that?
Yep they was the 7.9s. I know a well known oldtimer ,GB, who bought them by the pallet. I shot one year with them.
Just looked at my stuff and found a box of Die 1 10.5gr march 16 2021 and got a nother box of Die 1B 7.9gr pellets 1250 count I remember in the early 2000's there was 7.9 supper points that were Die1 production worked really well they were very tight but the accuracy was really good then Crossman stopped making them in Die 1 I don't know if it was a test run or what but I wish they'd make em again. .22 pointed pellets they were really accurate and well made around 1998-2003 they went to shit after that. Now I have to buy tins and test batch by batch to find a tin that has a good head size to them to get them to work well out at 70m. Benjamin Die1 or press1 10.5gr tin of 500 the first and last time I seen them they were selling for $30 a tin bloody expensive for a tin of 500. Even the boxes of 1250s 10.5 go for $50 a box now before I was paying $25-$30 a box
Where are you based mate? Canada? 50 bucks sounds mental...🤯
Yeah Canuckistan about 400 km from the Crossman factory 😂🤦🏼♂️. We pay a lot in taxes on products here bloody ridiculous for me to order pellets I'll pay About $40 in post just to have them delivered depending on the weight of the box.