posting this again for discussion about air rifles

[backwoodsbob]

for those who havent followed the advances in breakbarrel air rifle tech,there are some air rifles(that's not even the right term anymore)that are coming close to deer rifle ability.

At what point do we start regulating air rifles like other guns?I can go to any air rifle manufacturer website and order a breakbarrel that at this point rivals many rifles with no questions asked.

I LOVE my breakbarrels and dont want them stopped but people think these things are like dads old red rider bb gun and buy them for the kids and nothing is further from the truth.

I'm looking at selling two of my old air rifles to buy a gamo .25 that shoots at 2,000 fps.

Do we really need kids walking around with a pellet gun that is damn near is as powerful as a .25-06?

Yes this has been my pet worry,but dayum,,these things are getting insanely powerful with the new hydraulic systems and there are no controls on them.

[Agnosticsherbet]

1. First, we have to seriously regulate conventional rifles...

And that will be a very tough fight because the Gun Lobby and Gun Culture is very powerful.

[Eleanors38]

7. "First." What do you consider as "Last?"

[Agnosticsherbet]

10. We don't regulate semi-automatic weapons or the size of magazines...

Some states like Oklahoma do not register rifles or shotguns. Laws are not uniform from state to state. Gun manufacturers are not responsible for the mayhem they facilitate.

I'm not sure what you're getting at by "last." I support strong regulation of firearms. Before anyone is going to consider regulating air rifles, we should set up unIform regulation of firearms for public safety.

[beevul]

15. "Gun manufacturers are not responsible for the mayhem they facilitate."

Are alcohol manufacturers?

Or is that only important based on the arbitrarily defined "purpose" or the thing in question?

[NYC_SKP]

2. My air rifle is older, a Beeman R1 in .20.

Here:



Accurate but not deadly for anything larger than rats or squirrels.

I haven't researched newer models at all but I'm sure they have become far more powerful.

I'm not sure why there haven't been calls for regulation, but it might be because many advocates for control know so little about what they are trying to control.

[NYC_SKP]

3. Looking around, here is a "scary" model on Amazon. Full auto belt fed .22.

Cheap, too!

http://www.amazon.com/SMG-Full-Auto-Belt-Pellet/dp/B005FMPY5O/ref=sr_1_5?s=sporting-goods&ie=UTF8&qid=1356799212&sr=1-5&keywords=air+pistol



In all seriousness, some of the specially charged high pressure models (not this one) could, I think, penetrate the skull, and I'm sure many out there are already deadly.

[backwoodsbob]

5. you got that right

that's why it's so hair pulling insane to try to argue real gun regulation with an antigunner...they don't listen.

[Puha Ekapi]

4. There are...

large caliber air rifles up to .50 that are being used to take big game.


http://www.quackenbushairguns.com

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

6. It won't be long before...

...terrorists use them to shoot down airliners.

[holdencaufield]

8. I lived -- and shot ...

... for many years in a country where owning a Daisy Red Rider BB Gun is as heavily regulated as owning a deer rifle or a shotgun. Once the urge to ban is indulged, it will never stop at just "reasonable" bans.

You can't ban just one ...

[Puha Ekapi]

9. Exactly.

[Agnosticsherbet]

11. Engaging in logical fallacy invalidates everything you say. See Slippery Slope...

http://www.ask.com/wiki/Slippery_slope

[beevul]

16. The problem with that argument is...

The problem with that argument is...

In chronological order:

The national firearms act of 1934.

The gun control act of 1968.

The Hughes amendment.

The lautenberg amendment.

The brady bill.

Gun free school zones.

The original assault weapons ban.


And now, presently, people are screaming for more, and the ones doing the screaming (besides the ones that are screaming ban them all), are NEVER - and I do mean NEVER - willing to say where they'll stop.

Add to that, the unwillingness of most of them to denounce the "ban them all" crowd, and its not so much a logical falacy as it might seem to those not 100 percent in tune with the issue.

[AtheistCrusader]

12. First air rifle capable of felling a deer, appeared in the US in 1785.

20 shot weapon. Girandoni Repeating rifle.

[backwoodsbob]

13. can it do this?

as a disclaimer I own this exact air rifle

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4046323/hog_hunting_video_showing_the_power_of_a_new_gamo_airgun/

[AtheistCrusader]

14. The range isn't clear in that shot.

The Girandoni fired a .50-.67 caliber ball, with some rifling for spin, at useful pressures to kill a human, or a 250-350lb deer at 170 yards. For 20 shots.

That's a sub-100lb pig.

[SeattleVet]

21. I though the Girandoni was a .46 caliber ball repeater

with an effective range out to 150 yds (with a full air cylinder). At least, that's what I recall about the one that was carried by Lewis & Clark.

The rifle itself had 20 balls in a tubular 'magazine' (plus 1 in the chamber, for 21 shots without reloading), plus they carried spare air cylinders and the pumping equipment to recharge them.

[AtheistCrusader]

24. Calibers varied.

Same with early muskets and rifles of other types. The one from the L&C expedition was smaller than average, IIRC.

[Puha Ekapi]

17. Even the most powerful....

air rifles made and sold today are what I'd consider very marginal at best in power for hunting large game. Yeah, it can be done, but there are much better options.

[Flyboy_451]

18. Not to be nit picky...

but a .25 caliber pellet at 2,000fps is not "damn near as powerful as a 25-06".

While it is very fast and much more powerful than the air rifles we knew as kids, it falls well short of true firearms. The heaviest pellet that I could find with a cursory search is 43 grains. Launching this pellet at 2,000fps yields about 380 lb/ft of energy. This is woefully short of a 120 grain bullet from a 25-06 at 3,000fps, yielding nearly 2,400 lb/ft of energy.

Has there been some rash of criminal activity with air rifles that I am not aware of? Do we really want to start restricting items because they may be used for some nefarious purpose? I'm thinking that our legislative energies could be focused on something a bit more productive.

JW

[Puha Ekapi]

22. Where did you...

...find a .25 air rifle that'll do 2000 fps? The Gamo referenced above shoots about 750 fps with a 21 grain pellet, and 1000 fps with a 14 grain pellet.

The 40 grainer at 2000 would put it in the .22 Magnum neighborhood. Useful for varmints but not large game for sure.

[oneshooter]

19. In New Jersey you have to go to a FFL Dealer

and get a NCIS check to purchase a Daisey Red Ryder for your kid.

Here in Texas you just go to Wal-Mart.

[bobclark86]

20. Go read Sherlock Holmes...

man-killing air rifles are NOT new by any stretch of the imagination.

That said, you know how many people die a year from BB guns (actually, all non-powder weapons from the super-weak to the super-powerful)?

4

Source: HERE

That's less than 1/15 those killed by lightening. It's on par with being crushed by vending machines. Now, for the families of those killed (the majority children, whose parents should have been watching them or taken them away from unsafe kids), it is a tragedy. For the rest of the world, however, it's a microscopic statistic.

Don't we have bigger priorities than banning BB guns? If it takes a decade of mass shootings to talk about another AWB without an outspoken fear of losing any majority in Congress, how far down on the list should BB guns go?

[Nutsmustbecracked]

23. We need to ban assault air rifles.

Anything over 500 fps is too much to be sold over the counter. It's only a matter of time before someone is seriously injured by our depraved gun culture.