BRK Ghost Review

[Franklink]

Time to change scopes on the BRK Ghost.

For most of the first 18 months an Athlon Midas Tac sat atop. For the last 5ish months it has had a PARD electronic scope. The PARD allowed the filming of some prairie dog pesting, as well as the filming of an Ultimate Field Target match (all of that shared here already). But I need some more magnification for the UFT matches than is available from the PARD. And the Midas Tac has since moved on to another gun that I'll use for AAFtA field target....

My homeless scopes that were potentials were a 20x fixed SWFA and a Falcon X50 10-50. The SWFA has been successfully used for UFT before but not the X50.

Pros to the SWFA are: mil, size, weight, fixed power so no FFP/SFP concerns. (Could still put the Ghost in the factory hardcase with this one. )
Cons are: IQ and only 20x so can't turn it down for the forced offhand shots

Pros to the X50 are: IQ and 25x (max allowed), can be turned down to 10x for the offhand shots
Cons to the X50 are: SFP, moa, size, weight.

Pretty much decided on the the X50 mostly for the IQ. But i was somewhat concerned about the 1/8moa clicks requiring more than a revolution for 100 yards during UFT matches, not having enough elevation to shoot out to 200+ yards (remember this is my dedicated slug gun now), and the SFP. So I did some number crunching and theorizing by mocking up a profile in Strelok and referencing the X50 manual.

Strelok says I'll need 72 clicks at 100 yards and 19 clicks at 20 yards (max and min for UFT) for a 30 yard zero. Since I'll prob set my zero more like 40-45, we're all good there. Scope has 80 clicks per revolution, so 20-100 yards are within one revolution. It's not a complete deal-breaker if a scope doesn't work out to one revolution for a comp gun, it's just easier to not get off by a complete rotation by forgetting where you're at on the turret.

Assuming my vertical zero will be about what it was from the previous gun, I've currently got 260 clicks of vertical before maxing out, which would take me to 190 yards with the BC and speed of the .20/18.9 NSA slug.

I also am seeing in the manual that it's MOA @ 25x, and everything doubles at 12.5x. Since the reticle goes to 20moa, it'd be 40 moa of holdover @ 12.5x. 40moa would get me to 218 yards. So with a combo of clicking and holdover @ 12.5x, I can get as far as I have any business throwing hail Mary's (which I sure enjoy doing).

So, the X50 is now on the Ghost. Will run it primarily at 25x and mostly dial the turrets to avoid/account for the SFP problem. Will also figure out holdover+dialing solutions for 12.5x @ 190+ yards. Next step is to zero it and work out my actual dope by shooting it at 20-250ish yards. Then a dope card. Then we'll be all ready to see how it does at the next UFT match at the end of January.

(Man this X50 is a monster of a scope. I'm not sure if I mounted a scope on the Ghost or if I mounted the Ghost on the scope. It'll be interesting to see how top-heavy/tippy it makes the Ghost platform.)

 

[Smitty911]

Time to change scopes on the BRK Ghost.

For most of the first 18 months an Athlon Midas Tac sat atop. For the last 5ish months it has had a PARD electronic scope. The PARD allowed the filming of some prairie dog pesting, as well as the filming of an Ultimate Field Target match (all of that shared here already). But I need some more magnification for the UFT matches than is available from the PARD. And the Midas Tac has since moved on to another gun that I'll use for AAFtA field target....

My homeless scopes that were potentials were a 20x fixed SWFA and a Falcon X50 10-50. The SWFA has been successfully used for UFT before but not the X50.

Pros to the SWFA are: mil, size, weight, fixed power so no FFP/SFP concerns. (Could still put the Ghost in the factory hardcase with this one. )
Cons are: IQ and only 20x so can't turn it down for the forced offhand shots

Pros to the X50 are: IQ and 25x (max allowed), can be turned down to 10x for the offhand shots
Cons to the X50 are: SFP, moa, size, weight.

Pretty much decided on the the X50 mostly for the IQ. But i was somewhat concerned about the 1/8moa clicks requiring more than a revolution for 100 yards during UFT matches, not having enough elevation to shoot out to 200+ yards (remember this is my dedicated slug gun now), and the SFP. So I did some number crunching and theorizing by mocking up a profile in Strelok and referencing the X50 manual.

Strelok says I'll need 72 clicks at 100 yards and 19 clicks at 20 yards (max and min for UFT) for a 30 yard zero. Since I'll prob set my zero more like 40-45, we're all good there. Scope has 80 clicks per revolution, so 20-100 yards are within one revolution. It's not a complete deal-breaker if a scope doesn't work out to one revolution for a comp gun, it's just easier to not get off by a complete rotation by forgetting where you're at on the turret.

Assuming my vertical zero will be about what it was from the previous gun, I've currently got 260 clicks of vertical before maxing out, which would take me to 190 yards with the BC and speed of the .20/18.9 NSA slug.

I also am seeing in the manual that it's MOA @ 25x, and everything doubles at 12.5x. Since the reticle goes to 20moa, it'd be 40 moa of holdover @ 12.5x. 40moa would get me to 218 yards. So with a combo of clicking and holdover @ 12.5x, I can get as far as I have any business throwing hail Mary's (which I sure enjoy doing).

So, the X50 is now on the Ghost. Will run it primarily at 25x and mostly dial the turrets to avoid/account for the SFP problem. Will also figure out holdover+dialing solutions for 12.5x @ 190+ yards. Next step is to zero it and work out my actual dope by shooting it at 20-250ish yards. Then a dope card. Then we'll be all ready to see how it does at the next UFT match at the end of January.

(Man this X50 is a monster of a scope. I'm not sure if I mounted a scope on the Ghost or if I mounted the Ghost on the scope. It'll be interesting to see how top-heavy/tippy it makes the Ghost platform.)

Pictures or it never happened.

Without all the turrents getting you to 218 yards, I'm curious what the holdover would be out at 250. I have Strelok Pro, I guess I need to start using it.

Smitty

 

[Franklink]

Pictures or it never happened.

Without all the turrents getting you to 218 yards, I'm curious what the holdover would be out at 250. I have Strelok Pro, I guess I need to start using it.

Smitty

This was taken as a size comparison before I mounted the Falcon.
Bottom is the PARD (on the Ghost in the photo)
Middle is the X50
Top is the SWFA

Next time I get the gun out I'll try to remember to take a photo to share.

 

[Franklink]

Pictures or it never happened.

Without all the turrents getting you to 218 yards, I'm curious what the holdover would be out at 250. I have Strelok Pro, I guess I need to start using it.

Smitty

Big scope.

Tried various combinations of scope mounts/rails/rings/cheek riser and ended up here as what seems the best compromise.

With many guns, the scope height is determined by the objective bell, but with the Ghost, a guy runs into cheekbone before he runs out of room for the scope bell.

Anyway, it's on there now, and pretty dang cool to be able to see my slug holes at 170 yards.

 

[keith1]

I apologize in advance that this post will include some non-Ghost stuff but it'll show a little of the fun that I had with my son and airgun friends this weekend. And there will be some Ghost sprinkled in as well.

SO great little camping/field target trip with my 9 year old son Colben.
We decided that a night in a tent was better than waking up really early and driving to make it to the match on time. We got to the match site a little after dark and got set up pretty quickly.
Campsite....
View attachment 297849
He was calling this the "s'more station."
View attachment 297850
Colben spotted a tarantula right at the beginning of the match.
View attachment 297851
Colben went on to shoot his personal best field target match, 41/48, using a gun he has claimed as "his." (no, it wasn't the Ghost but a short length of pull gun that he started shooting ft with last summer).

I shot the Ghost of course. I had decided before hand to shoot from my normal field target position, sitting on a bumbag and using a harness, or rather "Open" class position. But I had also decided to use a laser rangefinder. The scope I mounted on the Ghost was a spare 20x SWFA and I didn't have one of my rear-to-sidewheel focus contraptions on it.

In my opinion, there are a couple of integral parts of shooting a good score in field target. First, the gun has to be accurate and capable of maintaining its point of impact. Second, the shooter has to be familiar with the trajectory, ie, know where the pellets are going to impact at 10-55 yards. And finally, the distances have to be accurately measured. The yardage determination is as big a factor as the first two in getting a good score. Most guys range by focus, using the AO of the scope. And that creates a problem when one is assessing the first component (the guns potential for accuracy, reliability, maintaining point of impact) because if the distance isn't estimated correctly, not matter how good the gun is, you'll still miss. Since I really wanted to know how the Ghost would fair, I decided to eliminate the range estimation component and just use a laser rangefinder. And, as previously stated, I shot a 47/48. I went 40/40 on the shots from the bumbag, 4/4 on the offhand shots, and 3/4 on the kneelers. So, I missed one kneeler, and the frustrating thing was that I simply pulled that shot, and pulled it bad! It was a gimme, nice big kill zone, not too far away and I shanked it about an inch outside of the killzone. Just flat out mistimed my trigger pull with all the movement inherent in forced position shots.

And no, that score did not bring home the Founder's Cup Trophy, although I was tied for the high overall score of the match. One must shoot from an AAFTA recognized class to be eligible for the Cup. And that laser rangefinder put me in Unlimited class, which isn't AAFTA approved.

As for my thoughts on the Ghost's performance in the match? Superb. The gun put 47 shots right where they were supposed to go. And would have put 48 in the kill zone were it not for my pulled shot. This may have been the first field target match shot by a Ghost? and what a way for it to start. I had minimal practice time with the gun. I shot a grand total of 3 practice offhand shots prior to the match and a grand total of 0 kneeling practice shots. I was refining my dope sheet the morning of the match because I had such little time to do so all week. With the poor preparation, I really didn't have any business expecting it to do as well as it did. The hardest shots at the match (in my opinion) were a 1.25 inch kill zone at 53 yards. That sure seems like it would be right on the edge of legality. That lane happened to be my last lane. So I was 45/46 prior to shooting at that tough target and it put em both right in the kz. I was pretty nervous but quite thrilled. I did have a moment of panic about 75% of the way through the course. I pulled the trigger.....nothing....pulled a bit harder....nothing. My first thought was "oh no! with all that fiddling I did in the trigger I messed something up and now the gun won't fire!!!" But nope, took a look at the safety and I had just bumped that push button and put it on safe inadvertently. Took it off safety and dropped the target.

Also, I was up and practicing not too long after daylight. The weather said it got down to 37 degrees at the match site last night. I was pleased to see that the dope was lining up with what I had gathered at my house on Friday morning in 80 degree weather. So, temp swings don't seem to induce any shifts of impact points.

The "tune" of the Ghost for the match......regulator pressure was still at 105. Hammer stroke length at max. And hammer spring tension at about 40% That produces 900fps with the FX 10.34grain pellets and accuracy was everything it needs to be for field target. Accuracy starts to fall apart with this barrel and 10.34s above 920fps. 880-900 seems to be the sweet spot.

Realistic expectations......
First off, the design of the gun puts the scope above the barrel quite a bit. I used higher than necessary mounts because they were already on the spare scope, so the scope was EVEN higher than it would have been otherwise. Once a guy has set up a handful of field target guns, you get a feel for how trajectory plays out. Well, with that scope so far from the barrel, it threw me for a loop because the dope data was quite different than what I see with most guns. The whole thing meant that I had a nice straight neck for seeing through the scope, but the close shots needed much more elevation than I'm used to seeing on ft guns.

Second, don't expect to be able to buy a .177 Ghost Carbine, slap a scope on there, and start shooting perfect or near perfect scores in field target. It will very likely require some tuning and maybe even a polish of the bore and a decent trigger fiddling. I documented the tuning process that I went through to get the gun to a point capable of this level of accuracy.....expect to need to do the same and you won't be disappointed. On that vein though, the fact that the gun did that well in a match means that it is capable of doing that well in a match. There are lots of guns out there that no matter what is done to them, they will never shoot a 47/48 in a field target match. So, while it required some trigger work and some chrono work in conjunction with thoughtful adjustments of the regulator and hammer tension, this particular Ghost specimen proved to be capable of a pretty impressive field target showing.

Third, I lucked out and shot my first ft match with the Ghost in nearly no wind. I had zero chances to shoot it in the wind in my minimal practice sessions. It is usually important to get a feel for how a barrel behaves with some wind currents pushing projectiles around. Knowing how your barrel does in the wind is perhaps the 4th big component of good scores in field target that I failed to mention in the list provided a few paragraphs ago. Fortuitously, there just wasn't much wind today.

After the match me and Van and Bobbie and of course Colben hung out and just shot for fun. Van had a tannerite-like product and we had a .....blast, literally.
Here is some of the tannerite packed into a pellet tin and another packed into 4 or so bottle caps sandwiched together.
View attachment 297856
View attachment 297857


Colben was our trigger man for quite a few of the explosions. Here he is using a .25 Ghost.
View attachment 297855

And a video of one of the BOOMS. (forgive my absolutely horrible filming job).

Watching that chunk of firewood get busted up and bounced around produced a bunch of good laughs.

Finally.....
Some goodies for the Ghost found their way home with me after the match. A PRS bag rider, some adjustable splitter cones for the shroud (not available for purchase, somewhat of an experiment to satisfy Bobbie's curiosity), and the most exciting one.....a full length .22 slow twist polygonal barrel with a .22 probe. With that barrel came another not-purchasable item: an adapter to go from 14/1mm threads to 1/2x20unf, so it can be threaded on the barrel threads, and a moderator threaded to that, sans shroud. That barrel and probe mean that we can crank up the power and the distance to see what this dude can do in that HP realm.

I was already feeling overwhelmed with all the future testing and documentation (more extensive .177 pellet testing, as well as .177 slug testing since a couple folks have expressed interest in how it does there), but now that .22 barrel really opens up the possibilities. Depending on finding a high bc pellet and especially a pellet lot that agrees with that .22 barrel, I might be competing with this gun at long range Xtreme Field Target matches this winter down in PHX.

Phew, LOTS more to come on the performance reporting of the GHOST, and now not just in .177. Stay tuned.

Im getting the ghost carbine in 177 for hft shooting what size of scope rings do you think i need? thanks for you help Michigan Keith

 

[Smok3y]

Im getting the ghost carbine in 177 for hft shooting what size of scope rings do you think i need? thanks for you help Michigan Keith

Only you can decide this depending on the size of your scope and how high you like your scope. The best thing you can do is to get the rifle set up and use something to stack on top of the rifle and put your scope on top. Then you can get behind the rifle and test different heights until you find a height YOU like.

I use sheets of paper. I take a stack of paper, lay it crossways across the riser, and then lay the scope on top. Get behind the rifle and see if it sets up well for how you like to get behind the rifle. If it isn’t high/low enough, then add/ remove paper until you find the height you like. Now you can measure the height of the stack of paper to properly order your rings that fit you, not someone else. I used to do this all the time, back when I didn’t keep spare rings around.

Be careful ordering rings, as just low, medium, high aren’t the same across manufacturers. Find the height you need and order those. Most rings are the height to the middle of the rings… but not all, so read the fine print. If they are then add 1/2 of the scope tube diameter to your stack of paper.

 

[Franklink]

Im getting the ghost carbine in 177 for hft shooting what size of scope rings do you think i need? thanks for you help Michigan Keith

@Smok3y gave some good recommendations.
With the various scopes I've had on my Ghost, "Medium" has been the height Ive been most happy with. And I almost exclusively use UTG scope mounts. They're budget friendly.

 

[cavedweller]

Time to change scopes on the BRK Ghost.

For most of the first 18 months an Athlon Midas Tac sat atop. For the last 5ish months it has had a PARD electronic scope. The PARD allowed the filming of some prairie dog pesting, as well as the filming of an Ultimate Field Target match (all of that shared here already). But I need some more magnification for the UFT matches than is available from the PARD. And the Midas Tac has since moved on to another gun that I'll use for AAFtA field target....

My homeless scopes that were potentials were a 20x fixed SWFA and a Falcon X50 10-50. The SWFA has been successfully used for UFT before but not the X50.

Pros to the SWFA are: mil, size, weight, fixed power so no FFP/SFP concerns. (Could still put the Ghost in the factory hardcase with this one. )
Cons are: IQ and only 20x so can't turn it down for the forced offhand shots

Pros to the X50 are: IQ and 25x (max allowed), can be turned down to 10x for the offhand shots
Cons to the X50 are: SFP, moa, size, weight.

Pretty much decided on the the X50 mostly for the IQ. But i was somewhat concerned about the 1/8moa clicks requiring more than a revolution for 100 yards during UFT matches, not having enough elevation to shoot out to 200+ yards (remember this is my dedicated slug gun now), and the SFP. So I did some number crunching and theorizing by mocking up a profile in Strelok and referencing the X50 manual.

Strelok says I'll need 72 clicks at 100 yards and 19 clicks at 20 yards (max and min for UFT) for a 30 yard zero. Since I'll prob set my zero more like 40-45, we're all good there. Scope has 80 clicks per revolution, so 20-100 yards are within one revolution. It's not a complete deal-breaker if a scope doesn't work out to one revolution for a comp gun, it's just easier to not get off by a complete rotation by forgetting where you're at on the turret.

Assuming my vertical zero will be about what it was from the previous gun, I've currently got 260 clicks of vertical before maxing out, which would take me to 190 yards with the BC and speed of the .20/18.9 NSA slug.

I also am seeing in the manual that it's MOA @ 25x, and everything doubles at 12.5x. Since the reticle goes to 20moa, it'd be 40 moa of holdover @ 12.5x. 40moa would get me to 218 yards. So with a combo of clicking and holdover @ 12.5x, I can get as far as I have any business throwing hail Mary's (which I sure enjoy doing).

So, the X50 is now on the Ghost. Will run it primarily at 25x and mostly dial the turrets to avoid/account for the SFP problem. Will also figure out holdover+dialing solutions for 12.5x @ 190+ yards. Next step is to zero it and work out my actual dope by shooting it at 20-250ish yards. Then a dope card. Then we'll be all ready to see how it does at the next UFT match at the end of January.

(Man this X50 is a monster of a scope. I'm not sure if I mounted a scope on the Ghost or if I mounted the Ghost on the scope. It'll be interesting to see how top-heavy/tippy it makes the Ghost platform.)

When I put a large scope on my ghost it became top heavy and tippy so I dropped back to something smaller and lighter.
excellent write up!

 

[Franklink]

What happens to FPE when nothing is changed but the caliber?

Been curious about the above question for awhile so just used a super windy day to spend some time over a chronograph in the garage.

Ghost with a 17 inch .177 barrel is the baseline. With the 0.047" wire diameter hammer spring and a reg pressure of just shy of 110BAR. MIN and MAX are right in the window of appropriateness for sub20fpe field target.

So, swapped only the barrel, the rest of the settings left the same. An oem 23 inch .22 barrel.

These are the .22 pellets that were tested....
Ranging from 13.43 up to 28.44grains.

And here are the results. The fps listed for the .22 pellets is a three shot average.

Realistically, something in the 15.89 to 21.53grain range is most appropriate for this, if the main desire is to not swap hammer springs or mess with the regulator pressure.

Interesting that on the high end, just the caliber swap (and extra 6 inches of barrel) nets double the fpe.

I've got enough of the 15.89, 18.13, and 20.83 weighted pellets hanging around that I just might do some accuracy testing with them at some future point.

 

[shooterpt]

Hi all!
Just to thank all the info shared, a very special word to Franklink for the great job!
Having the ghost for 1 month, the corrent purpose is to check if the ghost can be a competitive WFTA airgun, so I have made some new parts. 18 fpe from factory so changed the original spring gor a softer one. Regulator @ 75 bar. power from 180 ms, min, to 222 max. 0,177Jsb heavy. Shooting 217 ms @ number 17
In the future I intend to try other disciplines, this is a very multipurpose airgun!
Best regards from Portugal!

 

[Franklink]

Hi all!
Just to thank all the info shared, a very special word to Franklink for the great job!
Having the ghost for 1 month, the corrent purpose is to check if the ghost can be a competitive WFTA airgun, so I have made some new parts. 18 fpe from factory so changed the original spring gor a softer one. Regulator @ 75 bar. power from 180 ms, min, to 222 max. 0,177Jsb heavy. Shooting 217 ms @ number 17
In the future I intend to try other disciplines, this is a very multipurpose airgun!
Best regards from Portugal!
View attachment 539775

Falo Portuguese mas ele é do variedade do Brasil.

Obrigado por expressar sua gratidão. Tenho gostado muito do meu tempo com o Ghost.

Seu Ghost tem aparência elegante mesmo! Para bens, voce fez bem na escolhe de seus acessórios.

Voce tinha sucesso em seus tentativos de chegar menos de 12fpe pra usar seu Ghost em WFTF? Tenho ouvido falar que muito gente tem dificuldade nesse desejo de manter a energia de baixo de 12 fpe e também ter consistência de tiro a tiro.

 

[PowderBurnt]

Falo Portuguese mas ele é do variedade do Brasil.

Obrigado por expressar sua gratidão. Tenho gostado muito do meu tempo com o Ghost.

Seu Ghost tem aparência elegante mesmo! Para bens, voce fez bem na escolhe de seus acessórios.

Voce tinha sucesso em seus tentativos de chegar menos de 12fpe pra usar seu Ghost em WFTF? Tenho ouvido falar que muito gente tem dificuldade nesse desejo de manter a energia de baixo de 12 fpe e também ter consistência de tiro a tiro.

Dunno what you said, but it sounded good. Gotta love a romance language.

 

[shooterpt]

Falo Portuguese mas ele é do variedade do Brasil.

Obrigado por expressar sua gratidão. Tenho gostado muito do meu tempo com o Ghost.

Seu Ghost tem aparência elegante mesmo! Para bens, voce fez bem na escolhe de seus acessórios.

Voce tinha sucesso em seus tentativos de chegar menos de 12fpe pra usar seu Ghost em WFTF? Tenho ouvido falar que muito gente tem dificuldade nesse desejo de manter a energia de baixo de 12 fpe e também ter consistência de tiro a tiro.

Obrigado pelas simpáticas palavras, o seu português é perfeito!
At the moment, I'm using a custom spring, 30 mm long, 0.9mm wire, with a nylon plug insertion. Not a perfect speed variation, 3 or 4 ms per 10 shots, from the tin pellets. Fx pockechrono. In reality, the variation doesn't apear tho have a big impact in to my 50 meters, 55 yards, target, shooting FT.
Huma site offers a tuning regulator in 3 specific pressure ranges:

• Standard (LP) pressure range 60-150 bar
• Medium (MP) pressure range: 70-175 bar
• High (HP) pressure range: 170 -195 bar

So I assume that depending what we have from factory...

Made a longer hamster with adjustable arm made by my friend Bruno Silva.
I'm greatly enjoing shooting FT with the Ghost!