BRK Ghost Review
- Thread starter Franklink
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I think similar to a conventional valve, a balanced/assisted valve is more efficient when the air pressure in the plenum is marginally higher than the valve spring’s force because it allows for a faster closing stroke as the residual air (that isn’t expelled from the barrel) helps in that regard. I believe the main advantage of a balanced/assisted valve is its ability for a greater expulsion of air at relatively low hammer-strike forces compared to the higher forces necessary in achieving similar velocities from conventional valves.
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So would that mean in tuning you'd set your reg pressure then back of the hammer spring until it won't fire, then tension it up until it does? If your at the desired velocity, go with it......, Or continue to tweak around with the speed and hammer some more proving accuracy at whatever speed?
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Does this mean that after acquiring the Ghost you determined it was a much better rifle hence you looking to toss the RTI?
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My lady purchased a FX WILDCAT and I had to rebuild the bottle reg every time we shot it. At least FX sent her a new reg for free.The RTI had multiple valve leak problems. Ain't got time for that.
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Although the Ghost uses its own balanced valve system, I think you won't be having valve problems with it like you had with the RTI.The RTI had multiple valve leak problems. Ain't got time for that.
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I couldn't help myself & ordered one of these up in .30. Just so many good groups being had at distance to not see what is up. I did a 580 bottle , Left hand cocking, small Odb mod..I'll use a saber rail extension, 20x sightron SIII,Althon low rings & see what she can do at 100. I'll try 44, 50.15 & ZAN56.
Joe
Joe
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Just submitted an order for some of Nick's .20/18.9gr slugs.
With current configuration, I'm getting 915 with the JSB 15.89 @ 11 on the power wheel. Hoping to be able to push the 18.9gr NSA slugs fast enough with some more hammer tension, without needing to change reg pressure.
I've been kinda hanging back and hoping somebody else would share some concrete data on these new .20 NSAs but hasn't really materialized so I'll post results once they arrive and I have a chance to give em a shot. (Pun intended).
(Technically I have the Ghost and a Veteran, both in .20, that I could test them in, but I'll start with the Ghost and see how it goes).
With current configuration, I'm getting 915 with the JSB 15.89 @ 11 on the power wheel. Hoping to be able to push the 18.9gr NSA slugs fast enough with some more hammer tension, without needing to change reg pressure.
I've been kinda hanging back and hoping somebody else would share some concrete data on these new .20 NSAs but hasn't really materialized so I'll post results once they arrive and I have a chance to give em a shot. (Pun intended).
(Technically I have the Ghost and a Veteran, both in .20, that I could test them in, but I'll start with the Ghost and see how it goes).
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Darko sent me some cool stuff, received yesterday.
Tried em a bit last night in the fading light. Both function flawlessly, but I'm thinking I favor that flip open single shot loader over the magazine, just by preference.
Magazine has a nice stop after that last shot has been fired, bolt won't close again so you know you're on E. Pellets drop into each pellet well quite nicely.
Thank you Darko @ CARM magazines!
Tried em a bit last night in the fading light. Both function flawlessly, but I'm thinking I favor that flip open single shot loader over the magazine, just by preference.
Magazine has a nice stop after that last shot has been fired, bolt won't close again so you know you're on E. Pellets drop into each pellet well quite nicely.
Thank you Darko @ CARM magazines!
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Don’t know if you are aware but the valve in the ghost is the same 1 daystate is sending out as a update for alpha and delta. Wolves. Supposed to provide them with 10-15% more power at least thats what i was told on another site.
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Yes, cross-compatible, although I understand there have been a couple different generations of the valve.
Talking with my ART buddy once and he pointed out the valve is really something, being able to consistently produce a rather broad spectrum of power outputs. I've personally only gone as low as 18fpe and as high as 52fpe, with very tight extreme spreads. I've seen where guys that are shooting the .30s are sharing tight spreads up around 100fpe. I've also seen some share results of low power "tunes", seems like one of the commenters here on AGN removed some washers from the reg for a reg pressure of 50 or 60 and was doing down around. 12fpe.
So, 12 to 100fpe all sound doable, and all presumably from the same valve. Asking alot of the valve to be capable of such a power spread, but it doesn't seem to have any problems doing so.
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Well I dropped a pellet into the cocking block/hammer travel area last night. Slipped out of my fingertips just as I realized it didn't feel right. Of course, next shot the hammer didn't hit the valve stem so I knew a partial tear-down of rear end would be necessary.
And yep, smashed pellet /culprit circled in red here. I noticed clear tape across those open areas on Scotts Ghost at the Mormon Lake FT match about 10 days ago and he said he'd taped it off because the same had happened to him. It's obviously not a common problem, as I'm up around 8000 shots now and this is the first time, but it CAN happen while single-feeding and not paying attention.
Decided now would be a good time for a deep clean on the .20 barrel. So shroud removal and some Gunzilla through the bore with a cleaning rod and patches.
Also got interested in checking overall spring length as a proxy for "sag." This OEM 0.047" wire spring has been used for 99% of the shots taken from the gun. And it still measures 2 inches, just as it did when "new." Here it is next to the 0.052" wire OEM spring.
Also decided to look closely into the back of the hammer. @Arzrover told me a few months ago that his prototype Ghost has some sort of buffering device down in the recess of the hammer. Factory testing of a hammer debounce device perhaps? Anyway, this hammer does not have that. (I'm still using the lighter skelton hammer). For the tinkerers/curious types, there might be some gains on shot count or shot cycle by playing with orings of varying durometers down in the hammer, ala BStaley mod.
And finally, I'm happy to see the anodizing intact in the potentialwear areas of the gun. Mostly looking at: hammer raceway, triggers sears, and cocking block travel area. I'd hazard a guess that there aren't many Ghosts out there that have seen the shot count this one has, so it should be somewhat reassuring for owners (and BRK) to know that there's minimal wear on these areas of the gun at this point. On the topic of wear on anodizing, if I look really hard I CAN see some on the anodizing under the cocking lever. Here: (excuse the dust particles, this is a working gun)
Time to button it all back up, my boys are wanting to shoot this evening!
And yep, smashed pellet /culprit circled in red here. I noticed clear tape across those open areas on Scotts Ghost at the Mormon Lake FT match about 10 days ago and he said he'd taped it off because the same had happened to him. It's obviously not a common problem, as I'm up around 8000 shots now and this is the first time, but it CAN happen while single-feeding and not paying attention.
Decided now would be a good time for a deep clean on the .20 barrel. So shroud removal and some Gunzilla through the bore with a cleaning rod and patches.
Also got interested in checking overall spring length as a proxy for "sag." This OEM 0.047" wire spring has been used for 99% of the shots taken from the gun. And it still measures 2 inches, just as it did when "new." Here it is next to the 0.052" wire OEM spring.
Also decided to look closely into the back of the hammer. @Arzrover told me a few months ago that his prototype Ghost has some sort of buffering device down in the recess of the hammer. Factory testing of a hammer debounce device perhaps? Anyway, this hammer does not have that. (I'm still using the lighter skelton hammer). For the tinkerers/curious types, there might be some gains on shot count or shot cycle by playing with orings of varying durometers down in the hammer, ala BStaley mod.
And finally, I'm happy to see the anodizing intact in the potentialwear areas of the gun. Mostly looking at: hammer raceway, triggers sears, and cocking block travel area. I'd hazard a guess that there aren't many Ghosts out there that have seen the shot count this one has, so it should be somewhat reassuring for owners (and BRK) to know that there's minimal wear on these areas of the gun at this point. On the topic of wear on anodizing, if I look really hard I CAN see some on the anodizing under the cocking lever. Here: (excuse the dust particles, this is a working gun)
Time to button it all back up, my boys are wanting to shoot this evening!
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One more thought....
The. 20 barrel is 19.5inches long. Kinda cool that the chassis can hold that much barrel and still have the barrel shorter than a 480cc air tank.
With and without shroud alignment piece on the barrel.
The. 20 barrel is 19.5inches long. Kinda cool that the chassis can hold that much barrel and still have the barrel shorter than a 480cc air tank.
With and without shroud alignment piece on the barrel.
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What thread is on the female fitting that comes with the ghost.? I forgot to order a male fitting to thread on it before I got it.
Joe
Joe
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.20/18.9grain NSA slugs
My order arrived yesterday, NIck is always great about getting them out quickly. I think I only submitted that order on Mon or Tues, so 3-4 days and they were in my mailbox. Not bad.
As an introduction to this little bit of slug testing from the Ghost, I want to state that I am not a big proponent of slugs. I've just had too many poor results from them to be very slug gung-ho. And that's from lots of quality barrels from lots of high-end airguns. The best barrel/slug/gun combination I've seen yet was the 34grain Varmint Knockers at 1000fps, from a Derrick Wall tuned Vulcan 3. And that was the best by a WIDE margin. I currently hold the slug record at a XFT @ PRGC match, and I used that V3 to do it. All the other slugs I've tested have been thoroughly unimpressive. A couple were "okay" but nothing to get very excited about. So, anytime I go into testing slugs from a new gun/barrel, I do so pretty skeptically.
I also want to state that I buy my own ammo.
With that out of the way...
A couple years ago there was talk here on the forum that NSA had sent out some prototype .20 slugs to @Motorhead for some beta testing. Having tooted the .20 horn for 5 or 6 years now, I was pretty excited about the prospect of some .20 slugs, but Scott reported that accuracy from those beta slugs was pretty ho-hum, and the idea seemed to die there. Fast forward a couple years and Nick announced that .20 slugs were now available for sale. From memory, this seems like it's just been a few months. With my glass-half empty feelings on slugs, I wasn't too crazy about buying some, instead hoping somebody else would do some testing on them. Well, I haven't seen many reports on how they do, so I ordered some earlier this week.
And last night I shot some, of those 18.9grain .20 NSA slugs, 116 to be exact. And I'm going to report on all 116 shots.
I did lube them up, pretty liberally, with Gunzilla. One of my gripes with slugs is how they're so bad about leading up barrels. The Gunzilla has seemed to help in both reducing the leading, as well as making it easier to clean once the inevitable required barrel scrub arrives.
As a recap, I'm using the lighter OEM hammer spring and the skeletonized lighter hammer that came in the Ghost when it shipped as a .177 Ghost Carbine. Reg pressure at 140 bar. This tune puts out the 13.73gr JSBs @ 805fps and at "11" on the wheel, shoots the 15.89grain JSBs at 910-915fps. The only adjustment I made for the .20 slug testing was the hammer tension wheel.
1st shot with the .20 slugs = 584 (wheel on "MIN")
Cranked the wheel to max and took ten more shots, again just over the chrono into pellet trap in the garage. Those ten had an average speed of 870.5fps, with a 15.7fps extreme spread. Decided at this point to shoot them on paper so moved it all outside. The rest of the 116 shots were all at at average speed of 870fps.
Set up paper at 31 yards and 53 yards. The circles I'm using as aim points are 1 and 3/8" across. No hold-offs for wind on any of the accuracy assessment shots. I guessed winds were around 10mph but nearest weather station recorded sustained winds at 13-17mph and gusts up to 28mph during the 600-700 pm shooting session. I don't think I had that much at my house, but definitely had some wind.
The next 20 shots were all at 31 yards, and consist of 4x5 shot groups. Impact point a bit high for the scope zero, accounted for that on the second pair of 5 shot groups. Thought to myself that this was looking promising at this point.
Then shot another 45 shots at 53 yards, making 9, 5shot groups. Impact still a bit high, even at 53 yards-so first shot (upper left) was high still, accounted for that with hold-under for the other 8, 5 shot groups. There are some 5 shot groups under 0.4inches here, but also some groups that got away from me a bit.
At this point I refilled the gun. I had started with a full 250 bar fill and I was at 170 bar after those 66 shots. With reg at 140 bar, guessing there would be another 25 or so shots above reg pressure. So call it 95-100 shots at 32fpe with the .20/18.9grain slugs.
Ghost is aired back up now....placed a pellet trap at 94 yards and shot 8, 5 shot groups. FIrst shot hit a bit low as my guestimate for elevation was off some (upper left, circled group). Cranked in another couple clicks and shot the rest of the 40 shots shown here.
As i shot through those 40, I got pretty excited. 4 of the 8 are better than moa. And no hold off for the wind! In fact, results were good enough that i used the 5 best groups, superimposed over an EBR target to get a frame of reference for how these .20 slugs are shooting. (yes, cherry picking but keep in mind there are no sighters, nor wind flags, nor holding off for wind, etc,).
As for the Ghost felt to shoot those slugs? Very calm demeanor with this tune. Im sure I could get them rocking much faster, but with as good as they shot (accuracy) at 870, I don't think I want to. In addition, I'm getting 3 not only usable, but very accurate "tunes'from the current configuration. By simply turning the hammer wheel. "MIN" = 805 with 13.73gr pellets, "11" = 910-915 with 15.89gr pellets, and "MAX" = 970 with 18.9grain slugs. Also, Ghost was still fairly quite, even without a moderator on the end of the shroud. Some of that can be attributed to the 19.5 inch barrel in a shroud meant to fit a 23 inch barrel (lots of dead space in the shroud).
And that makes another point, I've seen lots of complaints about the Ghost power wheel not doing much. I've responded multiple times that it's all about the "tune." I'll point out here that at "min" the 18.9grain slugs are going 584 and at "max" they're going 870fps. That's a 286fps difference, or put another way, 14pfe, all the way up to 32 fpe, and only by spinning the power wheel. It IS possible to have a large difference with the hammer tension wheel in the Ghost, when the available settings are adjusted to allow that.
So, before I even walked down range and retrieved paper and measured groups, and even before I put the gun/etc away, i jumped on my phone and ordered a bunch more 18.9grain NSA slugs. In fact, the biggest order I've ever placed with NSA got made while I was still sitting at my little folding table "bench" yesterday evening.
I hope to find some time to measure the ballistic coefficient of these .20/18.9grain NSAs, and of course I'll share that here.
Finally, the accuracy I saw last evening was good enough to be competitive at Xtreme Field Target. I mentioned a few posts ago that I'd like to get my hands on a 700mm .22 kit to try out the Altaros 32grain slugs at an XFT match, but after pricing the Altaros out, and seeing how good the .20 NSAs are shooting, my enthusiasm is dampened a bit there. (Those particular Altaros slugs look to be about 3x the cost of the .20 NSAs).
Regardless, Nick @nielsenammo, PLEASE continue making the .20/18.9grain slugs.
My order arrived yesterday, NIck is always great about getting them out quickly. I think I only submitted that order on Mon or Tues, so 3-4 days and they were in my mailbox. Not bad.
As an introduction to this little bit of slug testing from the Ghost, I want to state that I am not a big proponent of slugs. I've just had too many poor results from them to be very slug gung-ho. And that's from lots of quality barrels from lots of high-end airguns. The best barrel/slug/gun combination I've seen yet was the 34grain Varmint Knockers at 1000fps, from a Derrick Wall tuned Vulcan 3. And that was the best by a WIDE margin. I currently hold the slug record at a XFT @ PRGC match, and I used that V3 to do it. All the other slugs I've tested have been thoroughly unimpressive. A couple were "okay" but nothing to get very excited about. So, anytime I go into testing slugs from a new gun/barrel, I do so pretty skeptically.
I also want to state that I buy my own ammo.
With that out of the way...
A couple years ago there was talk here on the forum that NSA had sent out some prototype .20 slugs to @Motorhead for some beta testing. Having tooted the .20 horn for 5 or 6 years now, I was pretty excited about the prospect of some .20 slugs, but Scott reported that accuracy from those beta slugs was pretty ho-hum, and the idea seemed to die there. Fast forward a couple years and Nick announced that .20 slugs were now available for sale. From memory, this seems like it's just been a few months. With my glass-half empty feelings on slugs, I wasn't too crazy about buying some, instead hoping somebody else would do some testing on them. Well, I haven't seen many reports on how they do, so I ordered some earlier this week.
And last night I shot some, of those 18.9grain .20 NSA slugs, 116 to be exact. And I'm going to report on all 116 shots.
I did lube them up, pretty liberally, with Gunzilla. One of my gripes with slugs is how they're so bad about leading up barrels. The Gunzilla has seemed to help in both reducing the leading, as well as making it easier to clean once the inevitable required barrel scrub arrives.
As a recap, I'm using the lighter OEM hammer spring and the skeletonized lighter hammer that came in the Ghost when it shipped as a .177 Ghost Carbine. Reg pressure at 140 bar. This tune puts out the 13.73gr JSBs @ 805fps and at "11" on the wheel, shoots the 15.89grain JSBs at 910-915fps. The only adjustment I made for the .20 slug testing was the hammer tension wheel.
1st shot with the .20 slugs = 584 (wheel on "MIN")
Cranked the wheel to max and took ten more shots, again just over the chrono into pellet trap in the garage. Those ten had an average speed of 870.5fps, with a 15.7fps extreme spread. Decided at this point to shoot them on paper so moved it all outside. The rest of the 116 shots were all at at average speed of 870fps.
Set up paper at 31 yards and 53 yards. The circles I'm using as aim points are 1 and 3/8" across. No hold-offs for wind on any of the accuracy assessment shots. I guessed winds were around 10mph but nearest weather station recorded sustained winds at 13-17mph and gusts up to 28mph during the 600-700 pm shooting session. I don't think I had that much at my house, but definitely had some wind.
The next 20 shots were all at 31 yards, and consist of 4x5 shot groups. Impact point a bit high for the scope zero, accounted for that on the second pair of 5 shot groups. Thought to myself that this was looking promising at this point.
Then shot another 45 shots at 53 yards, making 9, 5shot groups. Impact still a bit high, even at 53 yards-so first shot (upper left) was high still, accounted for that with hold-under for the other 8, 5 shot groups. There are some 5 shot groups under 0.4inches here, but also some groups that got away from me a bit.
At this point I refilled the gun. I had started with a full 250 bar fill and I was at 170 bar after those 66 shots. With reg at 140 bar, guessing there would be another 25 or so shots above reg pressure. So call it 95-100 shots at 32fpe with the .20/18.9grain slugs.
Ghost is aired back up now....placed a pellet trap at 94 yards and shot 8, 5 shot groups. FIrst shot hit a bit low as my guestimate for elevation was off some (upper left, circled group). Cranked in another couple clicks and shot the rest of the 40 shots shown here.
As i shot through those 40, I got pretty excited. 4 of the 8 are better than moa. And no hold off for the wind! In fact, results were good enough that i used the 5 best groups, superimposed over an EBR target to get a frame of reference for how these .20 slugs are shooting. (yes, cherry picking but keep in mind there are no sighters, nor wind flags, nor holding off for wind, etc,).
As for the Ghost felt to shoot those slugs? Very calm demeanor with this tune. Im sure I could get them rocking much faster, but with as good as they shot (accuracy) at 870, I don't think I want to. In addition, I'm getting 3 not only usable, but very accurate "tunes'from the current configuration. By simply turning the hammer wheel. "MIN" = 805 with 13.73gr pellets, "11" = 910-915 with 15.89gr pellets, and "MAX" = 970 with 18.9grain slugs. Also, Ghost was still fairly quite, even without a moderator on the end of the shroud. Some of that can be attributed to the 19.5 inch barrel in a shroud meant to fit a 23 inch barrel (lots of dead space in the shroud).
And that makes another point, I've seen lots of complaints about the Ghost power wheel not doing much. I've responded multiple times that it's all about the "tune." I'll point out here that at "min" the 18.9grain slugs are going 584 and at "max" they're going 870fps. That's a 286fps difference, or put another way, 14pfe, all the way up to 32 fpe, and only by spinning the power wheel. It IS possible to have a large difference with the hammer tension wheel in the Ghost, when the available settings are adjusted to allow that.
So, before I even walked down range and retrieved paper and measured groups, and even before I put the gun/etc away, i jumped on my phone and ordered a bunch more 18.9grain NSA slugs. In fact, the biggest order I've ever placed with NSA got made while I was still sitting at my little folding table "bench" yesterday evening.
I hope to find some time to measure the ballistic coefficient of these .20/18.9grain NSAs, and of course I'll share that here.
Finally, the accuracy I saw last evening was good enough to be competitive at Xtreme Field Target. I mentioned a few posts ago that I'd like to get my hands on a 700mm .22 kit to try out the Altaros 32grain slugs at an XFT match, but after pricing the Altaros out, and seeing how good the .20 NSAs are shooting, my enthusiasm is dampened a bit there. (Those particular Altaros slugs look to be about 3x the cost of the .20 NSAs).
Regardless, Nick @nielsenammo, PLEASE continue making the .20/18.9grain slugs.
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It was mentioned on a different post, that an inquire or lack of on What if Anything NSA changed up from the Prototype production slugs of a couple years ago to these newly Re-released .20 slugs ??
I dismantled my high power .20's into other calibers and at this time have no .20 slug interest. Do have my older Airwolf .20 with heliboard in the safe if interest re-peaks if or when results from others becomes published
I dismantled my high power .20's into other calibers and at this time have no .20 slug interest. Do have my older Airwolf .20 with heliboard in the safe if interest re-peaks if or when results from others becomes published
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It was mentioned on a different post, that an inquire or lack of on What if Anything NSA changed up from the Prototype production slugs of a couple years ago to these newly Re-released .20 slugs ??
I dismantled my high power .20's into other calibers and at this time have no .20 slug interest. Do have my older Airwolf .20 with heliboard in the safe if interest re-peaks if or when results from others becomes published
Seems like I saw a comment from you that the weights were different on the prototype .20 NSA slugs from a few years ago, when compared to currently available for sale .20 NSA slugs.
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