Damaged Skirt Pellet Testing

[SkeeterHawk]

Looks like they penetrated the boards about the same...

You are right. For grins, I reconducted this experiment after rebuilding my gun. I found a retaining nut on my valve was backing out and was allowing the valve to wiggle around in there a little. The pressure held it into place, but it allowed for some inconsistency.

Here are the new, bent pellets:

Here is a video of the shots:

Note that we were having about 10mph wind at the time, so I've got some windage difference. Again, this was shot at 50 yards.

Finally, since I rebuilt my gun, I ran the numbers again. They were marginally better, so here they are:

So, in conclusion, I got the same results. I won't be throwing away my bent pellets any more and will save them for plinking. They are definitely good enough.

Happy plinking!!

Jonathan

 

[Bernie Bear]

As i kid i used to shoot into a bar of soap and reuse them over and over until the the bar was full of pellets then we dug all the pellets out and reused them .
Fun project .

 

[Nvreloader]

Bob at GTA uses this heat and pour soap for Ballistic Gel, seems to work very well:

Clear Melt and Pour Soap Base

www.newdirectionsaromatics.ca

See info here: https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=188959.msg156178043#msg156178043

HtH's

 

[MickeyD]

In your testing of bent skirts, did you ever notice bits of torn skirt impacting the target? My son was shooting some very flimsy Wally World paper this morning, and we found several tears too small to be from a round.

 

[SkeeterHawk]

In your testing of bent skirts, did you ever notice bits of torn skirt impacting the target? My son was shooting some very flimsy Wally World paper this morning, and we found several tears too small to be from a round.

That's an interesting question. The short answer for me is no, I didn't see any anomalies like this. I was shooting at 50 yards, so I doubt any little piece of lead like you are talking about would have been able to stay on target that far. I assume you were shooting pretty close.

I was shooting the really soft lead JSB pellets, and as @Sqwirlfugger57 demonstrated shooting the bent skirt into the water, the pressure forces the skirt back to round. From what you are saying, I would suspect that the rifling is eating at the skirt, or you may have something else nicking the skirt on the way through the breech. You could repeat the experiment, and shoot a few rounds into a bucket of water and see both the extra pieces in there after the shots, as well as what the rifling was doing to the skirt...and look for a nick in the head or something.

I guess the most obvious question before all this speculation would be, is it accurate otherwise?

 

[JimD]

I saw a youtube from a channel called "aim small" where they concluded pellets with bent skirts shoot about the same. I've never tested it but normally I just shoot pellets as they come from the tin. I bought a head size gauge for 177, however, and plan to test accuracy on the 30 yard challenge with pellets with more consistent head size. My P35-177 seems to care about head size.

I have tested accuracy as measured by my 30 yard challenge score with my most accurate PCP, my P35 in 22 using pellets supplied by Amazon in bent tins and those supplied by Pyramid Air in pristine tins. I saw no difference. I still prefer pristine tins but I could not measure a difference. The pellets from the damaged tins do not appear to be damaged, however, so that supports the results.

Before I got my P35-22 I ordered a plastic tin of assorted JSB pellets to test the new gun with. The first 3 shipments looked terrible. All sorts of pellet damage. Amazon was the source, only source I could find at the time, and is good about returns so I just kept sending them back until I got a "tin" that looked decent. Even now knowing that it doesn't seem to typically make much difference, I'd still send back beat up looking pellets.

I fully support the conclusion that there is no reason to throw away pellets with bent skirts. I sometimes segregate them, however. I use them for testing moderators where I shoot them to land a couple hundred yards away in a lake, for instance. I also will use them to lead in a barrel after cleaning. Or just for informal plinking. But I don't want to try to get my top score with them or try to see if my guns likes a particular pellet with one that looks beat up.

 

[Stan’s boy John]

I've always shot the H&N pellets. The gun likes them and so do I.

I'd never shot any and decided to buy a tin of the famed 18.13gr JSB's. I received them yesterday. I'm amazed at the quantity of mis-shaped, bent and damaged skirts. It looks like the knife inside the pellet forming machinery that trims the skirts was either worn out or damaged. I picked out at least 30 pellets that showed evidence of damage and left a lot of them that had a sawtooth edge on the skirts. Contacted The Pellet Shop and got the don't worry they'll shoot great reply.

Meanwhile, I also bought a tin of the 15.89gr JSB's and they look great. I don't have a scale that reads in grains (yet) to weigh them, but I fear this tin is full of 18.13gr flyers which is not good for a neighborhood pester.

 

[Spartan]

My main concern with deformed skirts for plinking is that it could cause more lead fouling to develop/build up in the grooves of the barrel since the misshapen portions will not engage the lands uniformly as intended. Portions of the bent skirt could be getting forced up into the grooves as it traverses the barrel.

I have no data to support this. Just sharing why I choose not to save the bent ones for plinking. I don’t think they will do any favors in terms of keeping a clean barrel.

 

[nervoustrig]

A pellet skirt obturates (expands) to a gas-tight seal with the bore when the pressure pulse of firing slams it from behind.

A significantly damaged skirt will permit some amount of air to bypass it before the skirt expands out, which in turn reduces the degree of obturation, which means less surface area of the skirt in contact with the bore. So if anything, the degree of lead transfer arising from shooting pellets with damaged skirts would be less, not more.

 

[SkeeterHawk]

A pellet skirt obturates (expands) to a gas-tight seal with the bore when the pressure pulse of firing slams it from behind

@nervoustrig is absolutely right, and @Sqwirlfugger57 demonstrated in this post, the skirt gets "blown back into shape". Even though the H&N are obviously made from a more solid alloy, I would suspect that they would be blown back into true as well...but I haven't had enough bad skirts from H&N yet to conduct this experiment again.

I'm not a big fan of cleaning my barrel, and I have been shooting the pellets with deformed skirts now for a few months, and I haven't seen any anecdotal increase in the tendency to foul @Spartan , but I will keep my eye out for any variance.

 

[AirShot]

Years back I had the same pellet issue with the CP lite pellets. I used a piece of pine wood and drilled about 60 holes with a ball nose cutting tool into the wood. Just deep enough to allow the skirt to stick up above the surface mabey.030". This blovk of wood fit into the old Crossman Premier pellet cardboard box. I saved all my damaged skirt pellets and still do today even though I switched to JSB 8.4 pellets. When I get a bunch and that can be often, I drop them into the box with my drilled wood block and shake it around....most pellets drop into the holes head down ( heavy head) then I use one of the old Beeman pellet seating tools..the tapered end, and push while turning into the damaged skirt....rounds it right out, looks like new again !! They even shoot like new undamaged pellets. Best thing is you can do a bunch at a time. When you gave all the skirts trued up, just turn it over and bang it on a towel and most of the pellets fall out...some might need a fingernail to get them free. The fact that you can do them in quantities makes it a worthwhile step. Very few pellets get tossed anymore, when I get a bunch of bad obes, in 10-15 minutes they are good again. Get a ball nose cutting tool ( end mill cutter) slightly larger than your pellet head, the soft pine wood protects the pellet head while you gently round out the skirt and you have good pellets again...try it..you will like it !!

 

[SkeeterHawk]

Years back I had the same pellet issue with the CP lite pellets. I used a piece of pine wood and drilled about 60 holes with a ball nose cutting tool into the wood. Just deep enough to allow the skirt to stick up above the surface mabey.030". This blovk of wood fit into the old Crossman Premier pellet cardboard box. I saved all my damaged skirt pellets and still do today even though I switched to JSB 8.4 pellets. When I get a bunch and that can be often, I drop them into the box with my drilled wood block and shake it around....most pellets drop into the holes head down ( heavy head) then I use one of the old Beeman pellet seating tools..the tapered end, and push while turning into the damaged skirt....rounds it right out, looks like new again !! They even shoot like new undamaged pellets. Best thing is you can do a bunch at a time. When you gave all the skirts trued up, just turn it over and bang it on a towel and most of the pellets fall out...some might need a fingernail to get them free. The fact that you can do them in quantities makes it a worthwhile step. Very few pellets get tossed anymore, when I get a bunch of bad obes, in 10-15 minutes they are good again. Get a ball nose cutting tool ( end mill cutter) slightly larger than your pellet head, the soft pine wood protects the pellet head while you gently round out the skirt and you have good pellets again...try it..you will like it !!

Would you mind posting a couple pictures of your block and how you are using it? I believe that I understand what you are talking about, but a visual would really help. Thanks so much for the tip and (hopefully) the visual!!

 

[Smitty911]

I think one aspect is being overlooked. Everyone has been talking about shot cycle "forming" the skirt to the barrel.

You need to remember something else has to happen prior to the shot...…..The pellet gets loaded into the Magazine and then the breech. That alone should change the shape of the skirt.
1. Identify the bent skirts - Photo's
2. Take 10 bent skirts and load them into the magazine - remove and take photo's
3. Re-load in magazine and use bolt to seat the pellets in the breech, removed from breech, take photo's
4. Re-load and shoot.

Yes there will be some changes to the skirt after being inserted into the breech twice, but you will see how much actually changes just by seating the pellets.

Smitty

 

[AirShot]

Would you mind posting a couple pictures of your block and how you are using it? I believe that I understand what you are talking about, but a visual would really help. Thanks so much for the tip and (hopefully) the visual!!

Hope this helps, makes crappy pellets better!!

 

[AirShot]

As you can see, this has had a ton of use !! Started back in the late 80's when the SR came out and many realized some of them shot better with expanded skirts. This started as a skirt expanding tool, but as pellet quality began to suffer, I made a number of these for people to make better pellets from what was on the market. Started using JSB when I bought another TX 200 3-4 years back, shortly after, their QC began to suffer so I dug out the skirt repair tool again!! May not be perfect but a definet improvement for squished skirts. I haven't shot competition in many years now, but still enjoy accuracy!! Most of my informal testing shows the repaired pellets shoot just as well as new undamaged pellets. And you can repair a bunch in a very short time !!

 

[MOSOSODBOB]

New Guy Here. I recently took out a HW35 that I had since the 1980's when I brought it at an Army Rod and Gun Club in Germany. The gun and the three tins of pellets been in various stages of storage since. I shot them only occasionally since.

Question: does pellets goes bad? The ones I found when I cracked open the tins are not shiny like a tin of pistol pellets I purchased to shoot out of my air pistol... I also found several deformed or less than round pellets and shot them anyway... using an aperture rear and an aperture front insert and got 1" groups at 15 yards. If no harm shooting older pellets, I plan to use these tins up for plinking.

Got two more "better" guns in bound. AA TX200 in .22 and RWS54 in .177. Will get newer pellets for them. But... ok to shoot up my old stash in them?

Comments?

 

[Sqwirl57]

New Guy Here. I recently took out a HW35 that I had since the 1980's when I brought it at an Army Rod and Gun Club in Germany. The gun and the three tins of pellets been in various stages of storage since. I shot them only occasionally since.

Question: does pellets goes bad? The ones I found when I cracked open the tins are not shiny like a tin of pistol pellets I purchased to shoot out of my air pistol... I also found several deformed or less than round pellets and shot them anyway... using an aperture rear and an aperture front insert and got 1" groups at 15 yards. If no harm shooting older pellets, I plan to use these tins up for plinking.

Got two more "better" guns in bound. AA TX200 in .22 and RWS54 in .177. Will get newer pellets for them. But... ok to shoot up my old stash in them?

Comments?

If they seat fine they're probably fine to shoot. I would think worse case scenario you just pull a patch through the barrel when they're all gone and call it a day.

 

[SkeeterHawk]

The ones I found when I cracked open the tins are not shiny

If you don't know this, you can wash pellets. There are a lot of schools of thought here. Here is a link to a pretty good thread on the subject, but you should read up some if this is what you want to do. Make sure that you take care of your seals. If I were you, I would just get a patchworm and some Ballistol, shoot the old pellets, and clean the barrel if it appears that you are losing accuracy.

Something else to note, especially true with springers, that they will typically "like" a particular pellet. Once you use up your old stash, put all kinds of stuff through your barrel to find out which one you "should" be shooting. I hope this helps. Just my $0.02.

 

[AirShot]

As long as the oellets are not coated with a white/ gray powder they should be fine. Lead can and will oxidise with a powdery coating, then time to trash them. Over the years, I have used beeswax furniture spray to lube and protect my pellets, even my 30 plus year old Crossman Premiere pellets look excellent as they are protected by the beeswax. Lots of reciepes for pellet lubes/ coatings that will protect them and increase there storage life. I stick with my tried and true beeswax spray.

 

[Stan’s boy John]

The concentricity of the head to the skirt IMO is the random flier issue. For the competitions we evaluate and some weigh. I head size for big competitions. There is a new product about to be tested that allows you to check the concentricity of pellets. There was one posted on AGN back (https://www.airgunnation.com/thread...pellets-by-weight.1275719/page-6#post-1375207) a few months ago. The idea was refined and implemented into one-off machined carbide pieces that the tolerances check to .0000 so cross your fingers and stay tuned.

I wish I could understand German, but I would tend to agree with that the skirt is not the issue.

Field Target Pellets - CO2air.de

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