Silhouette 1701P slug shooter

[weevil]

Hello pistol friends,

Im mostly lurking

over on the PCP forum discussing experiments involving 177 slug shooting using my Leshiy Classic, Airmaks Caiman and most recently, a 20-grain slinging FX Panthera. However, on the back burner, I’ve been playing with a 1701P that I’ve had for some time, that was shooting pellets in stock form. A measly 4fpe but very accurate. Knowing it has a LW barrel with a twist rate capable of shooting slugs, I decided to try developing a tune for the tiny slugs that are available these days. Here are the results, but first some background on the setup:

The 1701P, which has a wooden grip set and 5”TKO mod had its barrel cleaned and very lightly polished with JB paste. The TP was enlarged to .064 and 100 10-grain Zan slugs were shot through it to lead it in, not even paying any attention to tuning or accuracy. It was then fitted with a pic rail adapter and Vortex 5X spitfire prism scope.

Onto the tuning…

 

[weevil]

The tuning consumed a lot of time and focused initially on Zan 10 grain slugs, which I figured most likely to shoot well from the small barrel and relatively low power. With a high level of hammer tension and longish hammer throw, I established a baseline tune that produced around 8fpe with a pretty flat string from 3000-2000psi, with hammer bounce creeping in during the last couple shots. I did not want to increase power further by enlarging the TP because I figured that the shot cycle would become unfavorable (jumpy) and I would also risk losing what was a remarkably flat and useful string. Note that there’s no BSB or reg here and you’ll see at the end that neither are needed…

At this point, I tested Zan 10 grain vs JSB 10.34 grain vs NSA 12.5 grain slugs. The Zans proved to have 2X the accuracy of the next best (JSB) and the NSAs were terrible, a very tight fit into the breech and the gun struggled to shoot then, yielding erratic fps changes. All in, the Zan 10s proved to be a little less accurate compared to JSB 10.34 grain pellets at 30 yards. I was a little disappointed at this and considered quitting and sticking with pellets. I figured that there just wasn’t enough velocity or that excess air from the barrel was destabilizing the slugs. However, before quitting, I decided to try all the other slugs in my collection, included by some heavier ones that I had figured initially would be very unlikely to work. Among these were 13grain Zans and surprisingly, they shot much better than the 10s and produced better groups at 30y than the 10.34 pellets!

I then focused on fine tuning for the Zan 13s based on accuracy over a string from 3000psi to 2100psi, amounting to around 20 shots. I got through around 1000 slugs in this phase, really dialing it in carefully. The final settings were: 5 5/8 turns from fully CCW on the hammer tension and 7/8 of a turn from fully CCW on the hammer throw (striker). This gave the following 21 shot string from 3000 to 2000psi with very low ES:

545

547

543

547

550

550

550

546

552

552

550

548

552

550

547

547

540

545

543

540

538

 

[weevil]

So, around 8.8fpe with those Zan 13grain slugs. Right after refilling, I shot the following 8-shot group out to 55 yards with the gun sat on two small rice bags. The target is my usual duct seal block with a grain of corn as my aim point. I clicked down 3moa from the 30y zero but was still a little low. 2 slugs hit the corn grain. Wind was ~8 from right to left. One pic of the target and one of a few of the slugs recovered from the duct seal:

 

[Simplemann]

NIce good looking 1701 The 1701P is an interesting air pistol for sure. I have a 2300S which is awesome IMHO. Thanks for sharing

 

[Simplemann]

Nice shooting 55 yards thats impressive

 

[weevil]

All of the slugs were embedded nose first in the block and showed partial expansion (to about 22 cal size) and had good rifling marks. Overall I’m pretty happy with this and excited to take it out hiking. I thought about going back to iron sights but the spitfire, although it struggles beyond 6in relief, works very well in a taco hold!

I’m now waiting for a furry volunteer in the yard and will update if one turns up. Happy to answer any Qs.

 

[weevil]

I guess one question is: why do the 13s shoot better than the 10s? Slugs are always a bit of a mystery. Could be that the longer projectile grips the rifling better before the choke and gets more spin. Or, perhaps the heavier slug is less prone to destabilization from air exiting the muzzle after the slug.

I guess one lesson is that you should really try every option - even if it doesn’t make intuitive sense!

 

[maxtrouble]

Impressive results from the 1701p platform. Bone stock they are a great PCP pistol.

 

[EdinGa]

Great shooting and congratulations on experimenting outside the norm. I'm shooting my 28.5 grain cast slugs from my stock Crosman 2240 for 8.3 fpe. It's doing great at 7 yards with the stock peep sight. This is a 4 shot group and the low shot was the 2nd one from a new cartridge and it was definitely lower powered than the next 3. I'll be carrying it in my kayak this summer for snake duty.

 

[weevil]

Great shooting and congratulations on experimenting outside the norm. I'm shooting my 28.5 grain cast slugs from my stock Crosman 2240 for 8.3 fpe. It's doing great at 7 yards with the stock peep sight. This is a 4 shot group and the low shot was the 2nd one from a new cartridge and it was definitely lower powered than the next 3. I'll be carrying it in my kayak this summer for snake duty. View attachment 357992

Hi Ed, that’s interesting - what’s the reason for using such heavy slugs? Max FPE?

 

[EdinGa]

Hi Ed, that’s interesting - what’s the reason for using such heavy slugs? Max FPE?

It was just an experiment at first but then I realized they hit like a freight train. They really make tin cans fly.

 

[weevil]

It was just an experiment at first but then I realized they hit like a freight train. They really make tin cans fly.

I guess they can also give those cottonmouths quite a headache!

 

[EdinGa]

I guess they can also give those cottonmouths quite a headache!

That's the plan.

 

[Struckat]

Nice post Weevil!

I have been dreaming of 177 slugs but never thought I had a gun worthy power wise.

It sounds like I need to try them in my 1720.

Have you done any more shooting? Found a volunteer?

 

[weevil]

The smaller volunteers have been absent. All of the action has been after dark with bandits, which the Leshiy Classic has been dealing with - shooting the Zan 10 grain. Lets us know how your 1720 does. Those LW barrels on the Crosmans seem to be capable!