Today I was able to take some time to make some barrel adjustments and get some trigger time in. I learned some things and came to a conclusion I’d like to share.
First of all, it is so much easier to work on magazine and barrel alignment issues and jams with the barrel cages off. These cages are the waffle like plastic pieces that cover the barrel back towards the receiver. I don’t like them. Using a black sharpie I placed witness marks on the barrel and chasis to have a reference point to my barrel orientation’s origin. In order to adjust the barrel I simply loosened the barrel retention screws, grabbed the moderator cover (not the shroud), and turned it in the direction I wanted to adjust the barrel. The photo below was obviously taken after moving the barrel from my starting point. I moved it until the only air I felt during the shot cycle was on my chin. I can deal with that.
Next I wanted to see how the mag cycled. I shot slugs and pellets. In my first mag of pellets after adjusting the barrel, I seated the pellets deeply. What this means is that using a retractable ink pen, I pushed the pellets deep into the magazine to where the dome of the pellet was close to flush with the front of the mag. If you look at an empty magazine chamber you should notice that the grooves in the magazine chambers (they do not resemble rifling. These grooves are straight) start from the middle of each chamber and run towards the front. If I pushed a pellet too far, I used my retractable ink pen tip to push it back into the mag from the dome as explained in a previous post.
View of deep seated JSB Match Diabolo 81 grain pellets from the rear of the magazine.
View of deep seated Diabolo pellets from the front. Notice the scratch on the dome of a pellet? That’s from the ink pen pushing that pellet back into the magazine.
After seating all of my pellets, I indexed the mag with the 1st pellet to align it with the barrel. To do this, rotate the magazine 2 clicks clockwise from the position where when standing behind the but of the rifle looking forward look at the rear of the left side of the magazine. Start rotating the mag when the pellet you wish to start with can be seen positioned in the uppermost chamber with an exposed pellet skirt and nothing beyond it is visible. Yes it reads like a lot, but I’m being intentionally specific.
After indexing the mag for my first shot, I pressed the trigger and the pellet was sent. However, the magazine didn’t index properly and the release lever had very little tension when I flipped it up. This was not the first time this occurred today. After assessing the situation here’s what I saw.
The pictured pellets became dislodged after the shot. You saw how deep I seated them in the magazine. On couple of occasions the issue was easy to correct. Once the mag shifted late after the shot on its own. Another instance I released the lever (flipped it up) and rotated the mag. It felt like the mag was stuck half way through its rotation to index the next shot. This is what I saw on the other side of the mag. The pellet pictured below in the top right chamber became dislodged and when the mag rotated it was pushed in partially and the part of the skirt that remained protruding outside of the magazine was deformed and flattened to what you see below. Also notice that all of the pellets below it have not become unseated. It seems that it may be mainly pellets on the left side of the mag that become dislodged easily. I’m unsure, but this is my suspicion.
I experienced a minor jam with another pellet that became dislodged and I had to loosen the barrel retention screws and back the barrel out a few turns in order to rotate the mag so that I could align the mag and shoot that pellet out through the barrel. I came close to removing the reservoir and barrel to see what was going on. Keep in mind that my rifle is mounted on a tripod that was leveled before mounting the gun and the rifle remained parellel to the ground since loading it. It was loaded atop the tripod in the same position I shot from.
Here is today’s target. Circles 1-5 were shot with JSB 81 grain Diabolo pellets. Circles 6-10 are shooting NSA 110 grain HPDB slugs. Keep in mind that I recently cleaned the barrel also, but the difference between the accuracy of the two projectiles is pretty obvious. Everything was shot form 50 yards with very little wind.
The NSA slugs shot as expected. The scope was zeroed for pellets at 35 yards. I used my holds from my DOPE and some shots grouped high, others hit low. I would change my hold sometimes to see if I could correct the variances, but there was no recognizable pattern to the trajectory deviation of these pellets. My conclusion from these groups and previous groups are that these pellets do not shoot well out of this gun out past 30-35 years maybe. I have to check that against previous targets. My biggest issue if with the vertical movement. That is not all due to my actions. Look at the slug groups. The vertical movement seen there is due to things I was doing behind the tripod. I understand what I did because it’s consistent. Then look at circle #8. I was able to cut down on some of that movement. Also note that targets 6-10 are significantly smaller that the circles above them.
I don’t know who wrote that pellets shoot well out of the Rattler 357 on the AOA website and Western Airguns site. I also don’t know which Rattler version or barrel that they used. Most importantly, I don’t know which pellets they used. As for me and my Rattler 357, it shoots JSB Match Diabolo 81 grain pellets as demonstrated within this thread. I stated my conclusion, but you be the judge. These same pellets shoot well from my Benjamin Bulldogs. When the NSA 110 grain slugs remain seated? They shoot good enough for me. I’ve shot them out to 65 yards so far.
Here’s some spent lead shot from the Rattler that I intend to recycle.
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