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twar · New Member

I have a crosman quest 800x in .22 and threw in a new mainspring from Jim Maccari. Shooting beeman crow magnum pellets I am getting a consistent 600fps. Is that the speed I should expect using these heavier pellets? My old pumpmaster in 177 was throwing gamo magnums at 500fps. I have only been using beeman pellets, are their any others that are good for hunting and still accurate?

AirGunEric · Site Admin

Well, a Beeman Crow Magnum .22 pellet weighs 18.2gr.

Another pellet, also a Hollow Point, the RWS SuperHPoint in .22 caliber weighs 13.9gr.

Another pellet altogether, the JSB Exact, which is not a hollow point but a round nose weighs 15.9gr.

A .177 caliber Gamo Magnum weighs 8.5gr.

My point? Those Beeman Crow Magnums are way freakin' heavy!

Use a calculator: http://airgunhome.com/pages/calculators.html

An 18.2gr pellet traveling 600fps is putting out 14.55 fpe.

A 13.9gr pellet with the same 14.55fpe gun would travel around 687fps.

When Crosman claimed the Quest 800 .22 would shoot at 800fps- this was, at best, an exaggeration using an 11.9gr 'Hobby' pellet- It just doesn't add up. For example, if we look at the UK and guns available there- the Quest's are sold "unmodified" and must be 12fpe or less under British law before they are called "firearms" and licenses are required. So, if we assume that the Quest 800 maxes out at 12fpe in order to fulfill this in an "unmodified" state, an 11.9gr .22 pellet would travel at 673fps- but probably even less than that realistically.

Now- if we collect up the anecdotal offerings of people who have owned the Quest 800 .22cal- they have claimed they get around 600-650fps. I'm not saying all these guys are correct- but that seems to be the general "range" they fall into- so we can probably assume reasonably accurately that if they used 11.9gr hobby pellets- they were getting near 650fps, and 600-ish if they used 13.9gr pellets.

So- you getting 600fps with 18.2gr pellets, or 14.55fpe- you did gain something worth mentioning with that Maccari spring- at least 2.55fpe.

Comparing this to a Crosman Pumpmaster in .177cal shows a huge difference- 500fps with a .177 8.5gr pellet equals 4.72fpe. Sure the velocity is only 17% lower, but the weight being carried is less than half. The actual power output on the Quest is approaching 3 times what the Pumpmaster was. As a further mathematical comparison- a Quest 1000 (exact same gun as an 800- but with a .177 barrel) shooting 7.9gr pellets at 14.55fpe (using the Maccari spring) would shoot those pellets at 910fps- exactly what is expected out of a .177 Quest with a Maccari spring in it.

The ultimate test here would be to compare what your specific Quest did before the addition of the Maccari spring. I think it's obvious you "gained" but exactly how much is really dependent specifically on what you started with- no two airguns leave the factory with the same output.

In any event- I do believe you got what you should have with the Maccari spring- I just took a very long trip to justify it!

As for other pellets- each gun (individually, even two of the same model of gun) has its own "preferences". For example, my Quest seems to like Crosman Premiers but isn't so exact with Beeman and is even less accurate with Crosman "generic" pellets. You could use pointed pellets instead of hollow-points. Depending on where you get your pellets- the pointed ones might even be a bit cheaper. It's all about experimentation to figure out which pellet will work best in your gun. As for hunting- anything that can penetrate your target and bring it down while still being accurate enough for targetting at the range you select is good enough. If you're trying to shoot birds, rats, squirrels you could definetly stop using those heavy Beeman's and go alot lighter. If you are trying to bring down something like raccoons with one shot- you could still probably go a bit lighter (15.9gr). That 18.2gr pellet might be used for something with a harder "shell" like porcupines or the like.

twar · New Member

Wow that was a long post. But thanks for the advice. I will have to try out some different pellets. I am mostly using it for pest control, such as red and gray squirrels, and possibly a raccoon at some point. Time for me to do some more testing.