Airgunning

  Pellets made by JSB 

There's a lot of confusion about the pellets made by JSB (JSB Exact, AA Field, Daystate FT, Webley Lazadomes). Are these pellets all the same or are they all different ?

I've read numerous stories about this. At first sight, they all look the same. At second sight, they all look more or less the same. After a closer inspection, they look quite different ;-).

Things started to become more clear to me when a guy at a dutch-speaking airgun forum started to cut pellets in half after he noticed he had 2 different types of AA Fields. Since I have no life anyway (I'm so sad I even weigh my pellets :D), I decided to give it a try myself.

I had an old batch of AA Fields which I bought at Pax in London in 2002. After cutting them in half, it became clear they are different from my AA Fields (indicated as new batch on the picture) which I bought in 2004. The old one has a much deeper, rounded hole. I get significantly more flyers with the old type AA Field than with the new ones. The new ones actually shoot very accurately in my EV2 (and in the EV2 and S400's of some of my friends).

Next observation was that the Daystate FT and the JSB Exact looked very similar to each-other but the hole in the pellet was different from the AA Fields and the Lazadomes.  The JSB Exacts and the Daystate FT's shoot very similar in my guns so I assume they are identical.  There were many deformed pellets in my JSB tins and no deformed ones in my Daystate tins but I've read stories where it was the other way around.  So it looks to me that the presence of deformed pellets in a tin is caused by some rough transportation which is a pity because it ruins an excellent type of pellet. I use the Daystate FT's in my EV2.

The Webley Lazadomes again has a different hole and is different from all the others. 

This simple test shows at least which pellets are not identical. 

Now I'm off, looking for a life ;-).

April 8, 2005 by Mario Severi