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Nautilus
(page 3)
After being forced
to relax over the Holiday weekend, I had to get out to the range
for a couple of hours. I loaded up everything I own and went out.
Rainy morning, but - that's fine. I made the eight trips to the
bench and set up. Even took the chronograph.
Went for my first fill
... found I'd grabbed a carbon fiber tank that was down to 1,800
psi. Uh-Ohh. What do you do then...? Well ... I just shot for
a few hours! You see - I'd taken the Nautilus 32. Come along.
Pic of unfinished rifle
- Gary's current "gone shootin' rifle"
Yep - what would have
been a bust with other PCP's wasn't a problem. I designed this
Tri-valve for a medium pressure peek operating curve. I shot for
hours and the tank was still giving 1,600 psi fills when I quit.
Keep in mind that the
Nautilus has Brass Sights - no optics. Sorry for the fuzzy pics - the digital still camera
often wants to focus "through" the bullet holes on the
background.
_
_
I took a tin of Barnes
Falcons. These are about 83 grains I think. I was shooting them
at about 820 fps for 124 fpe average.
I occasionally see
shady characters lurking around when I'm testing. No doubt industrial
spies ...
After shooting for
awhile. I remembered the writer - Jock Elliott, who's been quite
interested in long range PCP shooting with open sights. He enjoys
the movie "Quigley Down Under" and has written a couple
of articles where he set up scale versions of the "bucket"
shots Tom Selleck portrayed in the movie.
I couldn't remember
the details of the scale exactly, but I thought I remembered 56
yards. And, that's about all we can get at our airgun range. So,
I drew out a small bucket on a pine block ...
The block is a pc.
of pine about 3 1/2" square. The "movie shot" was
taken offhand. I never considered myself a great offhand shot,
but I figured I'd try. The Nautilus holds nice - it's very well
balanced.
I set the bucket out
at 56 yards. What's that look like ...?
Can you see the small
white dot under the big red arrow? Well - actually - that was
a larger block target. So - this one looks about half that size!
OK - here we go. I
pick out a few Falcons. Fill the rifle to about 1,700 psi. Strike
a pose .... Bang!
And the block flips
up into the air in two pcs.! How about that? Don't you always
do this sort of thing when there's nobody around ... ? I had called
Doc, but he was wasting the morning working ... ha ha. There's
shot #1.
Reload ... line up
.... BANG!
Another hit on the
block @ 10 o'clock.
You realize I'm hiking
back and forth and taking pics between the shots here ... right.
So, I set it up again ... hike back to the bench ... load it again
... strike another offhand pose ... BANG!
A hit! 1,2,3 shots
in a row from 56 yards with Brass Sights Offhand.
Yeah ... the bucket
moved ... ha ha ... but I had it worried!
Stuff like this is
fun when you go out for a range session. Hope you enjoyed coming
along.
More Nautilus build
pages:
Page 1:
Nautilus
Page 2:
Nautilus 2
Page
4: Nautilus Complete 8-18-04