Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Air Guns Nitro-Piston Rifles

Went to a gun show yesterday and saw a Benjamin Nitro new in the box. Came home and did some research and it looks like the very same rifle is sold under the Remington logo. Not unusual since Remington doesn't really make air rifles. Regardless, does anyone know anything a out these rifles?

I'm looking for a very accurate rifle under $300. Accuracy is more important than velocity, but I'd like to be able to take the occasional garden raiding varmint and winged creature who disturbs my morning news paper reading on the back deck.

I'm intriqued by the nitro piston vs the spring air, but I've also read a few reviews about this "Whisper" and Youtube has some interesting videos about that.

Thanks

Dan

I have had a .22 cal Nitro for about 3 months now. It is the older model made last year marked as Crosman(same as the current Remingtons).

Like ANY pellet rifle they have pllet prefernces. Once I found the pellets it likes, the gun will put five rounds into 1/2" groups at 25 yards from a solid feild rest.

It is also every bit as quiet as my .22 Marauder.

I would not PISS on a Gamo whisper compared to the Crosman Nitro.

GAMO is 90% marketing BS. Not quality.

The Whisper is going to be a MUCH rougher shooting gun.

The Nitros are made in the USA, more quiet and much smoother shooting.

They are also powerfull at 700 FPS for a HEAVY 22 cal pellet.

Also at $300 for a Scope mount and rifle combo, a very good deal to boot.

I'm very inexperienced with air guns, but I was offered a Gamo Whisper Nitro for testing, and I am told it is on its way.

I'll let you know what I think.

The trigger is reported to be very poor. Lots of creep and a stiff, rough pull.......I was considering one myself, but decided to go with the proven RWS M34 springer.

Well,it is a damn shame you let biased hearsay about the Nitro pistons influence your buying descision.

The ones I have actually shot do NOT have "poor" triggers,in fact they are just as good as the trigges on any field grade spring piston gun you will find out there that do not have a match grade two stage unit like the REKORDs.

There is NO way an out of the box RWS 34 will come close to shooting as smoothly or quietly as the Niro Piton rifles do.

Well what's a damn shame is you have to shell out $300+ to find out yourself. Thats what these forums are for.........your report is the FIRST good report I have heard. I have owned 34's before and have another one on it's way now. Proven performer in a nice German made gun. Not my first time around the block either.

Centershot..

Really, first good report?

The guns have been getting good reports from users ever since they came out nearly a year ago. Only a few Eurosnobs have been bashing them with no real evidience other than hearsay- just like your post above..

The Nitro piston guns have been SO successfull for Crosman they have expanded the line by about 3x this year under the Benjamin brand.

When I bought my Nirto rifle other serious airguinning friends highly recommended it to me, and the rifle was everything they said it was. No risk at all.

Yes, I spend considerable time looking at and reviewing reports. I was really wanting to go with the Benjamin version. There actually are a few here at the local Sportsmans warehouse. Reports of long, heavy, rough trigger pulls steered me to the RWS. Do a Google search on it and see what you find. Like I said before your report is the first good one I have heard. It would be great to have one to try, but when it's several hundred bucks on the line with no returns/refunds, I went with the standard. Hope it gets here soon, the chucks are out in force.

I just picked up a remington npss(made by crosman).It comes with a one year warranty against defects.This rifle seems like a solid performer so far.The trigger isn't great but it is not horrible either.Seemed like a better value than comparable rws models if you compare feature to feature.From what I heard also Crosman's customer service is outstanding, which is what swayed my to by this rifleover the rws model.Hope I made the right choice.Time will tell.

I have been shooting an RWS M34 Carbine for 17 years. It is a fine air rifle. You will be pleased with yours assuming they are still of the same quality as the older ones.

Okay, a quick Google confirmed what I thought. I think there's two issues here. But first, let me make sure we're on the same page. Is this one of the rifles in question?

http://ep.yimg.com/ca/I/airgundepot_2107_17686660

If so, good. The trigger mech looks for all the world like a Gamo product. I'd wager the rifle is likely built by Gamo. Or, perhaps in China, and a duplicate of Gamo's system. It's a proven, serviceable trigger. Nothing to set the world afire, and definitely not as nice as the typical German or British airgun. The 'Taurus' of airguns, if you will.

Okay, the second is the 'piston', which is nothing more than an pneumatic strut. Instead of a compressed metal spring shoving forward a breech seal, the compressed arm of the strut does the same thing. As there's no 'snaking' effect with the strut, as with a spring, there's naturally going to be less noise. I'd question the claim about recoil, as that strut has to come to a halt eventually, and that seems like it should mimic the same result as a spring.

Springs can be replaced, tuned, and greased. I don't think there's anything one can do to rebuild the strut, but I might be wrong.

Victor,

The Crosman NPSS rifles are made in the US and so marked. The 2010 version of that same gun are Remington branded and also made in the USA. There have been trigger tuning kits on the market for them for about 6 months.

Crosman employs 300 plus folks at their New York plant. They built most of their products right there.

You are exactly right that the basic laws of physiscs apply to ANY piston powered airgun, whether that piston happens to be powered by compressed Nitrogen as with an Air piston or with a coiled metal spring.

As Netwon stated, for every action, there is a reaction and if you are going to move a lot of air to make a powerful piston rifle, things WILL happen when you pull the trigger.

No matter how that piston is actually powered- the more ft lbs of energy the gun delivers, the heavier tyhe rifle it will need to be to dampen the movement of the piston unpon firing.

There are several solid advantages to Air or Nitro piston rifles though. As you said, there is no spring roll or torgue druing firing. Also, there is no spring fatigue if the rifle is left cocked over a period of time.

The air pison guns have a much smoother firing stroke. The firing behavior of even a $300 or less Corsman Nitro piston rivals that of tuned Euorpean spring guns that have $200 worth of tuning invested in them.

Wow, that's great to hear that you're putting your money straight to an all-American product. If it's a duplicate of the Gamo action, as I suspect, then tuning components have been out for years. So, there's lots of options there. You're quite right about the smoothness of the strut, over the spring. I've only shot a couple of them, but they are quite smooth.

I have some benefit of residing in the 'backyard' of Airguns of Arizona.

I do not know a whole lot about modern Air Guns. Can someone explain to me the differance between Air & Nitro? I'm seeing the ads for the new Benjamin Trail NP and am considering one. What really is "Nitro Piston Technology"? and are there better quality air guns on the market for roughly the same price.

"air" pistons and "nitro" pistons are the same basic thing.

The correct generic term is really a "gas ram" or "gas piston".

The air we breath here on earth is mostly Nitrogen- it is not pure oxygen.Nitrogen is a good gasd to use for those pistons due to it's stability over a wide range of enviromental conditions and the fact it is relatively inert in terms of combustion.

Match grade PCP airguns used in the Olyimics etc are actually charged with pure ntitrogen rather than ambient air due to this quality.

The Benjamin trail guns are a very good value for the money. No airgun in their price class really has any better overall build quality or basic design- plus you get the Smooth shooting qualites of the gas ram along with Crosman's great service and suppport.

The triggers can be tuned with aftermarket parts to the point that the only sporting piston gun trigger that is any better would be a Beeman/HW "record" trigger.

Thanks

Gas Rams have been out since the late 80's, long before Crosman's Nirto pistons came out. The original gas rams were devoloped by Theoben, a British air gun manufacturer and were and still are some of the best rams made. Also with the Theoben rams, they can be adjusted for power by releasing or increasing the air in the rams with a special pump. They also make aftermarket rams for select guns like HW80, Beeman R1, Webley Stingray, Exocet, BSA Supersport, Supersport XL, Lightning XL, Gamo Shadow 1000, CFX, Hunter, and several other guns, these are not adujstable.

I've had my Webley Stingray .22, and HW80 .177 (Weihrauch) both fitted with rams over 7 years ago by the U.S. Theoben distributor who by the way was Beeman's head airgunsmith. To this day, both are still shooting hard. I've taken a jack rabbit with the HW80 with a lazared 89 yard head shot, dropped right on the spot. Gotta love dem' rams.

...any report???

Bob

I would like to see a model with sights.

I purchased the Remington NPPS in 22 cal yesterday. I placed the gun in my cradle and was preparing to mount the scope when something caught my eye. I have a perfectly vertical line drawn on the opposite wall that I used to use for squaring cross hairs. What caught my eye was the reflection of that line down the center of the airgun receiver and how that line bent to the left at the junction of the barrel. That's got to make zeroing a scope a little challenging no?

I picked the gun up and sighted down the top of the receiver and sure enough, the barrel was hooking off to the left. As near as I could estimate, the axis at the muzzle was easily a half inch to the left of the receivers. I took it back to the place I purchased it and went through a total of 4 rifles to find one that was perfect. It was there but I had to look. Ironically it was the model with the Marine Corps Digital Camo pattern. I took it.

By the time I left, the sales guys at the Airgun warehouse had opened several boxes of their favorite rifles looking for alignment problems. I'm pretty sure the owners of that business are not going to be happy with me.

1 week ago I purchased an incredibly well built R9 and noticed this Remington has the same style barrel locking system. Pretty robust. I'll wring it out over the next couple of weeks and let anyone who's interested know what I think. Myself, I'm fairly critical about such things, and for a $299.99 pellet gun, it doesn't have to be a work of art, but it does have to be mechanically sound. Of course sporting the Marine Corps Digital Desert Camo Pattern, it IS a work of art!