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BSA’s Firebird

By Tom Gaylord

We were given the opportunity to test this package for you, and also to have a close look at a remarkable new air rifle from the British firm of BSA. The company is well-known for their spring rifles. Indeed, in 1906, it was BSA that built the first air rifle that could be described as both precision and adult. Since then, they have established an enviable reputation for making fine spring-piston air guns. But the Firebird we test in this issue is a precharged gun &emdash; not a springer. And, it is a very different type of precharged rifle at that. Several years ago, pneumaticist John Bowkett faxed me the results of a brand new air valve he was working on. It worked efficiently with very little air, so the rifle did not need a large tubular reservoir. John was testing it at both the UK legal limit of 12 foot-pounds and at a higher level for possible American use. That work eventually matured into the airgun now known as the BSA Spitfire &emdash; a PCP that looks like a conventional break barrel spring rifle. The air reservoir is concealed by the stock, which means the lines of the rifle are sleek and streamlined, and the barrel actually tips down for loading. In England, the Spitfire is refilled from a small 200cc air bottle thats easily carried into the field. Therefore, you have a rifle with a conservative air valve and a ready supply of air for many more shots (over 100) in a very compact package. Its a super gun for the Brits, but not many Americans will buy a 12 foot-pound gun, so the power had to be increased for export models. And the company also made an upgraded model with the same valving &emdash; the Firebird. The new Firebird has essentially the same valve as the Spitfire, but the rifle cocks via a short underlever that also opens BSAs rotating breech for loading. The American version of the Firebird is rated at about 18 foot-pounds in .22 caliber, which makes it a good hunting rifle. And it is quiet! The permanently attached sound moderator on the end of the barrel reduces the pneumatic pop to a quiet report. I would compare it to a Sheridan Blue Streak shooting with two pumps of air.

SETTING UP
     This is a package deal, so some assembly is required. Since the Firebird comes without sights, Compasseco includes their Tech Force 3-12-power variable scope. It has a 40mm objective lens and a one-inch tube. We’ve tested this scope in the past and found it to be bright, crisp and a good value for the money. A rugged design with modern coated optics elevates this scope to the class of glass that typically retails for twice what Compasseco charges for these house-brand products. The mounts are B-Square non-adjustable rings with dovetails made especially for the oversized BSA dovetailed base. They have a scope-stop pin built in, but because a PCP doesnt recoil, it is not needed. Nor is there a place for it on the Firebirds base, which created a small problem. B-Square made the mount with a reversible pin to fit scope-stop holes of different diameters, but you must select one of them. Since the Firebird base has no place for this pin to go, the mount would not fit on the rifle. From the picture it looks like the smaller-diameter pin might just fit inside the steel Allen capscrew head on the BSA base, but it doesnt. And the pin is necessary to the integrity of the ring; it cannot be installed without it. So I ground off the small end and everything fit fine. It turns out there was supposed to be another pin without a stop included in the package, but we must have gotten an older one that was not made for PCP guns.

SIGHTING IN
     Sighting-in an airgun is easy if you know the secret. You don’t need fancy equipment like collimators. All you need to do is fire one shot at a target just 10 feet away (you can do this as long as you wear safety glasses) to see where the gun is shooting. Airgun scopes adjust so close that the target will not appear too blurry. After the one shot, you will know how to adjust the scope for 10 meters. Bear in mind that the separation of the bore axis and optical axis is so pronounced at 10 feet that you should expect the pellet to strike at least 3 inches low. This rifle was on paper and well-centered with the first shot, so I backed up and finished sighting in with 4 more shots. Now it was time to see how well the rifle grouped. Except I couldnt! The BSA Firebird is so accurate that all the pellets went into the same hole at 10 meters, and that hole is too small to measure. Ill guess the five Webley Lazadomes went into a group measuring about 0.005 inches, but who knows? You have to back up much farther to see how well this rifle really groups. If the gun is on the point of aim at 10 meters, I expect it to be back on at 35 yards with an 18 foot-pound rifle. Theres no magic to this &emdash; just knowing where the trajectory places the pellet at various distances. The results I got at that distance, though, were magic. The Firebird really wants to shoot! Starting with the Lazadomes I used during sight-in, the rifle shot several groups under a half-inch at 35 yards. Then, by relaxing completely and waiting until there was no perceptible breath of air, I managed to shoot a group that measured just 0.339 inches across the widest OUTSIDE diameter. Subtract 0.22 to get a center-to-center spread of only 0.119 inches!

     Sometimes a rifle will really do well with one pellet but not others, so I switched to Crosman Premiers at the same distance. The point of impact changed a little, but the groups were equally tight. This time, I was already settled down, and it wasnt long before I came up with a 5-shot group measuring 0.069 inches!! Now, at that level of precision, I cannot guarantee the accuracy of my group measurements to the nearest thousandth of an inch. If this were a half-inch group, I would feel more comfortable, knowing that there is little difference between 0.495 inches and 0.505 inches. But at less than 7 HUNDREDTHS of an inch, you have to allow for some amount of slop. The point is &emdash; these groups are all wee teeny holes! Since Duane Sorenson of Compasseco recommended that I try Beeman Crow Magnum pellets in the gun, I shot them next. I didn’t expect to get super-tight groups from them because I have always found their accuracy diminishes after 25 yards. So in the brief time I had remaining at the range, I placed out a single target at 30 yards and gave it the old college try. The group I got speaks for itself.

FILLING THE GUN WITH AIR
     As mentioned earlier, the Brits fill their Firebirds and Spitfires from a separate 200cc air bottle. Compasseco did not even offer this bottle as an option when we tested the package. The only way to fill the test rifle was with the new BSA hand pump. It may look like a simple bicycle pump but dont be fooled. This machine can generate air pressure in excess of 3,500 pounds per square inch (psi), something all the bicycle pumps in the world cannot do. It resembles the hand pump from Sweden sold under several names, but this unit is both larger and several pounds heavier. And, as I mentioned, it can go to 3,500 psi, where the Swedish pump stops at 3,000. Since the Firebird can take a fill of 232 bar (3,410.4 psi), it may stump many shooters who only have 3,000-psi scuba tanks. You can fill to 3,000, but that means you lose shots with each fill. Fortunately, the BSA hand pump can go to 3,500 psi, which means you can get every shot the gun has to offer &emdash; which turns out to be a lot, as we will shortly see. The pump comes with an air hose that ends in a probe made to fit the BSA rifle fill port. The probe is a quick-disconnect device that simply slips into the fill port. Before disconnecting, you bleed off the high-pressure air in the line, then pull it out - no tools required. The pump works like any manual pump, but when the pressure builds above 2,000 psi, it becomes increasingly harder to pump. You certainly dont pump with your arms, only! You lock your elbows and flex your knees, letting your entire body weight come straight down on the pump handle to overcome the increasing resistance. For those of us who have extra weight to throw around, it works easily enough; but for smaller-framed men or women, a manual pump can be difficult and even impossible to use. I have seen men rest their entire weight of 135 lbs. on a pump handle without success. And, in this respect, the BSA pump is harder to operate than the Swedish pump because it goes to a higher pressure, which means more resistance. Consider that when thinking about the Firebird. Of course, adaptors can be made for any scuba tank to connect directly to the rifle, but as of press time, Compasseco did not offer one.

How many pump strokes does it take to pressurize the gun? Well, for starters, you dont begin at zero. You stop shooting the rifle when the velocity falls off too far to be of use. In practical terms, that means there will be about 1,500 psi of air pressure remaining in the gun. You leave it in there at all times, never allowing the gun to be unpressurized! Leaving a PCP rifle pressurized keeps the valves closed against airborne contamination, thus ensuring a long life for the seals. Leave it empty and the seals can be ruined in a very short time. As for the number of pumps it takes, plan on about 1.5 strokes per shot. If you shoot 35 shots (yes, you will get that many on a 3,500 psi fill), youll replace the air with 53 pump strokes. You dont count the strokes, though. You watch the pressure gauge on the base of the pump and stop when the pressure reads about 3,500 psi. When the air hose and pump are bled, the guns intake valve seals itself against air loss. It is perfectly permissible to leave the gun fully pressurized all the time, too. After filling the gun, you turn the brass screw at the base of the pump to bleed the air hose of high pressure, which also gets rid of any water the pump has separated from the air. The BSA pump is designed to remove a large measure of water vapor from the air it compresses. When you bleed the air hose after filling, this water is blown out of the pump by the escaping blast of air. Then simply pull the fill probe out of the port and close the port cover to keep it clean &emdash; the rifle is ready to shoot.

SHOOTING THE FIREBIRD - READ THIS SECTION CAREFULLY!
     Usually when I test an air rifle through a chronograph, I like to see a maximum velocity spread (difference between the fastest and slowest shots observed) of about 20 feet per second (f.p.s.) in a 10-shot string. The Firebird did not give the small velocity separation Ive come to expect, BUT &emdash; and this is important &emdash; it out-grouped almost every rifle I have ever tested at the shooting range! Think about that as you read the following tables.

DETERMINING THE MAXIMUM NUMBER OF SHOTS PER AIR FILL
     The first test was to determine how many useful shots were available per fill. This is done using a single pellet type and shooting all rounds through a chronograph to measure their velocity. I use an Oehler model 35P chronograph for all my tests. This instrument is the most widely accepted chronograph in the shooting sports and is the only one that actually combines TWO chronograph circuits in the same instrument. That gives a dual reading (two velocities from two different chronograph circuits) for the purpose of checking the fidelity of the primary instrument reading. I shot the Firebird with Beeman Kodiak pellets lightly oiled with FP-10. The rifle was filled to 3,500 psi for this experiment. I watched the velocity readings to see when the rifle began to give lower velocities.

Shot 1 626 f.p.s.
Shot 5 616 f.p.s.
Shot 10 623 f.p.s.
Shot 15 640 f.p.s.
Shot 20 625 f.p.s.
Shot 25 601 f.p.s.
Shot 30 635 f.p.s.
Shot 35 621 f.p.s.

     After shot 35, the velocity began to drop off more noticeably, though there were still a few shots above 600 f.p.s. Shot 38 (614 f.p.s.) was the last shot above 600, and from there the drop-off was nearly linear. So our test Firebird has a total of 35 usable shots per fill. HOWEVER &emdash; shot number 6 went 659 f.p.s., the fastest shot observed, while shot number 24 only managed 593 f.p.s. So, within the group of usable shots, the velocity with Beeman Kodiak pellets varied by an extreme of 66 f.p.s. Normally, that wide a spread would suggest less-than-optimum accuracy, but NOT WITH THE FIREBIRD! Have another look at those targets! Remember, small game does not ask what velocity the pellet is traveling when you hit the kill zone. Chronographs are marvelous tools, as long as you know how to apply the information. When a rifle shoots as well as our test Firebird, you dont spend a lot of time worrying about the numbers. Use the chrono to determine the number of useful shots or the muzzle energy and leave it at that. Following the basic testing to determine the maximum number of shots, I looked at the performance of several of the more accurate pellets.

     .22-caliber BSA Firebird PCP air rifle Muzzle 1' from the start screen 76F Oehler 35P chronograph All strings were 10 shots

Crosman Premier, 14.3 grains
High 781 f.p.s.
Low 769 f.p.s.
Average 776 f.p.s.
Extreme spread 12 f.p.s.
Standard deviation 3 f.p.s.
Muzzle energy 19.13 ft.-lbs. (foot-pounds)

Webley Lazadome, 15.8 grains
High 760 f.p.s.
Average 751 f.p.s.
Low 737 f.p.s.
Extreme spread 23 f.p.s.
Standard deviation 7 f.p.s.
Muzzle energy 19.13 ft.-lbs. (foot-pounds)

Beeman Crow Magnum, 18.5 grains
High 663 f.p.s.
Average 650 f.p.s.
Low 636 f.p.s.
Extreme spread 27 f.p.s.
Standard deviation 8 f.p.s.
Muzzle energy 17.36 ft.-lbs. (foot-pounds)

From these results, it seems the Firebird we tested was more comfortable with lighter pellets. As the weight increased, the extreme velocity spread did also. And Crosman Premiers, which were the lightest pellets we tested in the rifle, gave both the tightest groups AND the tightest velocity spread. Having said that, however, I must still observe that the Firebird really groups well with all pellets tested, regardless of the velocity figures.

IMPRESSIONS

The rifle
     The Firebird is a large air rifle. It stretches just less than 49 inches muzzle to butt, and the stock is profiled both wide and tall. Much of that length is due to the sound moderator on the end of the barrel. The weight of 8.5 lbs. with scope is surprisingly light, especially since the size of the package makes it seem like more. Actually, A Beeman R1 spring rifle with open sights is heavier. The stock is smooth and finished with a satin finish that reflects all light diffusely. There is no checkering and the cheekpiece is only vestigial, not unlike a Gamo stock. The wood is stained medium brown and shows very little grain. A honeycombed dark rubber buttpad keeps the rifle in place on your shoulder or when leaned against the wall in the corner. The trigger is well-positioned and relatively light, though there is sometimes a bit of creep in the second stage. It is adjustable for second-stage pull-weight via a single tiny Allen screw set into the top of the blade. I adjusted ours down to just under 3 lbs., which I find to be a good sporting weight. Loading is relatively easy. When the rifle is cocked by pulling down on the short underlever, the rotating breech turns to expose the breech. The rotating block has a smooth groove cut into it to help align a pellet with the breech to make it easier to load the gun. The only hang up I found is that domed pellets sometimes flip over on their noses and try to go in the barrel tail-first. A bit of technique can be developed to overcome this tendency, and loading becomes quite simple. Because the Firebird has a fixed barrel, the shooter can mount a huge scope without interference. Just remember to leave enough clearance at the breech to load. The phenomenal accuracy of the rifle makes it a candidate for a go-to airgun. You know &emdash; the one gun you use when the chips are down. Ignore the chronograph and revel in the knowledge that here is a gun that will place the shot exactly where the crosshairs intersect!

The scope and mounts
     Its hard to say enough good things about the Tech Force sporting and target scopes. I have tested a good many of them over the years, and we keep several in stock to mount on all our test airguns. They are well-made and, perhaps, represent the best value in optical sighting equipment today. The variable scope I tested on the Firebird is particularly well-suited to a hunting air rifle. It is relatively small and lightweight, yet it provides a clear, bright picture of the target. The mounts are fine, despite the stop-pin situation. But they are non-adjustable and, as such, you must use the internal scope adjustments to move the strike of the round. I prefer an adjustable mount, so I can save the scopes internal adjustments for the really fine work. But in a package like this, these mounts are good and they will certainly do the job.

The BSA hand pump
     I happen to prefer hand pumps over scuba tanks, so I’m very fond of this new powerful model from BSA. If I owned one, I would have someone like Airhog or Air Rifle Specialists make me a bunch of adaptors to fit all my PCP guns. BUT &emdash; the pump is not for everyone. At airgun shows, I meet many shooters who say they got into PCP guns to avoid the extra hassle of cocking a spring gun. These folks are not going to want to pump up a PCP, no matter how much money they may save in dive shop fees. Still, I must evaluate the BSA pump on its own merits, and there it shines. I find this pump to be everything needed in a manual high-pressure air pump. It appears to be rugged and well-made and it was completely reliable during our test. There is nothing not to like.

Compasseco BSA Firebird package

BSA Firebird
.22-caliber precharged pneumatic air rifle
Pro - Extremely accurate, good power, many shots, adjustable trigger, easy to cock, very streamlined for a PCP, handles many pellets well.
Con - None.

BSA manual pump
Pro - Rugged, well-made, compresses air to 3,500 psi.
Con - May be difficult to use for small men and women.

Tech Force scope
3-12 power by 40mm with a one-inch tube
Pro - Crisp and clear, parallax adjustment to less tham 10 meters, coated optics and good weather sealing, repeatable adjustments, quarter-minute clicks.
Con - None.

B-Square non-adjustable BSA scope mount
2-piece mount with 1-inch rings
Pro - Rugged, sized to fit the larger BSA dovetails.
Con - No pin without a scope-stop was included in our package.

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