I thought some of the folks looking at this site that don’t have any experience at all with the Sportster would appreciate hearing the impressions of a new owner. I’ve got 55 years or so experience with guns so it‘s just this rifle that‘s new to me, not shooting.
I ordered the .22 lr Sportster from WalMart on 4/30/10 and it was ready for me to pick up 5/6/10...good service. The order price was $144+/- and it was around $150 after tax…about the price of a tank and a half of gas in the PU
I haven’t even seen many Sportsters/Handi’s so did a little close looking as soon as I got it home. The thing that caught my interest the most was the front sight…looks like something that would go on a weathervane…sucker is huge.
I broke it open and tried to bore sight but with the rear sight ramp maxed out it was still going to shoot low. I ran some Hoppe’s #9 through it until it was kind of clean (they must test fire at the factory…the bore was really dirty) then ran some dry patches through and Gunslicked the outside. Rained for a couple days, of course, but finally made it out today.
The groups were shot with iron sights and CCI Blazer ammo at 20 yards. The first five rounds (ever fired) through the gun are at the very bottom and were shot with a fine bead taken on the CENTER bull’s-eye. The next group up was a coarser bead with the front sight plane across the top of the rear sight and the third group with the bottom of the notch about half way down the front sight.
The four random shots were from adjusting the windage by drifting the rear sight to the side. The rear sight moves MUCH easier than any I’ve ever worked with before. A dainty tap that would have been just letting my old Winchester ‘94 know that I was going to start working on it sent the rear sight nearly out of the slot. I’d guess this rear sight will get moved side to side by any small tap when hunting or in a pack.
The group to the right of the center bulls-eye was shot at the top, right, bull with a very coarse (half way down the front sight) after adjusting the windage.
I’m not sure what configuration this rifle will end up in yet so will wait until I figure that out to do any filing/remounting of sights.
I did run a few Remington CBee shorts and a few Super Colibri’s through it and the loudest noise out of them was the click of the hammer…was really cool. Tried them in my little Ruger MKI 4” barrel pistol and they sounded nearly as loud as a standard .22 round does out of the rifle.
I’ll update once I figure out what to do with the sights and can get them adjusted to shoot some groups out further.