First gun 30 years ago

Claret_Dabbler

Well-Known Member
It just dawned on me that this day 30 years ago I got my first gun.

A BSA .22 Airsporter.

My parents gave it to me on Christmas Eve, I was 11 years old.

My friend at that time also got a break barrel BSA airgun. We hunted the parish on foot for years with these old airguns, no starling was safe.

My eldest is ten now, can't see him getting his mits on an airgun unsupervised any time soon.

Changed times.
 
I had a BSA Airsporter S .177 30 odd years ago with a Tasco 3-9x50 on it well i think it was a 50 how i loved that gun so damn accurate, head shot countless rabbits with it then traded it in for my first shotgun and still regret it to this day.:cry:
 
It`s thirty five years since i had my Webley Vulcan .177.
No tin can was safe!!
basil.
Same here except mines a .22 and it still lives under my bed and comes out a couple times a year if theres a rat in the garden, it still packs a punch after all this time not much bluing left on the poor beggar now, i keep meaning to give it a tart up one of these days.
 
Got my aya yeoman s/s 16yrs ago, aged 17. It is my game gun of choice, and I regularly use it on the clays to good effect. Was going to replace it with a 20 bore game gun last month. What was I thinking!!!!

Stu
 
Stu, funny, my Airsporter gave way for a Yeoman. I just couldn't get on with it and it was swapped for an old Miroku OU. That Miroku and a Brno 22 were the only guns I owned until I was 29 years old.
 
Hmmm In 1979 I brought my Feinwerkbau Model 127 sport (.22) with ASI 4x32 scope in a one piece Rhino mount. The rifle and scope came from Streatham Armoury the mount direct from the maker as we knew him. That complimneted the BSA Std meteor .177 I had brought a few years previously. I also had a Crossman 755 which i still have but it needs are-build as the seals and valve gave out. Well I wore them out really.

The Feinwerkbau is on it's third spring now and it's second set of seals.
 
ah those where the days hunting was so much fun then .22 airsporters 1.75x5x40 tasco scope put pay to i dont how many starlings atb paul
 
It just dawned on me that this day 30 years ago I got my first gun.

A BSA .22 Airsporter.

My parents gave it to me on Christmas Eve, I was 11 years old.

My friend at that time also got a break barrel BSA airgun. We hunted the parish on foot for years with these old airguns, no starling was safe.

My eldest is ten now, can't see him getting his mits on an airgun unsupervised any time soon.

Changed times.

Brian, my maths indicates we're exactly the same age. My first shooting experience was aged 14, with my dad's hammer action 12 bore, without 'official sanction', hunting over every farm in the neighbourhood. I well remember a bumper summer evening of so many rabbits I couldn't carry them all, at least half a mile from home as the (endangered) crow flew, traipsing over neighbours' ground, aware I wasn't supposed to be there.
All this in Northern Ireland, in the early eighties, at the height of "The Troubles". Can you even imagine a teenager having that freedom now? There would be a social worker assigned to me today and, quite possibly, a psychologist.
Happy days indeed!

Adrian
 
i used to go roost shooting with the old man with a 410 from about 9 years old , i wasnt allowed cartridges for years . He gave me a 177 vulcan when i was about 13 and after being given the talk i was allowed out on my own , when id sold enough rabbits i bought some ferrets . Summer holidays were spent fishing then potting at rabbits with my airgun or a catti , but we couldnt wait for winter . We were lucky the farmers would let us on but thinking about it rabbits got pretty thin on the ground , me and my mate never had time for video games we were out dawn till dusk nevery day , great times and the start of it all
 
BSA Meteor in 22 with Tasco sights 35 years ago and my father has still got it. Refurbished about 3 years ago and it is still accounting for rats.
Tusker.
 
In 1946 my Gran gave me a BSA Cadet I shot literally thousands of rats with that little rifle and eventually gave it to my grandson.
I will never forget the first shot with it, I hung a wooden cotton reel on the fence in front of out pre-fab, hit it, the pellet riccocheted back and cracked the living room window. Christmas morning 1946
 
In 1946 my Gran gave me a BSA Cadet I shot literally thousands of rats with that little rifle and eventually gave it to my grandson.
I will never forget the first shot with it, I hung a wooden cotton reel on the fence in front of out pre-fab, hit it, the pellet riccocheted back and cracked the living room window. Christmas morning 1946

I'll wager there was a very warm butt in the house that morning when your dad found the cracked window!
 
Bought my first shotgun the day before my 16th Birthday, nearly 47 years ago. A 10 bob note for a shotgun licence from the post office and i bought a Webley & Scott 410 bolt action shotgun.
I carried that gun every where on my pushbike and shot a load of rabbits and the occasional pheasant and duck while on my way to work on the farm.
Happy days:D.
 
34 years ago I got a Relum .22 break barrel air rifle, and was the happiest boy in the world. Many guns and rifles have come and gone since then, but none have provided more pure fun and entertainment. It had dual concentric springs you know! It had more thump than my dad's Meteor too, but was no where near as accurate, or was that just me?
 
I went straight from my dads 9mm garden gun to his12 bore 46 years ago, I only got into rifles when the rapier rather than club idea took hold when I became friends with the late Dave Theobald in the late 70s, my first air rifle was a Theoben Sirocco. I soon changed it for an updated model but it the end sold that and bought an Original 45 .177 with which I slayed an awful lot of stuff from sparrows upwards, I gave that tp a friend a few years ago and I hear it still does good work in his garden on squirrels. Fitted with a one piece Apel mount and an Optima 4x40 scope. Thats one surprisingly underrated bit of glass, still holding zero after many thousands of cycles on a spring air rifle. Mind you I had adjusted the mount so that the turret adjustments were screwed down almost as far in/down as they would go.

The first gun I bought myself was a new Laurona O/U, 12 bore, tight as hell and built with the refinement of a brick outhouse. That would have been about 1973 time, cost me 86.50 with slip and a box of 3 inch ICI boxed shells in 1 shot. Still got an odd one of those about but the Laurona was changed for a Miroku after a couple of years, much nicer.

A
 
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