weihrauch hw 40 pca /beeman p3 review

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Picture courtesy of George Woolhouse.

Average Ratings

Value for Money	9.3/10
Reviewer Rating	9.3/10
Overall Rating	9.2/10

96% Recommended22 out of 23 Reviews

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By jes437 on 21st Nov 2007

jes437's Ratings

Value for money	8/10
Overall value	9/10
jes437's recommendation

Good Points

Consistently accurate.
Virtually no recoil.
Good scope of adjustment on rear sight.
Superb trigger for price level.

Bad Points

Less than perfect cocking action (but you do get used to it)
Grip feels a little 'soapy'.
Unnecessary decoration.
Trigger guard clearance could be better

General Comments

I wanted a reliable gun which would allow all year outdoor shooting, my co2 pistols' performance has waned with the onset of Winter weather, and this one made me curious after a lengthy handling in the gun shop. I'd gone in there to look at true target air pistols, but this became an attractive and far less costly step to take.

Starting with the negative, that handling session was necessary because on first glances the gun is difficult to take seriously. There's been some attempt at jazzing it up with false features, which in my mind is both a little toy-like, and wholly unnecessary. There's a slide release lever where you'd expect to find it on an ACP style weapon, coupled with a magazine/clip (?) button forward of the grip. Various other slots, grooves and steps give the gun an aggressive appearance from a distance, but the solid moulded in nature of these features just comes across as a bit lame really in the hand. This is exacerbated by the fact that as an air weapon at this price, it's a good one! In my mind the exterior of the gun could have been designed with something bolder and more confident looking, something made for it's own reasons, rather than hiding behind the pastiche we are presented with.

Ignoring all of that, let's just pretend that we are only looking at the sights to the target. In this condition a couple of things come to the fore. Firstly, it's fitted with light optic sight aids. Sections of round clear plastic serve as collectors of ambient light which is concentrated when viewing the sections end on. In effect what would be painted dots on regular open sights are illuminated on this gun, in fact rather brightly it must be said. The jury is out with me on this one, as it's demanded a change of sighting practice. Normally one focuses on the foresight, but I find the bright red dot that the foresight has become, seems to be difficult to isolate from the other elements, and the yellow 'lights' on the rear sight blur out the top of the notch sides. However, my shooting is no more or less accurate, so it's different, rather than worse or better in results, but it is easier to line up three illuminated dots than it is to judge gaps, as needed on regular sights.

Arming the pistol requires a release of the pseudo hammer to allow the top of the gun to open up, hinged from the muzzle end, by a very accurate piece of pinning that has no slop in the movement at all. The very simple air cylinder is exposed along with the barrel which resides in the top of the lifted section. The gun has no spring like a regular air pistol at this level would have, it uses a single stroke action, the closing of the gun, to compress the air in the cylinder to a high pressure ready to be released by a valve. As the gun is open fully there's a pleasant little hiss as the cylinder sucks in air ready to be compressed. With the top still fully open the pellet is inserted in the barrel, this can be a bit tricky to start with as there's not much room for positioning a pellet. Like a lot of things you just get used to it though, which includes the closing and pressurising of the gun, which can be awkward. You have to avoid pushing down on your finely adjusted sights, and if you were to pinch your skin in there it would smart somewhat!

Effectively we've now pre-charged the gun, and like the PCP weapons sharing this term, the trigger need only operate a valve. Rather than disengaging heavy sears you'd find on a springer. So I guess there is, effectively, an internal hammer which needs only to tap a valve for a split second to release the air. Before you can do that though a slide operating safety switch needs to be moved to fire, as it automatically engages when the gun is cocked. As a right handed person I can declare here that for once the left handers have the advantage. If held in the left hand this safety can be operated by the trigger finger without adjusting your grip on the gun, us right handers need to use the left hand on the safety to remain gripping the gun normally.

There's a well weighted first stage to the trigger, enough to allow fine positioning of the trigger finger by testing the movement. The second stage is lighter than one might imagine, I would say perfect for me, it's adjustable, but I've had no need to change it, it has the right relationship with the first stage, and is light enough with very little creep to be sure of when it's going to fire, yet heavy enough to prevent premature release. The trigger on this gun is superb, the guard around it less so, as I find my finger can rub on the lower section, a little more clearance there would have been good. There's an odd lump in this part of the guard just forward of your finger, as soon as the warranty is out the files are coming out! The charged air releases with a satisfying crack, a mixture of the valve being opened and the muzzle noise. There is a cursory compensator type set of grooves on the muzzle, but I suspect these are more misdirected cosmetics rather than functional.

With the pellet on it's way now the gun shows itself to be capable of placing pellets in the same place, with comforting reliability. To date JSB Exact's 4.52's are the best I've tried. With 20mm groups possible for me at 10M there's no doubt that the 175mm barrel is delivering pellets the same way time after time. The fact that it may only be a sub 3 foot/pound gun is academic in starter target shooting, so long as it's consistently accurate we only want to hole the paper target, not kill it!

I found with cheaper pellets, that may have dimensional variances, that the odd 'flyers' were quiet frequent. So I guess it could be said that the gun is intolerant of pellet type. With a lower powered pistol the effects of a misshaped or over/under sized pellet are going to be more pronounced. However, if you're going to enjoy the benefits of this gun why risk losing that for a few micro pence per pellet? Buy decent ones and the benefits will outweigh the costs if you're after nailing that bullseye, if you're more into knocking cans off walls then this is less of an issue, but remember that quality lubricated pellets are going to look after your gun better whatever you're aiming at.

By now, after loading and firing one shot, my hands will have started to slide around on the grip. The plastic is fine from an engineering point of view, very well moulded indeed, but not nice to hold. It gets warm very quickly, and with little in the way of surface friction available it does get to feel sort of soapy after a while. I found an ultra slim golf glove to be the answer, if a little stoopid looking!

So, wearing my silly golf gloves I've had loads of fun with this one. Firing it indoors in the warm, or outdoors on a cold day high up on the moors at our club range, it fires well. So objective one achieved.

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