Ruger Air Hawk .177 Review

Overall Rating

Beautiful hardwood stock
Excellent fit and finish
highly accurate
excellent trigger
very good open sights
very affordable price

Scope mount will not hold up to recoil. Needs a one piece mount.

The Early Scoop

The Ruger Air hawk is a chinese made airgun imported by Umarex that bears Ruger's brand name with an advertised muzzle velocity of 1,000 f.p.s. in .177cal. It is rumered to be made by BAM (Xisco) for Umarex. They have a reputation for making some of the best chinese made guns out there. The rifle comes packaged in a polybag wth foam blocks supporting the muzzle and the butt of the rifle. Also included in the box was the waranty information, the usual warnings, a 4x32 scope, owners manual, and an advertisement for the Umarex Baby Desert Eagle air pistol, Smith and Wesson air pistols, and RWS Superpoint Extra pellets. Right out of the box I noticed the fit and finish of the rifle is very good. Probably the best I've seen on a rifle in it's price range ($99 with 4x32 scope). The stock has a very beautiful dark finish to it with no noticable flaws, or dings. The blueing is also better than expected for a rifle in it's price range. While not on par with a high end RWS or Beeman gold series, It's on par with Gamo, and the lower end Beeman models but better than the Daisy Powerline 1000 or the Crosman Quest 1000/800. The saftey is automatic and is located at the rear of the compression chamber similar to the RWS design. The open sights are high quality fiber optic sights. The front sight is attached to the muzzle break. It appears to be the same muzzle break and front sight as on the RWS Model 34 Panther which makes scense as Umarex imports them both. However, like the first production run of the RWS 34 Panther, the front sight is lacking a protective globe like on the Gamo CFX or the Gamo Whisper. So while this is not a sore point for me, because I baby my rifles, one would have to be careful in the field as the right bump could break the fragil acrilic rod on the front sight. The rear sight mostly plastic with fiber optic inserts with click adjustments. It has very crisp autible feedback. A big plus for you open sight shooters. There is a dovetail mount on the compression chamber for mounting a scope. The scope that comes with it is kind of a cheapie but does have very crisp autible clicks on it so we shall see how it performs. It has the standard cheap aluminum mounts that seem to come on a lot of breakbarrels nowadays. With no scope stop, I doubt if it will stand up to the recoil. One would probably have to get a elevated scope rail with a hole for a scope stop pin and a one piece scope mount with scope stop pin to prevent scope creep. The rifle weighs aproximetly 8.16 lbs with an overall length of 44.8 inches and a barrel length of 18.7 inches and an advertised cocking effort of 30 lbs but feels closer to 40 lbs. Despite the large size, it seems to balance very nicely and is very easy to shoulder and hold steady. The Breakbarrel has a ball bearing to lock the barrel and barrel lock up is good and tight. The trigger and trigger guard is made of plastic but seems to be quite tough and has an adjustment screw right in front of the blade to adjust the first stage, with a hole in the guard for easy access. While the plastic trigger might be a turn off for some, I'll take a good light predictable trigger that's plastic over a heavy, creepy, unpredictable metal one any day. The trigger on mine was excellent right out of the box. With almost no weight to the first stage and the second stage being very light, very clean and was also very easy to tell the 2 stages apart. Best yet, it breaks exactly the same every single time so this trigger is very predictable. There was very little overtravel as well. I have not adjusted it since it seems right about perfect for me. Dare I say it rivals the accutrigger on my Savage .17 HMR rimfire. This trigger appears to be a copy of the RWS T05 trigger and they did a very good job of copying it. This is buy far the best trigger on an air rifle in this price range. Better than Crosman, way better than the Daisy Powerline 1000 trigger which feels like your pulling a 20 lb weight, better than Beeman, and thousands of times better than Gamo's creepy, unpredictable trigger.

Shooting

Before I started the target testing, I tightened all the stock screws. I also cleaned the barrel with a .177 cleaning kit. I fired a hundred pellets through it to give it ample time for any deasiling to stop and the rifle to settle down. For the 10 meter open sight testing, I chose a number of pellets including RWS Meisterkugeln, RWS Superdome, RWS Super-H points, and Crosman Destroyer pellets. I swabbed out the barrel afer every type of pellet to insure consistant data between different pellet types. Unfortunately, my chronny is on the fritz so true velocity numbers will have to wait. Right from the start I could tell it was going to be accurate. With the Crosman Destroyers proving to be the most accurate. Let me start off by saying I suck shooting open sights. My vission prevents me from focusing properly on the sights and target at the same time but I did my best. At 10 meters, I took 3, 5 shot strings, and all pellets went into a group the size of a dime. Any flyers were my fault. The firing cycle is quite surprisingly pleasant with very little spring twang but more of a solid thunk. The cocking cycle is equally good for a rifle in this price range, having a very fluid metalic feeling without any scraping or play in the compression chamber. For the 20 meter testing, I mounted the stock scope but swapped out the cheap aluminum rings for a one piece adjustable steel scope mount with duel scope stop pins. Although there isn't a hole for a scope stop pin in the compression chamber, this mount clamps on with such force, that nothing short of a beeting with a hammer will make it shift. I can't strip out the screws on it no mater how much tourque I apply to them. The little hex wrench will break first. Unfortunately I can't give you the name of the base as it doesn't have a name anywhere on it and it was installed by an airgunsmith on a custom Gamo Shadow 1000 several years ago and has stoop up to even the dreaded Webely Patriot without a scope stop. The adjustable scope mount allows me to adjust for windage and compensate for barrel droop, allowing me to use the full range of adjustments on the scope. After adjusting the base, I proceeded to shoot 3, 5 shot groups from the kneeling position. All of which were around 1/2 of an inch but on all of them, 3 of the shots would just about go through the same hole or cloverleaf with the remaining 2 shots opening up the group (my fault). As for power, it's definately there. Fot fun, i shot some Crosman Silver Eagle lead free hollow points and they went supersonic with a distinct crack. I would estimate the velocity for the 7.9 grain Crosman Destroyers to be in the mid to upper 800 fps range. I decided to take it to work one day and have some fun with it out behind the shop. At 35 yards I got about a 1/2 inch group with a slight crosswind. My boss and I were shooting walnuts (about 1 inch wide) off the dumpster and consistently nailing them one after the other.

Conclusion

Overall This rifle can't be beat for it's beautiful hardwood stock, excellent fit and finish, smooth firing cycle, good accuracy, and outstanding trigger. If you have been wanting to get the RWS model 34 but have held off because of funds, this is the gun for you. For the price it simply cannot be beat. It shoots as well as guns costing many times more than it. This is bar none, the best rifle for it's price made today.

Members' Comments onpatgreen123's Review

• coldwarvet202 on 23rd Nov 2008

  This review contained a lot of detail. Was very informative. Thanks!

• fenian on 22nd Aug 2009

  I found this review very helpful because of the wealth of details. PatGreen123 is apparently a very experienced air-gunner and the depth of his review rivals many of those published in enthusiasts' magazines. His set-up tips were also greatly appreciated.