Looks can be deceiving.

Went out for a quick little shooting trip today, and one would think I would be happy with two groups like this:

And I would, if those were two groups shot at 100 yards...but they aren't...it's 1 group of 6 fired at 25-yards.

The weapon in question was my new Gamo Whisper I got for Christmas, and I was trying to site it in at 25-yards. 

First, the positives.  It feels very well put together, and it's easy to load and fire.  The trigger is very crisp and smooth...impressively so.  I have no complaints with the 'gun' part of things. 

It was the optics that were the problem.  The pellet rifle came with a scope base, rings, a scope mount, and a Gamo brand 3-9 scope, with Allen wrench's to put it all together.  Everything went together smoothly at home, and within 10 shots, the pellets were going right where they were supposed to go.

I put the rifle down, and went to put some cover stickers on my target.  When I came back, my first shot was dead center, but two inches low.  Hmmmm.  Adjust, and back on target.  Two shots later, I was back to being low.  Son of a...

About the 8th time I adjusted the elevation on my scope, I noticed that the scope mount was actually 'jiggly' on the base.  And I had left the Allen wrenches at home.  Poop. 

I tightened the little screws as good as I could by hand, but the rest of my practice was somewhat unsatisfying.  I know that pellet gun can shoot 1 hole groups at 25-yards, but not when the scope was sliding back and forth a quarter of an inch in between shots.  Hence the nice horizontal alignment, but the questionable vertical repeatability.  Plus, I was using the hood of my truck as a rest.

For penetration testing, I used what I had available, which in this case was russet potatoes.  Not small ones either...I used some safety glasses to give them scale.

This is the entrance side:

And here is the exit side:

I have to say, I was pretty impressed with the through and through penetration of the potato.  It's not a small potato...about 2 inches in width, and it was still pretty hard.  The pellets I used for this testing were Gamo PBA Raptor's that came with the gun.  I have to imagine if I can get that kind of penetration on a potato, it would do on any animal I would ever think of to use it on in a responsible manner. 

As for the Whisper part of it's name...it seemed very quiet.  I really didn't have anything to compare it to.  It certainly doesn't sound like a gun, which is convenient for something that would have gun-like effect on rabbits and squirrels. 

If I can just get the scope mounting issue squared away, I think I will be pretty happy with this new toy.