In part 2 on the Air Venturi Bronco Target Pro, we’re going to look a bit more into the shooting cycle and how to get the most out of our little airgun. It does not shoot hard, but you don’t need “hard” to punch holes in paper, which is exactly what the Bronco was designed to do. Let’s jump right in.
How does it shoot?
The shooting cycle of the Bronco is about as gentle as they come. There’s very little felt recoil and only just a little bit of twang or buzz. My Bronco came to me this way. Normally, after I’m done with my initial review, I’ll tune any spring gun that I intend on keeping. I’ve never taken the screws out of my Bronco. It’s as stock as the day I took it out of the box.
Air Venturi Bronco – Target Pro ModelI’ve had my Target Pro Bronco for a few years and I love shooting it as it seems to cleans my shooting palate. Anytime I’m feeling a bit out of sorts with my hold or I’m not getting the results I would expect from a particular airgun, I’ll pick up the Bronco and send a few shots down range. That’s usually all it takes to “reset” my trigger finger and I’m back in the game.
What’s really nice about this rifle is how easy it is for just about anyone to shoot, especially youngsters, which brings me to another point. I mentioned in part 1 that I was getting 575 FPS with the Predator GTO Match Grade pellets. These are a lead free specialty pellet that provides match grade accuracy. This means that as my daughter gets a bit older, I won’t mind her handling and loading her own pellets. These lead free pellets have been adopted by many public shooting programs as they are safe for children to handle, yet allow the teams to still remain very competitive. This is a good thing.
Shooting at 10 yards with the Target Pro
I shot several 10 meter cards just to get a handle on what my sight picture needs to be each time I pull the trigger. I tried several different pellets and kept coming back to the GTO pellets. They were one of the most accurate and the extra bit of velocity seemed to let them cut cleaner holes in the paper.
Shooting at 10 yards with open sights is always a real challenge for me. There’s a reason that I almost always have a scope mounted to my airguns. My eyesight just doesn’t allow me to shoot with open sights and get the kind of accuracy that I know a rifle is capable of getting. Well, that’s generally the case. The peep sight on the Target Pro seems to help make up the difference for my eyesight. I bet if they came out with smaller apertures and a modular front globe setup, they’d have something even more special than then already have. I’ll have to send in my “hay can you do this” suggestion card to Air Venturi.
Air Venturi Bronco Front SightThe results
Please note that I am shooting from a rest. I haven’t taken the time to teach myself the art of shooting free hand… yet. My goal is to demonstrate how well the product performs, not how well I can shoot. Anyway, let me try to give you an idea of what I see when I look down the sights. When I look down the sights, I have to pick and choose what’s going to be in focus for me. Fortunately the rear peep sight helps a little bit with this and I’m able to see the inside diameter of the peep sight along with the front globe and post pretty clearly. At 10 yards away, I see a dark spot with what may or may not be a tiny red dot in the middle. The front ramp is as wide as the entire black bullseye on the 10 meter target that I’m shooting at. My goal is to simply hold the globe as equidistant to the inside diameter of the peep sight as possible, while aligning the front ramp across the middle of the black “smudge” of a bullseye down range. Then I hold my breath and as smoothly as possible, I squeeze the trigger. I hear the “plink” and then move on to the next bullseye. I don’t know where I’ve hit until I walk up and look at the target.
Air Venturi Bronco Rear SightAfter a bit of practice and a minor sight adjustment. I started getting what I considered to be very good groups (for me) with open sights. In this shot card I had 4 out of 5 shots touching the red. I’m very happy with those results.
10 Yard results with the Air Venturi Bronco Target Pro with Predator GTO PelletsWhat I love about shooting the Bronco is that I don’t know how I’ve done until I walk up and actually look. This is both frustrating and a lot of fun all at the same time. At least it is for me. I don’t know that I’ll ever give up my little Bronco. Well, maybe I’d give it to my daughter when she gets old enough to handle it. I’m really going to have to think about that one.
