Pneumatic air rifles have come a long way over the past 50 years, and Umarex has thrown down its own “Gauntlet” in the crowded airgun marketplace.
Famed writer of yesteryear, Robert Ruark, wrote a book entitled Use Enough Gun… On Hunting Big Game. I’m a proponent of the concept, most of the time. Sometimes, there’s sound reason for going in under-gunned. When it comes to pest control in my garage; less is more. That’s where the Umarex Gauntlet .25 caliber PCP comes in handy.
To be quite frank, it’s been 25 years since I last tested and reviewed an air rifle. It’s been a breath of fresh air, pun intended, to handle a pneumatic weapon again. It takes me back to the days when I had to peddle my 10-speed — Crosman 760 strapped to the handlebars — to the woods to hunt just about anything.
Life on the farm presents a host of opportunities, and a lot of them come in the form of pest control. Feed and seed stored in the barn is a magnet for rats and mice, and the opportunistic air gunner can spend hours “on the hunt” for these vermin. I typically plant between a half to three-quarters of a ton of winter wheat each fall, and I like to buy it when prices are lower. That means storing it for a while. Some years are worse than others for mice and rats, and this past summer was one of the worst. It only took a week before the vermin found the 50-pound bags of seed and started helping themselves.
“I traded the 1911 for the Gauntlet pellet rifle that was sitting on a shelf and proceeded to solve the problem without shooting any more holes in my new garage.”
My friend in the big brown truck delivered a new Umarex .25 caliber Gauntlet Pre-Charged Pneumatic (PCP) air rifle just in time to exact some revenge on the now-fat mice and rats living in and around my barn. Rifle in hand, I climbed into the loft and got comfortable on a camp chair. Resting the rifle on a rail, I didn’t have long to wait for the first mouse to dart across the dirt floor toward the pile of heavy brown paper bags. He stopped at an already chewed hole that had some grain scattered in front of it. The big .25 caliber pellet wrecked his day. Over the next two hours a half dozen mice repeated the same mistake as the first and ended up in the same perforated condition.
When the action seemed to slow, for some reason I started scanning the overhead beams to stem my boredom. At the far end of the barn high in the rafters some movement caught my attention. I stared at the spot and couldn’t pick anything out of the shadows. I reached into my pocket and clicked on my Surefire light and shined it into the dark space. A turkey nest-destroying opossum glared back at me, having disturbed his nap. I trained the light on the beady-eyed varmint while planting the crosshairs just below his toothy grin and squeezed off a shot. That motivated him to leave his perch. I shot him again… mostly because the gun wasn’t empty yet… but the first shot would have been adequate.
Round 2
My wife gets excited when she gets surprised by varmints in the garage. I still chuckle about her getting cornered by an errant armadillo, but that’s another story. The poor gal has to start her day early to make an hour’s commute into Nashville during the work week. One morning last summer, she got an unwelcome surprise. Walking into the garage, a cup of coffee in each hand, she had to walk close to our chest freezer along the back wall to get to her car. We keep the cat food in a foot-square plastic bin sitting atop the freezer to hopefully thwart varmints from strolling in and snagging a free meal.
It didn’t work out as planned. As she walked by the freezer, out popped a growling, fat ‘possum jaws wide to hiss at her with his cat-food breath. The unearthly sounds emanating from my garage that morning managed to startle both sleeping Labrador retrievers inside the house. A 1911 in hand, we all charged from the house to my wife’s rescue.
The tables turned, I calmly convinced my wife to stop yelling at the ‘possum while the dogs took over keeping the toothy devil treed in the cat food dish. I traded the 1911 for the Gauntlet pellet rifle that was sitting on a shelf and proceeded to solve the problem without shooting any more holes in my new garage. That’s actually a challenge, since I’ve had on numerous occasions to run ‘possums, coons and armadillos out of the garage before blasting away so pass-through shots don’t put holes in things that should remain hole-less. A powerful pellet rifle fits the bill nicely.
Gun Details
This Gauntlet is available as a kit, which includes all of the essentials to jump into PCP airgunning. In addition to the rifle, it includes an Axeon 4-16×44 scope with rings to affix it to the rifle. It has an 11mm rail that’s standard size for .22 rimfire claw mount, making optics mounting easy.
The Gauntlet sits alone atop the heap of PCP airguns when its sub-$300 price is applied to the calculus of its components. Combine its .25 caliber barrel and its shot-to-shot regulator and it’s a tough pairing to beat.
This airgun’s barrel measures 28 ½ inches, and the overall length stretches to 46 ¾. The barrel is a sleeved, integrally suppressed tube that’s not much larger in diameter than many other airgun barrels. Noise suppression works well shot after shot, and is quite comparable to a .22 LR rimfire shooting sub-sonic loads.
The stock profile is interesting, to say the least, and its non-traditional look makes one think that Buck Rogers and Captain Kirk got together with some Italian gun engineers to come up with its design. That’s not a bad thing, just different than what I grew up shooting as a kid. Its design does work well, though. It hides the air tank well, isn’t flimsy feeling for its weight and is well balanced. It carries well in the hand or slung over a shoulder.
To charge the 13 cubic-inch tank a hand pump was supplied to take it to 3,000 psi, and connects via a Foster quick-connect fitting. For convenience in the field, the tank’s pressure can be bled off a with a supplied pressure release key so another fully-charged tank can be swapped.
The Gauntlet’s .25 caliber 8-shot magazine will take a bit of fumbling with for those of us who are allergic to instruction manuals. Once I got the hang of it and learned that the first pellet loaded worked as a spring stop to keep the magazine’s internal spring wound, it was quick and easy to reload.
Like any magazine-fed gun, purchasing extra magazines will keep you shooting longer between reloads. With this particular rifle, four magazines seems about right, as it’ll be time to recharge the tank and reload magazines to keep it running at an optimum performance level. A minimal accuracy bump can be achieved by using a single-shot sled to reduce potential damage to soft lead pellets.
Close-Range Work
To get an idea of the Gauntlet’s accuracy capabilities, an inexpensive Simmons 3-9x scope was mounted for firing at targets placed at 25 yards. Velocity data was collected with an Oehler 35P chronograph placed one foot from the muzzle. Two 10-shot groups were fired with each pellet tested, and pellets were visually inspected to cull damaged ones prior to loading the magazine. The smallest group with each pellet tested was used in the following information.
The Umarex Gauntlet .25 caliber achieved a maximum muzzle velocity of 876 fps with 25.39-grain JSB Exact King pellets, which seemed to be its favorite. The smallest group recorded produced a single ragged hole measuring 0.355 inches.
SPECIFICATIONS
- Manufacturer: Umarex
- Model: Gauntlet
- Caliber: 25 Pellets
- Type: PCP (Pre-Charged Pneumatic)
- Capacity: 8-shot magazine
- Gun Price: $300
- Kit Price: $495 (w/ scope & pump)
Haendler & Natermann’s (H&N) Crow Magnum .25 Cal, 26.23-grain hollow-point averaged 859 fps. The smallest group measured 0.771 inches.
H&N’s Field Target Trophy.25 Caliber was the lightest and fastest, weighing 19.91 grains and averaging 940 fps. Groups opened up with the pellet, with the smallest group measuring 0.942-inch.
Benjamin Sheridan BD225 .25 Caliber is a 27.9-grain domed pellet that should prove to be a good hunting projectile. It averaged 845 fps, and accuracy was excellent at 0.648 of an inch.
The best hunting pellet tested is going to be a tossup between the JSB Exact King and the Benjamin BD225. The JSB was the most accurate by a significant margin, but the slightly heavier BD225 may provide deeper penetration.
To give a good reflection of the shot-to-shot consistency of the Umarex Gauntlet the tank was topped off and the JSB Exact King pellet was fired… again… and again… and again… across the Oehler 35P chronograph. The velocity stayed within 6 fps of the average of 876 fps for 26 shot before beginning a downward curve in its velocity. At that point the velocity drop was about 9 fps each shot until 50 shots were fired.
The .25 caliber Gauntlet, as tested, came as a kit that included and hand pump and scope. The last time I checked, this “kit” could be purchased on Amazon for $495 with free shipping. The rifle alone can be found for about $300. Check the Amazon for current prices on the rifle.
If you’re like me – turned loose on the world at 8 years old with a Daisy Red Rider and a yellow-and-black tube of BBs – the Umarex Gauntlet is a great adult version air rifle that will provide a welcome trip back down memory lane. Whether or not you are new to air rifles or not, this PCP will provide hours of low-cost shooting fun.
PERFORMANCE
| Manufacturer | Make | Weight | Velocity | Accuracy |
| JSB | Exact King | 25.39 | 876 | 0.355 |
| H&N | Crow Magnum | 26.23 | 859 | 0.771 |
| H&N | Field Target Trophy | 19.91 | 940 | 0.942 |
| Benjamin Sheridan | BD225 | 27.9 | 845 | 0.648 |
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