A PERSONAL PARADIGM SHIFT, THE HUMBLE HW30S

First and foremost let’s get a few things on the table for everybody, especially those of you in the back.
-Sometimes writing about my experiences is a simple catharsis for me and in the bizarro world we live in where folks are trading toilet paper squares for 9mm rounds or vice versa I can use the catharsis……and bourbon……lots of bourbon.

-So this is written really more for me. It is long and written about an over glorified “bb gun” if you will. If you decide to read my long winded, rambling, homeless guy sounding diatribe I do hope you get something out of it, maybe a chuckle, maybe a tiny bit of knowledge, maybe a nice picture. All that said if you do not, I will happily refund every penny you paid.

-I am not a writer, a gun fighter, a cop or a meat eating, bearded tier one operator who has killed more terrorists with nothing but a stare then most 2000lb bombs have. I am just a gun geek, a shooters shooter if you will. I take great joy in everything from the mechanics, to the skills to history of shooting. I have no desire to visit violence on anything that ever had a mom. So my points of view center around the sheer pleasure of shooting.

-My skills as a shooter fall somewhere between you’ll shoot your eye out kid and the A-Team, which is to say I am what you might call a blind squirrel nut shooter, good shots happen but I’m not sure why.

So once more into the breech fair friends……

Like most red blooded American boys I grew wanting to shoot. I grew up with 80s action movies, playing cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers and “army”. I had an arsenal of toy guns and loved every minute of it. I was also lucky enough to have family who were heavily into firearms and shooting so I was lucky to learn the basics at a very young age with some very interesting firearms. While most kids learn on .22 single shot rifles my early shooting experiences involve a Colt Gold Cup, a Mac 11 and an M16, and no I don’t mean an AR15. Safety, responsibility and the raw power of firearms was also drilled into me at an early age and I still remember seeing that first watermelon explode and how much of a holy hell, these things are serious impact it left on me that I carry to this day.

So while I had actual firearm experience I didn’t grow up in a shooting household, I did however, get my first bb gun sometime in the early 80s and even though I had shot some firearms that folks today would lust over the chance to shoot, that air rifle was just so incredibly awesome to 10 or so year old me. I could go out on my back deck and fend off a green army man invasion, plink away at my leisure and just generally be the red blooded American boy I wanted to be. That rifle was a pot metal and plastic stocked lever action bb gun similar to the Red Ryder rifle. Dump about a million bbs down the muzzle loaded reservoir and go to town. It was about the most fun a 10 year old kid could have and I shot the bejezzus out of that thing.



As I grew up I got more into firearms and throughout these many years I have been blessed to own, shoot, and or experience a VAST number of firearms from 20mm to belt fed to simple .22 long rifles. For me if it has a trigger and propels a projectile safely it’s firmly in my wheelhouse.

Well eventually after many years of shooting and many firearms I decided as an adult I wanted an air gun so I could plink off my back deck again. So I did what EVERY firearm guy does when he wants an air rifle. I went down to the local largemart and found the most powerful air rifle I could find because POWWAAAA!!! Yeah I was that guy too. What I bought was an “expensive” “Beeman” .22 break barrel rifle. I put those things in quotes because the rifle was probably like $150 bucks and the “Beeman” was actually a Spanish Norica rifle and frankly it was trash. It looked nice but between the horrible trigger, the lack of true spring gun experience and rough crown and internals it was the perfect storm of crappy gun, ignorant shooter and lack of the specific skills necessary. I shot it off and on for a couple years but it was always just a toy and in NO WAY gave me any of the joy I got shooting my firearms.

After a couple years later I had learned a little bit so I decided to give it another go and ordered a CZ 631 Slavia rifle. It was very inexpensive but had a real firearm manufacturer behind it so there by the grace of God I went. The stock was a little too squared off and light and the trigger was fairly poor but the gun shot very well and was the beginning of my understanding of both techniques and accepting that I didn’t need MORE POWAAAAAA in an air rifle…….I had……you know…….actual guns for that. So that little CZ started to kindle more of a fondness and joy shooting air guns. It was vastly different then shooting my firearms but that was ok.



So a couple more years and its around 2005 and I have learned more about air guns, gained more skill shooting them and found that there was a world of high end air guns. It took me some time to digest that there were idiots out there who were dropping $300, $400 hell &700 bucks on a “bb gun” I mean what kind of idjit drops REAL GUN MONEY on a toy any self respecting American left behind at about seven years old. Well apparently that kind of idjit was me, because I had to know what the hell made an air gun worth real gun money, so I did my research and it all pointed to the Beeman R7/HW30s as the best all around air rifle to dip my toes into the water with. So I ordered a .22 caliber HW30s Deluxe……like a damn idjit.



The definition of a paradigm shift is a fundamental change in approach and or expectations. The little rifle that showed up at my door was my personal shooters paradigm shift. From the moment I unboxed this thing I was taken aback by the attention to detail, the feel, the bluing, the weight, the stock, the packaging. I had many firearms that were not nearly as nice upon first inspection. I broke the barrel and cocked the gun to load it for its first shot. Everything was so smooth and mechanically satisfying. I hadn’t even shot this thing and it was already leagues better than the average Ruger 10/22. Well SOB those idjits were on to something. So I loaded a .22 caliber pellet, took aim at my target and pulled the trigger, again paradigm shift. I was expecting the typical big box air gun feel but what I got was a satisfying thunk, a muted report and a trigger that was absolutely fabulous and was adjustable on top that. That little pellet landed dead center and I sat there gob smacked that this air gun, this toy, was more impressive to shoot then a GREAT many firearms. I mean sure firearms gave you power, repeating actions etc. etc. but for sheer pleasure which my shooting centered around anyway, this little air rifle was at the top of the class. HOLY CRAP…….I WAS GONNA BE ONE OF THOSE IDJITS!!!! And here we are many years and many high end air guns later and not only am I one of those idjits I am literally here proselytizing about it.







I have since owned a great many very nice air guns. They have largely supplanted any .22 LR shooting I would do. I quite literally enjoy them as much or more then my firearms. They are not a replacement, but they are an immensely enjoyable separate but similar shooting experience. They come with their own pride of ownership, their own skillsets and their own simple joys. They are similar in nature to how black powder shooting is its own similar yet completely different subset of shooting.

I have had that little HW30s for 15 or 16 years now and I was shooting it last night and it is just as satisfying in every way as the day I bought it. The action is buttery smooth, it is far more accurate then troglodyte behind the trigger and most of all it still brings the same joy. I still own a vast number of firearms, I still shoot a vast number of firearms, I still love owning and shooting a vast number of firearms but that little HW30s in .22 was my personal paradigm shift into the world of REAL air guns and I couldn’t be happier I took that plunge so many years ago and I am a better idjit because of it.

As always take care, shoot safe and maybe try some new things every once in a while sometimes the most ridiculous sounding things might end up being some of the most satisfying experiences of your life. I mean PEANUT BUTTER STOUT!!!!! Who’d a thunk, :P but I digress.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: parabellum,

Is the HW30s still made?

Sounds like a good place to start in they cry once buy once vein.

HK Ag

Yes it is and yes it is.

Thank you for the very enjoyable read. I had a Beeman P1 pistol some years ago that I foolishly sold to fund something else. So I knew when you mentioned them that you’d be talking about high quality. I will put that rifle model on my short list.

Nice air rifle, clsinger.

RWS Diana 34 here. Death on the squirrels in my backyard.

You had me at Bourbon.
Try a Bourbon barrel stout if you have a chance. I recommend Bourbon County from Goose Island.

Long story short- Years ago, My father had a problem with those "GD Lizards". He was in southern Florida and the iguanas were all over the place, messing things up. I got him a real nice Beeman .177 pump. When I first gave it to him, my father looked at me like I was an idiot and said "what the hell am I going to do with that? Do you think I'm 10?". Well, in the 1st box was a pith helmet, I put the hat on his head, and called him "The Great White Hunter", and told him to have at it with the lizards. He was hesitant at first, but a few weeks later, I got a call from him saying it was the best gift he got since he was a kid.

He'd spend his mornings on the deck with a cup of coffee, the crossword puzzle and his lil plinker. I believe before he died, he was well in the 300+ range for lizard kills, I forgot how many "wounded, presumed dead". (He kept a running tally on a small chalk board by the door to the deck)

Every once and a while, I'll go down there to check up on the property. One of ten neighbors still remembers him and I. I laughed when he said a few years after my Dads death "Man, there sure are a lot more of those goddammed lizards around."

Now I have it, (and half of his "real" guns) and I gotta say, I shoot that pellet gun probably more than any other gun I have. They are fun lil toys!!!

Nice rifle.
Enjoyed reading this and I understand the special feeling that can be had with an accurate, well made air rifle.
My R7 was a pawn shop find, without sights, years ago.
It's still a fantastic rifle.

R7 was my first air rifle, I now have three. Amazing accuracy. Have a range setup in the basement to make the Winter go faster. Nice write up.

Reviving an old thread because the HW30s is THAT GOOD!

Yes….yes it still is.

So, I owe you for my HW97K that I bought due to your write-up of the joys of the HW95. It hasn't been the unalloyed joy that I'd hoped, partly because it is much heavier than I expected, but mostly because my skills are much less than desired. Now I come to find out that I bought the wrong HW. Thanks, thanks a lot!

Well hell If you want light weight and easier to shoot you want the HW30.

I should get a royalty check.

Seriously though. Shooting a spring gun well is difficult to master, more so for us gun folk who already have learned to shoot real rifles. The light hold and letting it recoil is counter-intuitive to us. That 97K is a laser if you do your part but yes she is heavy.