Gamo Silent Cat Air Rifle - .177 Caliber Break Barrel Pellet Gun with Noise Dampening Technology | Ideal for Backyard Target Practice, Pest Control & Small Game Hunting

I just got a Crosman Fury: Even though it's a piston and not a springer it still is hold sensitive. Making sure to put my fingers on the stock exactly the same each shot I'm better with the Fury the first day than with my Gamo Silent Cat after 3 months!I still love my Silent Cat, but the Fury is: heavy metal and well built; 4x scope not 3x; no iron sights but no iron sights to interfere with the view through the scope; the barrel is smaller so most pellets have to be pushed in not just dropped in loosely; tap to break barrel open and a bit harder to cock; nicer trigger; the noise is an old fashioned air pop instead of a spring twang so it's louder than the Cat but way, way easier to bullseye over and over with any pellet I choose, even cheap Destroyers! All for half the price of the Gamo! I love both, but the Gamo is for silent 4am de-raccooning of my roof, while the Fury is for bullseyes on paper indoors.PELLET TEST UPDATE: 30’ (measured with a tape measure and no rest). I tried:Benjamin Hunting Hollow Points (750 tin of domed hollow point)Beeman Silver Arrow (pointed, huge 11.5g)Crosman Premier Hollow PointsGamo Bone Collector (domed hollow point)Crosman Premier Super Match (flat top wadcutter)Diablo Basic (green tin of flat top wadcutter)Crosman Wadcutter Premium Grade (tin of 250, premium not premier)Gamo Red Fire (red polymer plastic spiked tip)Crosman DestroyerCrosman Destroyer EXGamo Tomahawk30 year old flat top (Crosman or Daisy) wadcutters I found in a drawerPLUS: a bunch of other pointed and evil looking hunting pellets I had laying around.FIRST THE BAD: Gamo Tomahawk, Destroyer, Destroyer EX were all pretty horrible. The Destroyer EX were slightly better than the regular Destroyer, but just barely. There were a bunch of pointed pellets I had that were also horrible. The only pointed pellet that did okay were the crazy Gamo Red Flame pellets with the red plastic tip. They were pretty darn good actually! They fit REALLY tight into the barrel, which I think is a good thing.THE BETTER: The only pellet I had that did (a smidge better) than the Gamo Red Flame were the Crosman Premier Hollow Points. These are domed hunting pellets with a hollowed out point. I still wasn’t pleased, and I actually found a handful of 30 YEAR OLD Crosman (or Daisy) flat top wadcutters which were AWESOME (in comparison). So I ordered a bunch of flat top wadcutters to test up against the Crosman Premier Hollow Points.THE BEST SO FAR: Here is where it gets weird. After testing 7 different pellets with two different holding styles (more or less artillery hold) I have a clear winner, a clear second place that is not really for accuracy and a few different pellets that either win 3rd place or don’t depending on how I hold this rifle.WINNER: The Benjamin hunting hollow points (in the 750 pellet tin) was by FAR the best pellet. Twice in a row I shot 5 pellets and ALL 5 PELLET HOLES IN THE PAPER TARGET TOUCHED! This is a domed hunting pellet with a hollow point. You can’t argue with 5 holes all touching on the paper target with no rest at 30 feet using two different rifle holding techniques and no rest either time.SECOND PLACE: this is a weird one. The Beeman Silver Arrow 11.5g pellets are HUGE, long pellets that are really heavy. Each single shot of these looks like two holes touching because either the pellets go sideways or are tearing the paper (they’re pointed for killing and NOT flat wadcutters for cutting clean circular wads of paper out of paper targets). I shot them into some wood and they are NOT going sideways. They’re just beasts that shred the paper. If you’re going to kill a raccoon or something I’d use these: they’re accurate and devastating. The tears in the paper make it hard to tell what exactly is going on: shredded bullseye after two shots. LOL. I think the points of impact may be wider than some of the third place winners, but only slightly. In an animal you WANT this type of tearing for an instant kill. For paper targets it’s just a mess. Two shots and it looks like the target got hit by a shotgun. Neat, but hard to tell precision-wise what is going on exactly.THIRD PLACE: Crosman Premier Super Match (flat top wadcutters) won with the most touching holes both times with different holds.POSSIBLE THIRD/FOURTH PLACE DEPENDING ON HOLD OF RIFLE: Crosman Premier Hollow Points either came in third or worst depending on hold. Gamo Bone Collector and Diablo Basic (green tin wadcutters) either came in fourth or last depending on hold. Depending on how YOU hold your Whisper Cat you may do better with a Bone Collector or Diablo Basic than MY third place Crosman Premier Super Match. In fact three large raccoons were dispatched at 4am using this rifle and Gamo Bone Collectors (after owning this rifle for less than 2 days and not having shot pellet/bbs in the past 20 years or so). ANOTHER aside about the Bone Collector: unlike the photo somebody posted showing a merely bent penny, I actually SHATTERED A PENNY INTO TWO PIECES with a Gamo Bone Collector Pellet at 30 feet.Stay away from my “First the Bad” list and anything that is pointed (except for Red Flame which were pretty awesome and left nice wadcutter type circular holes in paper). I’d Concentrate on trying:Benjamin hunting hollow points (in the 750 pellet tin)Crosman Premier Super Match (flat top wadcutters)Gamo Bone CollectorDiablo Basic (in the green tin can)If you need to kill something large, go for the Beeman Silver Arrows, they just make a SHREDDED MESS of the paper targets, so it’s not as much fun for precision. If a wild boar or grizzly broke into my house and I could only shoot it once with a pellet it would TOTALLY be the Beeman Silver Arrows. I think I’d end up using the rifle as a club quickly afterwards, but at least the first shot would be the worst for the beast. LOL.WHAT’S NEXT: Well, I planned on buying a bunch more flat top wadcutters to test against what I ASSUMED would be the winners of the testing when I opened up all these tins of pellets today. Now, I’m not so sure. I still want to try a bunch of fancier wadcutters (the ones made in Germany) but I’m thinking I should be testing more domed and domed hollow points.I lined up the pellet tins in a row and started at one end used each one. Then I changed my hold and started at the other end and went backwards. I fired 5 pellets each. On a few if I had an obvious flyer that was either weird or totally just my fault I’d take a 6th shot. I did this all very quickly, and I did NOT adjust the scope or where I was firing. I just aimed at the bullseye center and shot 5. It was the grouping (closeness) of the holes in the paper that I cared about, not if I was high or low or left or right. With all of that any and every time I used the Benjamin HP (750 per tin) ALL THE HOLES IN THE TARGET TOUCHED!The BEEMAN Silver ARROW 11.5g pellets aways shredded the target with touching shredded ragged holes after two or three shots making it difficult to tell where the last two or three shots went (but they went through the original shredded shots).ALL FIVE of the Benjamin HP (750 per tin) holes on the target touched and could fit within two of the Silver Arrow holes. The Crosman Premier Super Match and Premier Hollow Points *may* mostly fit into an almost as small area, but both that 1 or 2 flyers outside the main group every time. Even when I took 6 shots they spread out a little more on the paper.Still love this rifle!There are 3 less raccoons in my neighborhood. Domed Gamo Bone Collector pellets are accurate and can punch almost all the way through a 2x4. My shoulder muscle has gotten used to cocking it so no ringing arm/hand syndrome. It doesnt smoke anymore and I'm STILL USING THE ORIGINAL SCOPE WHICH IS DEADLY ACCURATE x 3.EDIT: found higher scope mount rings.Millett See-thru weaver-style 1" .22 smooth SE00014. Let's me use iron sights and scope on my Gamo Silent Cat. I have to take the scope covers off so they don't block the iron sights.The iron sights are also set to almost their lowest setting. I could easily get more clearance if I added shims under the scope tube before I dropped it onto the bottom of the rings (Before clamping the tops on).To keep the scope from sliding backwards after each shot I just jammed a brass screw into the scope stop hole (see my photos). It still worked after about 100 shots: iron sights work close, scope works and doesn't creep and 95% of the obstruction from the silencer and iron sights is gone!The ultra light weight pellets that come with this rifle go so fast they break the sound barrier and crack like a real rifle.I've ordered some super heavy 11.5 pellets. Update: shot number two was with Beeman Silver Arrow 11.57g pellets and it was so quiet all you could hear was the spring twang.The iron sights show in the scope a little and the scope is too low to allow you to use the iron sights with it on. There are probably higher mount rings available that would raise the scope. My old ten pump daisy is set up that way now.PYRAMYD AIR shipped it and it arrived THE SAME DAY!!!!! I live close by in Michigan though.Buy heavier ammo for quieter and more accurate shooting.After the two shots outside I took it in my basement and marked off 30 feet with a tape measure. In the sitting position the scope was to the right, I adjusted and 2nd and 3rd shots were closer. The 2nd shot had a lot of smoke come out (friction of spring ignites extra lube in the compression chamber and it made a lot of smoke--I was kind of freaked out). 3rd shot smoked only a little. 4th shot (after adjusting scope again) was dead center and no smoke. I STOOD UP and freehand shot the rifle and the 5th shot actually went through the hole of the 4th shot.I called it a GREAT NIGHT and went to bed (happy).I'm ordering a bi-pod off Amazon cheap (just for kicks) and am searching for the ever elusive 11mm dovetail extra high scope mount rings with the SEE-THRU holes that will (hopefully) let me use the scope and the sights at the same time.YES: the scope gets in the way of the sights. Normally I wouldn't care but the sights have cool fiber optic thingies that seem fun. I might just buy a regular set of extra tall mounts and drill a big hole in each one on my drill press.Oh the RECOIL! I shot actual firearms (real guns with real bullets): Ar-15, Ruger 10/22, Savage 22, Glock 19, S&W .357. All of those guns except for the .357 have no recoil--only muzzle rise. The .357 stings my hand.....THIS GAMO stings my hands just a little and my face. These springers have forward and backward recoil like slapping your hand on a table top real hard: ringing. LOL! I read about that but I didn't believe it.About the smoke coming out: 9 out of 10 people on message boards say it's normal, their rifles still smoke after 2000 shots, you can't do anything about it because opening the gun kills the warranty,etc. Then there's always that 1 guy that says even once smoking (or dieseling as they call it) means the gun is destroyed. Well: shots 2 and 3 smoked. 4 didn't and 5th went through the same hole as 4th even though I moved from sitting to standing. I'm not (overly) worried.Oh, indoor shots 1-5 were Gamo bone collectors. I chose them because they're a good medium weight 7.xxg and thought they'd be easier during break-in/sighting indoors than those INSANE Platinum PBA they give you 50 of.***I fired two shots (a Platinum PBA & Beeman Silver Arrow 11.5g)outside plus the 5 indoors (7.xg Bone Collectors) and the smoke was almost all gone***My other pellet rifle is a 20 year old 10-pump Crossman with no recoil ;)Oh: unlike the Crossman 10-pumps you can ONLY use pellets in this Gamo (no BBs).We'll see if I can find elevated see-thru mount rings or the scope rattles to pieces first. I actually liked the scope, it's not as nice as my Nikon scope I (got free) and slapped on my old ten pump but its fine for now.Also just realized: I never ran a cleaning cloth thru the barrel before shooting. I was just so excited! Probably couldn't hurt to put a dry cloth through the barrel to get rid of any manufacturing gunk. Order and try lots of pellets and remember that a change in pellets (and thus weight) will mean you'll have to re-adjust the sights/scope.FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!-mike from DetroitThis is my observations and opinion on the "Gamo Silent Cat" in .177 cal(iber). Make sure you understand what I'm saying.The "Silent Cat" looks cooler than it shoots, but maybe thats because I'm spoiled from shooting my "Savage 93R17 Btvs". The "Savage 93R17 Btvs" is SUPER ACCURATE as long as you have a good and steady rest and if you can shoot. If your loooking for THE MOST ACCURATE .177 cal than get a 17HMR, because I can shoot a quater (25 cents) at 150 yards/meters EVERY SHOT, and thats NO JOKE! If your a good shot than you can shoot a squirrel at 300 yards, NO PROBLEM, with a "Savage 93R17 Btvs."Pros - The "Gamo Silent Cat" looks VERY cool, the pellets/ammo is very inexpensive, its very quiet if you shoot lead pellets because the lead pellets shoots at around 1,000 fps (feet per second) which makes it SUBSONIC and doesnt break the sound barrier (over ~1,100 fps and it makes a "cracking noise" and it is alot louder). I like that I can shoot pellets JUST UNDER the speed of sound because its alot quieter and it still has as much impact power as it can get, if you know what I mean. BUT the LIGHTER "PBA PLATINUM" pellets shoots around 1,250 fps and makes a "cracking noise" and I'm sure that would "spook" the small game that your hunting. I like the "noise dampener"/suppressor because it looks way cool and its supposed to reduce the noise by (allegedly) 52%. Also I like it because its a good "grip" to hold onto when cocking the gun. I like how the guns stock looks "tactical". I have NOT used the iron sights (yet) but its good quality with BRIGHT fiber optics, making it better for low light shooting. If you buy the "Gamo Silent Cat", don't expect to get groups less than 4 inches at 50 yards, but most of the pellet guns in this price range will be the same, I think.Cons - So far I've only shoot about 50 pellets through the gun, and most (real) guns shoot better after 100-150 rounds/bullets (its called "breaking in the barrel"). At about 20 yards/meters I could only get like 2 inch groups, but I'm hoping that after I shoot another 100 pellets or so the accuracy/grouping will get better. I don't really like the scope that it came with and in the future I'm going to put a 3-9x power scope with an AO (Adjustable Objective) lens. I'm hoping a better scope will increase my accuracy.Overall -If your looking for a pellet gun that looks REALLY COOL and is inexpensive, QUIET and have as much power as possible without going "SUPERSONIC" (and supersonic means its going to make the "CRACKING NOISE") Id reccomend this pellet gun if you plan on shooting under 50 yards or so. I think its a good deal. But I belive that because the scope is NOT directly mounted to the barrel, its NOT going to be as accurate. If the barrel doesn't lock EXACTLY back into place than its going to effect your accuracy. I'm thinking about getting a .22 cal pellet gun that is powered by commpressed air, and you fill up the guns "tank" with a scuba tank and if you do it that way, than the barrel and scope will be fixed in place and be more accurate. Also I shot a friends .22 cal pellet gun (like 7 years ago) and it was VERY acccurate and I think it was more accurate because it was NOT a break barrel type. My friends .22 cal pellet gun had a big LEVER on the side that you would use to cock/pressurize the gun, and the scope and barrel was FIXED to eachother. You would just need to cock the lever ONCE on my friends .22 cal pellet gun, unlike MY FIRST bb guns when I was a kid and I'd pump it like 6-10 times to get it to go 600fps or whatever.I'm glad that I bought the "Gamo Silent Cat" because for the money its a good deal. But what I'm thinking is upgrading to something more accurate, like I said, and let my buddies use my "Silent Cat" and hunt together. BUT I'll have the more accurate gun after I upgrade.As I said, I've only shot about 50 pellets through my Silent Cat so far because the BUGS were killing me, and I'm just telling you guys my opinions and observations. Also think about getting a .22 cal pellet gun if you want more hitting power, but the .22 cal pellets/rounds cost a little more money.Id rate the Silent Cat a 6.5 out of 10. 1 being really bad and 10 being really good. Its good for the money, but if you have plenty of money than spend like $400 on THE MOST ACCURATE .177 cal, which is the 17HMR that I talked about. But the 17HMR is going to be alot LOUDER because it shoots the bullets over 2,400 fps, and the ammo for a 17HMR is NOT cheap but its worth the money for sure. So these are things to consider.And if your a kid (under 16 or so) and your parents don't want you to have a pellet gun than think about getting into PAINTBALL AND/OR AIRSOFT because they are SUPER FUN and as long as you and your friends have the proper safty equipment, like a FULL FACE MASK, than you can shoot at eachother. Just treat EVERY gun as if it were loaded and don't point the barrel at anything you don't plan on shooting. And keep your finger off the trigger until your ready to fire.God bless and keep it safe.______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________EDIT on July 25th 2012 or 7/25/12(I don't know how savvy of a shooter you are so I'm going write like I'm talking to noobs.)I took my "Gamo Silent Cat" out today and it performed alot better. I shot about 80 rounds (of JUST the GAMO Hunter .177) today and I've changed my opinion about the gun. The scope is NOT as bad as I first thought and a 4X (Power) scope is decent for the "GAMO Silent Cat" because it does the job. For example, your NOT going to put a 6-20X (Power) scope on a "Daisy Red Rider" because even if you put a 6-20X (Power) scope on the "Red Rider" and zoomed all the way to the 20X (Power) and you tried to take a shot at 200 yards/meters, it won't make much of a differece in your accuracy, AND thats if the "Red Rider" could even shoot that far, HAHA. But for the "GAMO Silent Cat" I think a 3-9X (Power) scope with an AO (Adjustable Objecctive) lens would increase your accuracy because this gun can shoot MUCH BETTER than a "Daisy Red Rider". Like I said, I'm going to put a 3-9X scope with an AO lens, but I need to get my check/money first.BUT I noticed that the "heavy" trigger pull on the "GAMO Silent Cat" pushed some of my shots "off target" a little bit. My FAVORITE trigger is called the "AccuTrigger" which "Savage Arms" makes. The AccuTrigger is VERY SAFE and has a SUPER LIGHT trigger that can be (made) as light as 1.5-2 pounds of pressure! Any experienced target shooter will tell you that a lighter trigger equals more accurate and consistant shots. Also if your looking to see how accurate your (pellet) gun can shoot than it requires a VERY STEADY REST (Bi-pods work good) with sandbags. If you do it that way than your gun and scope is going to be COMPLETELY STILL, which means ACCURACY! If you have THE MOST ACCURATE .177 cal (like) the 17HMR and take a STANDING shot at 150 yards (with NO REST) than your shots are going to be ALL OVER THE PLACE even though the 17HMR gun could EASILY shoot 2 inch groups at 150 yards with a proper rest like sandbags and a light trigger.At the moment I am NOT a member of a gun club/shooting range and I've ONLY taken my "GAMO Silent Cat" into the woods (just) TWICE and took my shots on a "zipper type" guitar case filled with lots of paper that I got from the package that Amazon sent me. If I was at a gun range and had sandbags and a more powerful scope with a lighter trigger I believe that the "GAMO Silent Cat" could (easily) shoot 1-2 inch groups at 30 yards or maybe better (especially if you found the perfect pellets that works best with your gun).With that being said, I'll get to the point. Like I said I was shooting in the woods in NOT perfect target shooting conditions and my FIRST THREE SHOTS AT 20 YARDS was LESS THAN A 1/2 INCH GROUP! BUT it was NOT a bullseye because I was in the process of getting the Silent Cat "scoped in", BUT it was still 0.5 inch group at 20 yards.My next 4 shots at 20 yards (on a different target but the same type) THREE of the 4 pellets were touching eachother. Thats about a 1/4 inch group AT 20 YARDS! But the 4th pellet was just under an inch away, and that could be because of the "heavy" trigger pull on the "Silent Cat".The other 5 targets that I shot at averaged about 1 inch at 20 yards. But I believe that the others grouped in at about 1 inch (at 20 yards) was because the trigger is a little too heavy and I didn't have the best rest for my gun.I bet if GAMO could make/copy a trigger like the "AccuTrigger" and put a 3-9X scope with an AO lens on the "Silent Cat" than people would spend more money on it because it would be more accurate. I think a fair PRICE for the "Silent Cat #2" with the mentioned upgrades would be like $210 or $220 after shipping.On a scale of 1-10, when I first wrote the review I gave the "GAMO Silent Cat" a 6.5, but I think its worthy of a 7-8 (if only they would put on a better scope and put on a trigger like the AccuTrigger.).I'm still getting used to this pellet gun because I've only shot about 120 pellets through it.Keep it safe and keep on shooting!God bless the WHOLE WORLD!Love the cheap price of the ammo and the extremely easy cleaning. Not quite silent, but way quieter than any unaltered gun. Very accurate, right out if the box at over 100 feet. Loading the small pellets between shots can be a nightmare when it is cold, definitely cannot do it with gloves. A pen feeder is a must.