BB guns: Excite Smart Shot lead BBs

Is this new ammo what the BB gun world has needed for years? Phill Price asks

I’ve been pestering the UK importer of H&N products, John Rothery Wholesale, for a while to bring in this new ammunition.

They’re high-quality lead BBs with a copper coating to ensure they feed well from all sorts of BB guns. They answer to what, for me, has been the biggest complaint about steel BBs – when they hit a hard surface, they ricochet in a scary way. It’s so bad my gun club, Bisley, won’t allow permit shooters to use them anywhere on their ranges.

At home, I use a large cardboard box stuffed with rags to capture and hold steel BBs and I always wear eye protection. Just one unlucky rebound could cost you your sight.

The Excite Smart Shot lead BBs are quite different. Like a lead airgun pellet, they deform on contact so they just fall to the ground. I tried them first in an ASG Dan Wesson revolver, which uses dummy bullets to hold the BBs. Sure enough, they shot well with no difficulties. The Smart Shot flattened about halfway and simply dropped to the bottom of the steel pellet catcher.

Next, I gave them a far sterner test in the form of a stick-style magazine in a Crosman PFM16. This stacks the BBs one on top of the next and feeds them from the top. If there was going to be a problem, this would be it. But to my delight, it fired a whole magazine-worth without a hitch.

This pistol uses its gas pressure more efficiently, and the Smart Shot was almost completely flattened and again, just dropped down to the bottom of the steel catcher.

I’m really pleased this new ammo works so well. It has opened up a whole world of pistols I’d previously discounted as they shot steel BBs only.

More testing will be needed to see if they suit all guns – some rely on a magnet to hold steel BBs in place, which clearly won’t work on lead – but I have great confidence this really is a new dawn for the BB gun market. Let the fun begin!

RRP: £ 7.49 per tin of 500

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