UNDERLEVER BELIEVER

Few things are more pleasurable in airgunning than submitting to the exquisite torment of choosing a new rifle, and surely there’s nothing more tortuous than deciding which underlever you want.

We’ll pore over magazine and YouTube reviews, ask the opinion of people we know – and many more that we don’t through faceless internet forums – and often descend into a spiral of indecision.

Fixed-barrel springers have an advantage over break-barrels as they do not rely on mechanisms to hold the barrel still once cocked. And yet underlevers, and to an even greater extent sidelever springers, are few and far between.

The options for a new, full-power underlever spring rifle are somewhat limited, although that’s not to say choosing one is necessarily easier. It really comes down to a rivalry between just two manufacturers – Air Arms and Weihrauch – the best of Britain and Germany.

It couldn’t be any other way I suppose. Yes, there are alternatives. However the superb Walther LGU has been discontinued and Diana’s equally impressive 460 Magnum seems hard to get hold of, at least here in the UK.

So that’s the manufacturers sorted then. Now to the rifles themselves, and that’s where things get a little more difficult. In the Air Arms camp your choice is either the Pro Sport or the TX200 Mk III, which, for