I am a Marine Corps vet, old school and some might say "country as fried chicken," but when I unboxed the Crosman ST-1, I just stared a minute. The appearance of the ST-1 is unlike any air gun I have ever handled. The black-and-white color scheme and space-age look are reminiscent of a sci-fi "shock troop." I am happy to report that you too can be a "storm trooper" in your backyard (and your accuracy will be significantly better than that of your average fictional white-armor-clad bad-guy).
Let’s cover the features and specs first.
- Select fire for semi auto and fully auto
- Powered by CO2 cartridges (2 at a time)
- Ammo is .177 BBs (and lots of them)
- Magazine fed, reservoir holds 300 or so and the mag will reload from that to up to 25 in the slot.
- Sight is Red dot that is included
- Weight is 5.3 pounds
There is a quad rail on the gun, a removable barrel to turn it into more of a large pistol and an adjustable stock. The grip is like that on AR-type rifles.
Overview
I may or may not have shot this gun more than any other gun I have reviewed in quite a while. Ahem.
First, the ST-1 was easy to assemble. The red dot sight was simple to install and sight-in as well. It uses a 2032 battery and has two settings depending on the light you have to shoot in. The CO2 cartridges go into the magazine and the slots are marked FIRST on one so you know which to install each time before the other. There is a hex key that fits in the magazine to get this job done. The BBs are easy to pour in the magazine reservoir, and the cover is easy to work as well. No fumbling around there.
I did not use many BBs to get the gun sighted in, but I wanted to, because it's such a pleasure to shoot. Cans are great targets out to about 50 feet with consistency. I did shoot some targets to get it sighted in and accuracy is what you would expect out of a gun that sends BBs downrange at 430 feet per second (fps). A few BBs from time to time might go slinging off to the left or right, but most are hitting the can every time or a group of about 2 inches with reliability at that range.
Function and Mechanics
When firing the gun on semiautomatic I found that I could get close to 200 BBs out of the pair of CO2 cartridges many times. One of the things I noticed at the tail end of my CO2 power was that the gun would “burp” a few BBs at a time or fail to cycle the bolt. It was not an issue with me, but I knew for sure at that point the CO2 needed to be changed out. I also noticed that if I shot slower and purposefully at cans and did not just fire at will as fast as I could, the CO2 cartridges lasted longer.
Fully auto firing ripped through the CO2 cartridges and power disappeared closer to 100-120 BBs for me while testing. Of course everyone wants to burn up targets on fully auto, and it is fun. I rarely used my rifle on burst while in the Marine Corps, but I remembered the fun when I shot this BB gun on auto. The cans were punished!
The gun shoots very well at a reasonable pace on semiautomatic and even with a few mags fired on fully auto. I was happy with the way I was able to have fun with it. It's a BB gun; it's not loud. I think a suburban homeowner with a large backyard that is fenced or bordered by bushes would have no issues having a ton of fun with this gun as long as you have a good backstop like a dirt pile. As with any airgun, keep in mind, BBs can bounce.
Possible tweaks?
The end of the bolt handle is a tad sharp when releasing it in a hurry. The magazine is hard to tell when the slot has 25 BBs in it although I am not sure how that can be fixed given how small BBs are. Finally, if the “burping” of a few BBs is able to be rectified that would be nice, but it is not at all a deal breaker in my opinion. It is simply an indication you are low on CO2.
Pros
Did I mention it's fun? Because it's fun. The sight is quite good. The ergonomics of the gun are good minus that sharp outer edge of the bolt handle. The mag holds a lot of BBs and the CO2 lasts a reasonable amount of time. Soda cans get ripped up by the gun. Heavy soup cans get pummeled, but not pierced often. Perfect powerlevel in my book to avoid worrying about ripping up things too badly. For more information, visit Crosman.com.
