Beeman P17

[Toolmaker]

 Well, I went on vacation and this pistol followed me home from Bass Pro Shops. $48 bucks and change out the door. I opted for the version with the red dot but unfortunately the red dot is junk. I removed it right away and mounted a Bushnell Trophy red dot. The pistol is a Chinese clone of the Beeman P3 / HW40 German made pistol. It is a SSP (single stroke pneumatic), ie; one pump per shot. It takes a fair amount of force to close when cocking. It has no recoil. It's fairly quiet, just makes a quick "pop" when fired. It's not "powerful", it's made for plinking and paper punching. The balance and overall feel are great. It's made mostly of plastic but the quality seems good. The barrel, trigger, pump / valve and other working parts are metal.

 Everything you've already read about the P17 is true.
1) This thing is FUN to shoot!
2) One pump delivers 400 fps.
3) The trigger is nice. It's an adjustable 2 stage. It does have some creep in the 2nd stage but for a factory (cheap) trigger it's not bad.
4) Accurate. I was getting nickel sized groups at 10 meters (rested) this morning.
5) This thing is FUN to shoot.

 I tried Crosman Destroyer EX, CPHP, Daisy hollow points, Daisy wadcutters, Beeman hollow points, RWS basic, and RWS Meister's. It liked the RWS pellets the best. The Beeman HP's and Daisy wad's are OK. It does NOT like any of the Crosman pellets I tried. They wouldn't hold a pattern at all.

 Here are some chrony strings:

Crosman Destroyer EX: 400.3, 401.9, 403.1, 403.2, 403.0
                          CPHP: 389.1, 387.9, 390.8, 397.2, 391.2
                  RWS Basic: 393.5, 400.0, 393.2, 396.4, 386.4
                 RWS Meist.: 358.8, 359.5, 356, 351.3, 298, 311, 347.3, 295.3*

*Now for the BAD     If you notice that last chrony string is getting slower. This was accompanied by a slight burning rubber smell. I believe the piston O-ring has failed. It only has 125-150 shots through it at this point. It will be an easy fix. It's disappointing but not unexpected for it to fail so soon. Other reviews I've read had similar experiences. I'll replace the O-rings with better quality stuff and be back to shooting soon!

[JonnyReb]

 Thanks for the review Matt, you about covered it all. Just curious but did you say this gun uses Orings for it's compression seal?

  Bought my brother one of these a few years ago and i'll agree, it's about the most fun for the money you can buy, no CO2 and no pumping but still very respectable power. Accurate as you said, for a pistol anyways and best of all i love the design and grip, fits me perfect.  J

[northern lights]

I just got mine a couple of week ago an really enjoy matter of fact got two for price of one r&l supply send me a free one cause the first one was bad. I found out know to fix it. He said keep it as a spare. they are great gun for the money an good accuraccy for a pistol . size is perfect for a pistol not some big cannon. enjoy