The Brocock Enigma An excellent hunting carbine from the UK gets a workout before heading afield.                                      Jim Chapman

I had been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Brocock Enigma ever since first seeing it at the 2010 SHOT Show. I did not know the company had altered their direction and product offering since the innovative Brocock pressurized cartridge system had been forced off the market in their home country a few years ago. And by the look of the gun the American distributor Airguns of Arizona was showing, I was anxious to see what they could do.

The ‘Enigma’ is the only take-down that offers a full true ambidextrous wooden butt section with cheek piece and ventilated rubber butt pad. The  rifle, breaks down into three sections and has a full wood butt section with a generous, fully ambidextrous cheek piece. This ‘screws’ into the rear of the action. The barrel has a muzzle with a  ½” UNF threaded barrel. The rifle has a straight pull action that runs a very reliable Perspex-fronted, 9-shot magazine. It boasts a quality 2-stage adjustable trigger and manual safety and from a 200-bar fill gives 50-60 shots in the .22 calibre.

On the range the gun yielded impressive results; the pellets used were 1) Beeman Kodiak Extra Heavy, 2) Beeman Field Target, 3) Beeman Laser, 4) JSB Exact, and 5) Defense XP. The highest velocity (768) came from the lightweight Lasers but generated one of the lower power outputs (17 fpe). The Kodiak Extra Heavy pellets generated lower velocity (661 fps) but yielded the highest energy to the target. They were also very accurate out of the Enigma, which makes them a great selection for hunting. Shooting off sticks, I was consistantly printing ragged one hole groups at 25 yards

Specifications 2 Stage Trigger Weight: 7.2 lbs Overall length: 39.6" BarrelLength: 17.75" Multi-shot mag: 9 shots

and at 50 yards shooting from field positions I could easily keep 9 shot groups inside the kill area of a squirrel. I like the pistol grip configuration on this gun, and found it pointed well and was shootable from every position. The forestock, while being substantial, fit my hand well and the checkering helped get a consistant and secure hold. The gun cycled quickly, using a cocking lever that has a mechanical release. There is a solid lock up, and after shooting hundreds of pellets I've not experienced a malfunction. The 9 shot rotary magazine is indexes the pellet when the gun is cocked and functioned flawlessly. It was easy to load, however I needed to seat the pellets with another pellet as I loaded it. I could still load quickly, and overall like the design a lot, it was very tolerant to a number of pellets designs.

In the next installment I'll take the gun out hunting and tell you what I thought about it as a field gun!