Daisy is best known for their inexpensive youth BB guns, modeled after lever-action rifles. Perhaps the most famous of these is the Red Ryder model, which is still in production today, despite the fact that the Red Ryder comic strip was canceled in 1963. These simple smoothbore, spring-air BB guns fire at low velocities, and are marketed to children ages 10 and over. In addition to the spring air BB guns, Daisy also markets a line of multi-pump pneumatic rifles capable of firing pellets or BBs to the same age group.
Production of the Daisy Model 25 was restarted in 2009. Featuring a spring feed mechanism and modeled after a pump-action shotgun with pumped cocking, the Model 25 dominated the low-price, higher-performance airgun market for over 50 years (1914–1978).
The Powerline models are Daisy's more powerful, more accurate line of airguns, marketed to ages 16 and up. The Powerline rifles include multi-pump pneumatics and spring-piston break barrels, have rifled barrels designed for shooting pellets, and are capable of greater velocities than Daisy's Youth Rifles. Powerline pistols are multishot double-action designs, powered by CO2 powerlets or spring pistons. BB models are smoothbore, while pellet models have rifled barrels. These are styled to resemble firearms, and are often used by adults in place of firearms for inexpensive training and practice, or in jurisdictions where firearms are heavily restricted or prohibited.
The Avanti line consists of Daisy's target guns. Some of the Avanti line are pellet guns, either single-stroke pneumatic or CO2-powered, with high-quality sights and built to much higher standards. Some models use barrels from Lothar Walther, a top European barrel maker. Even the least expensive Avanti model, the 717 pistol, has been used by world championship 10 m Air Pistol shooter Don Nygord to shoot a medal-winning round in a California state championship. The Cadets and Junior Canadian Rangers adopted the Daisy/ Avanti model 853C target rifle for their cadet program's marksmanship training program, as well as competitive 10m target shooting.
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Daisy also makes, as part of the Avanti line, the Model 499B Champion, billed as the "world's most accurate BB gun". This is a true competition BB gun, with a micrometer adjustable rear peep sight, a sling, and a precision smoothbore barrel. It is to be used with Daisy's precision-ground steel BBs that are made for the 499. The 499 is unusual in that it is a single-shot, muzzleloading spring airgun. The 499 is most commonly used in 5-meter (16 ft) BB gun competitions by youth groups such as 4H and Boy Scouts.
During the Vietnam War Daisy BB guns were used in Quick Kill training for soldiers in basic training.
Winchester licensed products
Daisy also sells a line of spring-air rifles marketed under the Winchester brand name. These are moderately priced break-barrel and semi-automatic CO2-based designs with wood or composite stocks, with velocities ranging from 500 ft/s (150 m/s) to 1,000 ft/s (300 m/s). For a time, Daisy also imported and marketed an Umarex made, Winchester branded copy of the Winchester 1894 rifle. This is a multi-shot CO2 pellet rifle using the standard Umarex revolver action. This model is now marketed under the Walther name.
Red Ryder BB Gun
The Red Ryder BB Gun is a BB gun made by Daisy Outdoor Products and introduced in the spring of 1940 that resembles the Winchester rifle of Western movies. Named for the comic strip cowboy character Red Ryder (created in 1938, and who appeared in numerous films between 1940 and 1950, and on television in 1956), the BB gun is still in production, though the comic strip was cancelled in 1963.
Design and specifications
The Red Ryder BB Gun is a lever-action, spring piston air gun with a steel smooth bore barrel. Current production (ca. 2017) has a rear iron sight adjustable for elevation only and a post front sight. It uses a gravity feed magazine with a 650 BB capacity. It has an engraved wooden stock and a saddle ring with leather thong on the receiver.
A youth model airgun, the Model 1938B Red Ryder produces an actual muzzle velocity of about 270 feet per second (82 m/s), although the specification on the Daisy states the Model 1938B Red Ryder has a "Max. Muzzle Velocity" of 350 feet per second (110 m/s) with a nominal.177 caliber, 5.1 grain steel BB.
The effective range is fairly short, about 10 yards (9 m), after which the low velocity and inaccuracy of the smoothbore barrel makes hitting the target difficult. BB guns are shot competitively at distances of 5 meters (16 ft), but the Red Ryder's open sight, which is also hampered by having no windage adjustment, makes it impractical for competition so it is primarily a plinking airgun.
Popular culture
The Red Ryder BB gun was prominently featured in the 1983 film A Christmas Story, in which Ralphie Parker requests one for Christmas, but is repeatedly rebuffed with the warning "You'll shoot your eye out." The movie's fictional BB gun, described as the "Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and this thing which tells time," does not correspond to any model in existence nor even a prototype; the Red Ryder featured in the movie was specially made to match author Jean Shepherd's story (which may be artistic license, but was the configuration Shepherd claimed to remember). However, the "Buck Jones" Daisy air rifle, immediately above the Red Ryder in the Daisy line, did have a compass and sundial in the stock, but no other features of the "Red Ryder" model. In 2020, Daisy released a limited-edition model of the Red Ryder titled, "A Christmas Wish," featuring the compass and sundial in the stock.
Crazy Earl, a character in the 1979 book The Short-Timers and the 1987 film, Full Metal Jacket, based on the book, carries a Daisy Red Ryder BB gun in addition to his M16 rifle.
Hogarth Hughes owns and uses a Red Ryder BB Gun in Brad Bird's 1999 film The Iron Giant.
In the 2011 movie Tactical Force about a SWAT team using non conventional methods, SWAT Sgt. Hunt (played by the actor Michael Jai White) uses a Red Ryder BB gun which he named 'Daisy' to shoot a kidnapper/robber in the forehead.
In a post game interview in a Week 10 game against the Cincinnati Bengals in the 2015 season, J. J. Watt in a quote referring to quarterback Andy Dalton: "Our goal was to come out here and make the Red Rifle look like a Red Ryder BB Gun, and I think we did that." The reference was used as a play on Dalton's "Red Rifle" nickname. Dalton's response made the quote go viral.
V/L caseless rifles
Daisy was the first company to introduce a production caseless ammunition and rifle, the V/L Rifle, in 1968. The V/L ammunition consisted of a.22 caliber bullet with a small disk of propellant on the back, and no primer. The rifle resembled a typical spring-air rifle, but the hot, high pressure air served not only as a power source but also to ignite the propellant on the back of the V/L cartridge. The V/L guns and ammunition were discontinued in 1969 after the BATFE ruled that they constituted a firearm, and Daisy, which was not licensed to manufacture firearms at that time, decided to discontinue manufacture rather than become a firearms manufacturer. About 23,000 of the rifles were made before production ceased.
Rimfire rifles
In 1988 Daisy briefly made a line of rimfire rifles, the Legacy rifle. These were bolt action or semi-automatic rifles chambered in.22 Long Rifle, and were available in a number of different models. Options were wooden stock or plastic stock with adjustable buttplate, and single-shot, 7-shot box magazine (for semi-automatic models only), or 10-shot rotary-feed (the magazine was similar to, but not interchangeable with, the Ruger 10/22). While these are very rare, the inexpensive construction and the fact that they are firearms, not airguns, has led to little collectors' interest.
