This is Hard Air Magazine’s Complete Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide! We’ve brought together the information we have published about this remarkable airgun to make it more accessible and understandable for both owners and wannabe owners.
But what is the Umarex Komplete? It’s a low-cost air rifle that sells for around $200.00. You can find it for sale online, in big box stores and some gunshops.
It’s also a fairly new product, being launched in mid-2024.
Plus, it’s a Hard Air Magazine Gold Award winner for its combination of usability, quality, value and performance.
In fact the Komplete is actually a revolutionary airgun. It is the most versatile air rifle ever in terms of power sources. It’s also a great entry point into the exciting world of PCP – Pre Charged Pneumatic – airguns.
All this – and more – makes the Komplete an outstanding way for the newcomer to make a start with airgun shooting. Read on, we’ll explain…
BUY FROM PYRAMYD
Umarex Komplete NitroAir PCP Rifle 0.177
Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide – Overview
The Komplete is a revolutionary approach to the question of how to provide a “PCP in a box”.
It’s well-known that adoption of PCP air rifles in big box sporting goods stores is minimal. That’s due to the perceived complexity of PCPs, with their need for separate charging equipment.
The Umarex Komplete NCR addresses that issue head-on by not requiring a hand pump, compressor or HPA tank. It’s truly a “PCP in a box” that can compete on retail shelves with the inevitable breakbarrel air rifles that still sell in at such locations.
Everything is included: gun, scope and HPA source. All the new owner needs is to buy pellets. That makes it comparable to a breakbarrel springer air rifle while the sub-$200 price is very competitive too.
In base form, the Komplete uses a “NitroAir” power cartridge. It’s a similar size to the long-running 88/90 Gram CO2 cartridges. However it contains 32 Grams of Nitrogen gas, providing a pressure of 3,600 PSI.
That 3,600 PSI pressure is fed to the Komplete’s built-in regulator where it is limited to 1,800 PSI shooting pressure. The result – says Umarex – is up to 45 consistent, regulated shots from each screw-on, disposable NitroAir cartridge. In fact, in HAM testing, it can be many more.
NitroAir represents a huge step-up in power from the 88/90 Gram CO2 cartridges, plus it does not suffer from CO2’s varying pressure (and hence performance) at different ambient temperatures.
Even in base form the Komplete offers a HUGE value proposition for many airgunners who make their purchase in big box stores.
For $200, they can buy a PCP complete with a NitroAir charging cartridge plus a 4×32 scope and rings. At a stroke, there’s no need for a HPA tank, compressor or hand pump.
There’s no effort required to break the barrel, nor is there any need to deal with the sharp recoil, length or weight of a spring/piston or gas ram air rifle. These are massive benefits for first-time buyers that will make it much easier for them to be shooting on-target immediately.
With a bare weight of 5 Lbs 13 Oz (plus the scope) and a length of 41.5 Inches, the Umarex Komplete is a light, manageable air rifle. The whole family could use it.
The Komplete offers sidelever cocking, magazine feed – two are included – plus an integral silencer. In .177 caliber, it’s specified to achieve above that critical 1,000 FPS Muzzle Velocity with lead pellets and is also available in .22 caliber.
Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide – Choosing Power Sources
This is where the Komplete’s versatility comes into play.
Unlike most other air rifles, which only accept one source of propulsion, the Komplete can be powered in multiple ways. These are:
– 32 Gram, 3,600 PSI, NitroAir Nitrogen cartridges.
– 88/90 Gram CO2 cartridges.
– 12 Gram CO2 cartridges (with adapter).
– 3,600 PSI High Pressure Air (with adapter and charging equipment).
All of these cartridges and adapters simply screw into place using the same screw-thread interface built-in to the gun. Plus, you are not committed to one power source for good.
With the Komplete, it’s really easy to change from one to another at any time. Just “degas” the gun before changing to the new power source – as is explained in the Owner’s Manual.
These capabilities give the owner a choice of benefits, as follows:
– 32 Gram NitroAir Nitrogen cartridges give 3,600 PSI power but can be expensive for heavy shooting. However they are also available in 24 packs. Compared to buying the 2-pack, that’s a savings of 16.7% per shot.
– 88/90 Gram CO2 cartridges give less power than NitroAir and provide less power in cold weather. But they give more shots per fill. They are also cheaper.
– 12 Gram CO2 cartridges (with adapter) are ideal if you want to make a fairly small number of shots in one session. Again they don’t perform well in cold weather. But they’re very cheap and extremely widely available.
– 3,600 PSI High Pressure Air. This requires an adapter and separate charging equipment but then can provide limitless “no cost” filling. Now you’re into a full PCP (Pre Charged Pneumatic) system that you can enter at any time.
Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide – Shots Per Fill
Hard Air Magazine has tested the Komplete with all these power sources under identical conditions. This means that we can give an “apples to apples” comparison of how many shots can be achieved with each propulsion type, as follows…
32 Gram NitroAir Nitrogen Cartridge
Umarex claims up to 45 consistent, regulated shots per NitroAir cartridge. The Komplete tested by HAM completely blew away Umarex’s claims for the number of shots per NitroAir cartridge!
As you can see from the chart below, we achieved no less than 60 consistent shots at an average of 976 FPS with 8.64 Grain H&N Field Target Trophy pellets.
As the Umarex Komplete does not include a pressure gauge, most new owners will likely keep shooting until either the point-of-impact drops appreciably or the gun stops going bang.
The chart above shows that – in .177 caliber – the Komplete tested by HAM was still shooting at an acceptable 645 FPS at shot 84. That’s seven magazines worth!
88/90 Gram CO2 Cartridge
CO2-powered cartridges typically deliver somewhere between around 800 and 1,100 PSI, depending on temperature. The Komplete works using the 88 Gram CO2 cartridge as its power source with no modifications at all. Just screw one in!
Now let’s see the performance from the same gun, unchanged, with the same pellets using an 88 Gram cartridge of Umarex CO2.
Wow! Now we have 150 “good” shots from the one CO2 cartridge. True the Muzzle Velocity is less consistent than when using NitroAir. But it’s still pretty good, in my opinion.
Why the dip between shots 1 and 40? I have no idea!
Putting both graphs together at the same scale, we can see the comparison well.
Obviously the Komplete is much more powerful when fed it’s intended diet of Nitrogen. The Muzzle Velocity is much higher. It’s also more consistent. But there’s a ton more shots available using CO2.
Another feature of CO2-powered airguns is that they shoot faster with increasing temperature. In fact I have found that the increase is around 2 FPS per change of one degree F temperature. PCPs have very small differences due to temperature changes.
At any event, we can expect that the Komplete will shoot 46 FPS faster at 90 degrees F than in our 67 degree test range. We can now compare the results as follows.
As you can see, CO2 power gives more power, simply by shooting in higher ambient temperatures!
12 Gram CO2 Cartridges
Now let’s look at the Komplete’s performance with 12 Gram CO2 cartridges, using the CO2 Adapter from Umarex USA.
This time, I used a .22 caliber Komplete for the test. Here’s the shot count chart using 2 x 12 Gram CO2 cartridges in the adapter.
That’s 25 “good” shots. Again, we can see the effect of shooting in hot weather in the following chart.
Given my long experience with CO2-powered guns, I would expect the shot count in .177 caliber to be about 20% more. Say 30 shots. That could be ideal for a happy linking session!
3,600 PSI High Pressure Air.
Now we are back to .177 caliber for this test, using the same gun as before.
To use High Pressure Air, we installed the Air Venturi PCP Conversion for Umarex Komplete. This comprises a black, anodized High Pressure Air tube. It’s around twice as long as one of the original NitroAir cartridges and about 3 Oz heavier.
The PCP conversion uses an identical screw mounting thread to that of the NitroAir cartridges. It screw directly into the Komplete.
At the other end is a standard 1/8-Inch NPT “Foster” male quick disconnect. There’s a substantial cover that screws into place to protect the connector when not being charged with High Pressure Air.
Operation is extremely simple. Screw the Air Venturi Conversion onto the Komplete, remember to shut the de-gassing screw, connect your HPA supply. Disconnect and shoot!
Here’s the shot string using High Pressure Air. Again very consistent until the regulator set point was reached. After this the Muzzle Velocity dropped away as expected.
(There’s no significance to the extra shots at the “tail” of the NitroAir graph. They just weren’t necessary for the HPA test.).
Let’s now combine the graphs for NitroAir and PCP propulsion at the same scale…
As we can see, our Komplete gave a slightly higher Muzzle Velocity when using High Pressure Air (green dots) in the PCP Conversion than it did with the NitroAir cartridge (red dots). As all other parameters were the same, this slight difference must be due to the action of compressed air in the gun, compared to Nitrogen.
Next we’ll look at the same data but “zoom in” to part of the graph. Now we can see the differences – and similarities – more clearly.
We’ll analyze the data over 60 shots per fill. This is 5 magazines worth of pellets in .177 caliber and most people would probably re-fill at about this point if they wanted to stay on target.
When firing with High Pressure Air, our Komplete produced an average of 990.6 FPS for 60 shots in .177 caliber.
Looking at the green dots, we can see that the regulator set point was reached at about shot 50. After this point the Muzzle Velocity fell away rapidly.
Again the red dots show performance using NitroAir. As the graph makes clear, the regulator set point was reached at shot 54. After that, the FPS fell away more gradually than it did for High Pressure Air. The average of 976 FPS was achieved when using Nitrogen power.
The Air Venturi PCP Conversion For Umarex Komplete works well. It provided very similar performance in the test gun to using one NitroAir cartridge. But you will need to have a high pressure hand pump, HPA tank or compressor to provide the air.
Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide – Riflescope
There’s good news and bad news here…
The good news is that the Umarex Komplete has a good-length Picatinny scope rail molded into the top of the receiver. This provides plenty of real estate for mounting different length riflescopes and individual shooter’s eye relief requirements.
More good news is that the magazine does not project high above the top of the Picatinny rails. This is another feature that makes scope mounting easy and flexible.
Then, too, a riflescope and rings is included with the Komplete. This allows the excited new owner to start shooting immediately.
The bad news is that this bundled scope is – inevitably for cost reasons – a 4×32 model of limited optical quality. The HAM Team fitted the 4×32 scope for photography, but that’s all.
We suggest that all Komplete owners up-grade their scope as soon as possible. It will be a great help in achieving the best possible accuracy from this PCP air rifle.
I hope you enjoyed your complete Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide and found it useful. Happy shooting!
BUY FROM PYRAMYD
Umarex Komplete NitroAir PCP Rifle 0.177
The post Your Complete Umarex Komplete Airgun Guide appeared first on Hard Air Magazine.
