The Umarex PCP Hand Pump is a new accessory product obviously intended to support the Gauntlet air rifle.
This hand pump is manufactured by Hill Pumps in England. Hill has a long history of providing quality high pressure hand pumps and so long-term reliability can be expected to be good. The Umarex PCP Hand Pump certainly worked well on test here at Hard Air Magazine.
As with most PCP hand pumps, this Umarex product is supplied as a kit of parts. But it’s very easy to assemble. Five minutes, tops!
The Umarex PCP Hand Pump is supplied with the expected standard female quick disconnect to fit many PCP air rifles. An adapter may be required to fit those PCP air rifles using a probe filling system, but owners of such guns will be aware of this already.
The Umarex PCP Hand Pump is supplied with instructions and a tube of silicone lubricating grease for the minimal ongoing maintenance.
But it’s missing one feature that we’ve come to expect as essential with any hand pump. There is no pressure gauge.
Not having a pressure gauge means that the user has to rely on the pressure gauge built-in to the gun itself. This is somewhat unsatisfactory as these built-in gauges are often inaccurate and are always small, making them somewhat difficult to read for those with less than perfect eyesight.
As a compensation for the lack of a pressure gauge, the Umarex PCP Hand Pump is attractively priced at a List Price of $179.99. It also benefits from having a desiccant system available as an option.
In fact, such a desiccant system should be mandatory with all hand pumps. Moisture in humid air is probably the number one cause of internal damage to PCP airguns over the long term.
This means that the you really should also buy the Dry Pack system available as an accessory for the Umarex PCP Hand Pump. This is claimed to remove up to 90% of the moisture in air. It has a List Price of $49.99.
The Dry Pack accessory is very easy at fit to the Umarex PCP Hand Pump. It comes complete with two sachets of desiccant granules. These are easy to fill into the Dry Pack and further supplies are available as required.
However, the Umarex instructions do not tell the owner how frequently to replace the Dry Pack’s desiccant granules, or how he/she would know that they need replacement. HAM assumes that these granules will need to be replaced somewhere between every 2 and 4 months, depending on the humidity of the ambient air. But we could be wrong…
As always, the base plate of the Umarex PCP Hand Pump seems to be too small for HAM Publisher Stephen Archer’s feet. (Or does he just have big feet?)
Being made in England, the Umarex PCP Hand Pump requires metric tools. You will find it beneficial to have 6, 14 and 20mm wrenches available, together with the appropriate size wrench to attach a probe or other fitting to the end of the hose.
The maximum pressure capability for the Umarex PCP Hand Pump is given as 3,000 PSI. This is less than the 4,500 PSI typically provided by other Hill-manufactured hand pumps, but is satisfactory for the majority of PCP air rifles, particularly those at the lower end of the price spectrum.
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