Thread: Who still makes 0.223" diameter projectiles?

Find some factory ammunition somewhere,some how. It will eliminate your loads as being bad if it too patterns like a shotgun.

I suppose that would be ideal, although from what I can see online the ammo hasn't been made for quite awhile even in eastern europe where it comes from, think it'd be pretty unlikely to pop up in little ol New Zealand. I'm going to keep going with load development for now and see if I can improve things, bumped the scope last time I was out and now im not even on paper so there may be other factors at play causing the inaccuracy.

If a bump does that...definately an issue.three inches at fifty is bare barrel type pattern.eg I can do that with no sights at all.

yeah not too sure whats with that, I hope to get out again today once the fog clears and see if I can get it on target again, looks about right when bore sighting it but still missing the target so will be start quite close this time.

I'll post up again if I get some results, might be something im missing (other than the target lol)

Anyone tried swaging .224 bullets down to .223? Not much of a difference and I anticipate with a bit of case lube through a lead projectile type sizing die with good surface finish they'd come out very nice.
I don't have a need for .223 bullets but happy to try if someone really can't find any.

Thats an interesting thought, although from what I've read regarding the early 22 hornets with the 223" bore .224 projectiles dont tend to cause any issues, going off that I would think that the same should apply to the 220, so far velocity is fine, not had any stuck or otherwise odd interactions with projectiles, just poor accuracy, which could be down to my ability at the end of the day,

99%sure I've read of folks doing it with much bigger cup n core projectiles .318 comes to mind. A gentle hand and a bit of lube might be your new best friend.... Get your mind out of gutter,nipple chains n all

Your scope n rings are both unknown quantity.... Beg borrow or steal something proven to be consistent and put on rifle at base level only.eg don't move anything just take yours off n put other on via the screws onto dovetail. Fire group at big bit of paper or big backing board.it doesn't have to hit bullseye,you looking to see if it groups or still patterns.

Got out to shoot some, shot 10 rounds, started at 10M to try and see where things are going wrong, but it was fine, slightly low at 10m but central on target,

moved out to 50m and missed twice when shooting for the middle of a 1.2m tall target, brought it back in to 40m and can see that its shooting 8-14cm high at 40m (likely zeroed for 100m?) , have got photos of 2 groups, one is vertically strung aiming for the blue circle below in the picture, the other is grouped above the blue circle but there were 4 shots and only 3 holes (ignore the hole right next to the blue that was the 10M shot)

both of the groups are around 8cm,
I'm shooting of a large fence post which is very solid but probably not as good as a rest with bags,

I have some more pics of previous groups which ill post up once I find them on my phone,
I'll borrow the scope of my 303 and see what happens, at this point I'm leaning towards bedding issues though, the action is currently stuck in the stock with bedding compound so that doesn't instill confidence in the bedding job.

these are all 5 shot groups, same target, different paper.
this is from before I touched the scope, they all shot high and right @ 50m so I made 2 clicks of adjustment to the left and proceeded to miss 10 more rounds of ladder load testing,

typing that out maybe the scope is the problem so I'll go swap them around now.

If you can.change rings out to.

"At this point I wish I just coughed up the cash for a howa mini in 223, I brought the 220 because it was cheap, still working on load development with standard projectiles so if I can get it shooting well enough it'll do."

That sucks. We all make bad decisions once in a while.

Best of luck with it. Hope it works out for you.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

If you can.change rings out to.

probably would be wise to, I'm hoping get out again this morning to test the other scope on the rifle, although the quality of the rifle crown has come into question from a friend, certainly is has a bit of buildup of corrosion/carbon so after testing the scope I will have a crack at cleaning it off and see if anything improves,
if nothing comes from that the plan is to get the action out of the stock, currently its glued in with bedding compound from the previous owners DIY job, I'm thinking I'll put it in the chest freezer overnight then start trying to tap it out.

I guess I'll keep posting here, why not lol

Originally Posted by Oldbloke

"At this point I wish I just coughed up the cash for a howa mini in 223, I brought the 220 because it was cheap, still working on load development with standard projectiles so if I can get it shooting well enough it'll do."

That sucks. We all make bad decisions once in a while.

Best of luck with it. Hope it works out for you.

hah, I'll happily take whatever luck I can get,
I can't pass up a good deal so I'm just treating it as a learning exercise for now, still have a few ideas to try yet.

What in suggesting is if you can take it off 303 and put straight on the 221 without opening rings you eliminate another variable and if it shoots ok you now KNOW issue is either scope or rings. If however you trasphere scope alone into the,suspect rings and it still doesn't group.the rings may still be issue. If nothing else check they are firm while scopeless.

Slight delay but got out again with the 4x off my enfield, results seem much better, after a few zeroing shots I managed to get 4 shots in 1.5cm at 35m then 3 shots just over an inch at 60m, which considering I could barely see my blue dot I'd say is pretty good.

I think I might try remounting the original scope and seeing if the groups stay half decent, the 4x isn't much good with my bad eyesight,
also managed to shoot one of my target holding standards in half which is a first