Thread: 22 RF Tuner strategies?

Usually the biggest problems with tuning are inconsistent ammo, inconsistent conditions (ie outside) & moving the tuner too much between test groups

Tuners on Rimfires are a mine field of Witchery .
I’ve played with Tuners for about 20 years ( shot competitive .22 benchrest for years ) and still use a Tuner on my Tikka T1x .
Rimfires are all about ammo , it’s as simple as that .
At distances out to 50m you will often find numerous different loads that will shoot well , find the one that shoots best and fine tune it .
When you start to extend your range to 100m and further you often find the best at 50m is no longer the best at 100/200/300
The quality and consistency of the ammo is now the major factor.
You need to chronograph different ammo types and find the one that has the best SD and ES figures, don’t worry about its grouping abilities, just find the most consistent.
Then use your tuner to get the best results you can with that ammo .
.22lr ballistics are so bad at extended ranges that just a few fps can result in many inches of vertical and wind dispersion.
You can get away with variance at 50m , and I’ve had some of the worst statistical ammo shoot the best at 50m .
My advice is find the best ammo you can without the tuner .
Install the tuner and starting from zero setting shoot 10 shot groups .
Work out how many clicks are in a full rotation of the tuner and divide it by three .
Shoot a 10 shot group then turn the tuner a third of the way around and shoot another etc etc .
You should shoot enough groups that you have made a minimum of at least three full rotations ( more is better)
Analyse your results and find the three best settings you achieved.
Then start refining those either side of that setting in smaller increments.
If your shooting is good enough fundamentally you will be seeing very minor differences once you have narrowed down the settings.
Tuners work , but they don’t perform magic.
To fully tune a rifle/tuner combo you need to shoot a lot of ammo to confirm that your results are not anomalies and are in fact real data .

Excellent, the type of advise needed thanks.

Originally Posted by Ground Control

Tuners on Rimfires are a mine field of Witchery .
I’ve played with Tuners for about 20 years ( shot competitive .22 benchrest for years ) and still use a Tuner on my Tikka T1x .
Rimfires are all about ammo , it’s as simple as that .
At distances out to 50m you will often find numerous different loads that will shoot well , find the one that shoots best and fine tune it .
When you start to extend your range to 100m and further you often find the best at 50m is no longer the best at 100/200/300
The quality and consistency of the ammo is now the major factor.
You need to chronograph different ammo types and find the one that has the best SD and ES figures, don’t worry about its grouping abilities, just find the most consistent.
Then use your tuner to get the best results you can with that ammo .
.22lr ballistics are so bad at extended ranges that just a few fps can result in many inches of vertical and wind dispersion.
You can get away with variance at 50m , and I’ve had some of the worst statistical ammo shoot the best at 50m .
My advice is find the best ammo you can without the tuner .
Install the tuner and starting from zero setting shoot 10 shot groups .
Work out how many clicks are in a full rotation of the tuner and divide it by three .
Shoot a 10 shot group then turn the tuner a third of the way around and shoot another etc etc .
You should shoot enough groups that you have made a minimum of at least three full rotations ( more is better)
Analyse your results and find the three best settings you achieved.
Then start refining those either side of that setting in smaller increments.
If your shooting is good enough fundamentally you will be seeing very minor differences once you have narrowed down the settings.
Tuners work , but they don’t perform magic.
To fully tune a rifle/tuner combo you need to shoot a lot of ammo to confirm that your results are not anomalies and are in fact real data .

Awesome info, thanks for taking the time to explain. I have two ammos that shoot pretty good and that I can get more of. I've tested it at 50M across 3 rifles that shoot pretty good. The Eley Team gives the lowest ES (14 to 24fps) and best SD (4.7 to 6.7) but the groups are maybe 0.1 to 0.2" bigger than the Eley Match I have tested (2 different lots, ES 19-22, SD 4.7 to 7.7).

I can't use the tuner on my best rifle (of all things a 1934 Winchester Model 52) and it's not suitable for the competitions we have here, but I'm thinking run the Eley Team in the Lithgow LA101 with the tuner.

Are the groups repeatable and not showing any of the 'group diagnosis' patterns?

I think endless chasing of the ammo that gives smallest groups in one particular rifle isn't that useful, especially given how small options are to obtain decent match grade ammo here I.e. no Lapua, SK and now overpriced RWS. So this time round on the new indent of Eley I focused on the ES and SD of the lots avaliable to me. As long as 50M groups were in the sub 0.4s in all three rifles I like to shoot the most I was happy.

The Norma Tac 22 shoots very well, pretty cheap at $12 per box if you know where to get it

Originally Posted by Kiwi Greg

The Norma Tac 22 shoots very well, pretty cheap at $12 per box if you know where to get it

It sure does, I shoot a lot of it, but I find it has frustrating fliers at a ratio of about 5 per box, once you realize that and don't let it spoil yer day life is good

Originally Posted by Tentman

It sure does, I shoot a lot of it, but I find it has frustrating fliers at a ratio of about 5 per box, once you realize that and don't let it spoil yer day life is good

I haven't had the feed back yet from the benchrest boys & have sold plenty of it, could be the batch ?

I am not far away from going down the rimfire tuner "rabbit hole" myself. Got a suppressor / tuner on the way.
Some good advice in this thread and follows my own thoughts - find an ammunition with good velocity consistency and attempt to tune to accuracy.

Originally Posted by Tentman

It sure does, I shoot a lot of it, but I find it has frustrating fliers at a ratio of about 5 per box, once you realize that and don't let it spoil yer day life is good

I regularly run a SpeedTracker chrono when shooting groups and testing ammo and the SD / ES of TAC22 is consistently 10/30, which is exactly what I get with RWS Special Match also. This is across 2 different Lot#’s of TAC22 and RWS SM.

Would be good to know what SD/ES is considered acceptable in the Benchrest world?

Originally Posted by gqhoon

Would be good to know what SD/ES is considered acceptable in the Benchrest world?

I doubt any would even know or check, the target is the only thing that matters, SD & ES has little to no baring on group size/point of impact at all in short range bench rest, rimfire or centrefire

External influences are far more significant, shooting outdoors without flags is next to pointless even if it "isn't windy"

Shooting 22 benchrest outdoors is the most humbling thing you can do with a rifle

Originally Posted by gqhoon

I regularly run a SpeedTracker chrono when shooting groups and testing ammo and the SD / ES of TAC22 is consistently 10/30, which is exactly what I get with RWS Special Match also. This is across 2 different Lot#’s of TAC22 and RWS SM.

Would be good to know what SD/ES is considered acceptable in the Benchrest world?

Not unsurprising as RWS Match and Norma Tac-22 and RWS Special Match and Norma Match are made by the same company (was Ruag now Beretta) only the headstamps are different.

Originally Posted by gqhoon

I regularly run a SpeedTracker chrono when shooting groups and testing ammo and the SD / ES of TAC22 is consistently 10/30, which is exactly what I get with RWS Special Match also. This is across 2 different Lot#’s of TAC22 and RWS SM.

Would be good to know what SD/ES is considered acceptable in the Benchrest world?

Interesting results, the "best" ES/SD I've come across are the latest batches of Eley Team and Match, with ESs down to 14 in one rifle and SD 4.7. I got some for a top PRS comeditor to try, will be interesting to see what his results are.

The Tac22 can shoot very small groups, currently I'm playing with a Remmy 581, it just delivered a 0.21" group of 5 rounds at 50Y with Tac 22 - freaking awesome! Next group blew out to 0.6 but it's windy as here today so both might be flukes. Sure as hell haven't over-capitalised on the 581, has only cost $200 plus about $30 for tooling to install a rear action screw. If you wanted to be picky about costs not included is a bit of sandpaper to open up the barrel channel!

I picked up an EC Tuner on my recent ventures overseas, i have it on my BRNO Mode 2E thats quite a bit modified haha. I just like to tinker and see how accurate i can get it, its done me well out to 300 yards over the years.

I had a play with it yesterday with the tuner and supressor on, and using the white box Eley hollow points that i currently shoot in it and with not much adjustment it made quite a diffrence in group size at 100m going from 1" to 2" with only a 1/4 rotation. But this rifle does have a long skinny barrel and without the tuber i get around 1" on most days anyway, it does a bit better with the fiocci official 300 (never tried 320 for some reason).

Anyhow, be interisting to see where i end up. If i find the barrel too sensitive with the tuner i might cut it to 16" from the current i think 22 or 24"