Norinco JW15A 22 LR

Hey guys, I bought a JW15 secondhand from the local GS, took it home, have it a quick clean, fiddled with the trigger bits to get it a bit nicer and then took it to the range.

So far after trying Winchester bulk 555 supersonic, Winchester 40 grain subs, CCI 40 grain subs and browning 40 grain supers, it has only taken a liking to the CCI subs.

After mucking around with the el cheapo 4x scope that came with it, I chucked my Bushnell 3-9x40 on and had a better view of the target as I was shooting.

Will get some picks up tonight.

It has the plastic stock on it which is fairly functional but quite flexi in the fore end. Any tips to stiffen this up?

Also I have the action screws torqued to 25 inch pounds, anyone have a number I should be using for this?

Buy a wooden stock. Or you can do the carbon fibre arrow stiffen job on thw fore end. Epoxy or bedding compund to set them in. A quock google should put you on thw right track. Mudgrips is the 22 guru hes made a few of these nice rifles from memory.

Sent from my SM-G986B using Tapatalk

Drill a 1/2 hole in the end of plastic stock and fill up with liquid polystyrene.Let it set as it expands out of yr drilled hole,file off and tape over hole.Your stock will be a lot stiffer.:D

Maybe if I say his name three times he'll appear... @mudgripz @mudgripz @mudgripz

unfortunately those plastic stocked JW-15s are a bit hit-and-miss for accuracy. The Polytech and Gun City ones are pretty average .

Earlier , wooden stock ones are the best of the lot - but they can all be made better with not a lot of money spent.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sportco62

unfortunately those plastic stocked JW-15s are a bit hit-and-miss for accuracy. The Polytech and Gun City ones are pretty average .

Earlier , wooden stock ones are the best of the lot - but they can all be made better with not a lot of money spent.

---

I'm not looking to move mountains, just if there are any easy tips like torque settings but I can probably figure that out myself :thumbsup:

Roughen the inside of the foreend, and use a small amount of boatbuilding epoxy resin with microballons in it to lower the density. Hugely stiff, impervious, and sticks like poo to a fancy bed covering. Then pillar bed the thing, job done as good as you can with one of those stocks.

Re: torque settings, the plastic in the stock is compressible so unless you pillar bed forget setting to a torque. Just tight (that's the 'just' tight not mechanic red face tight then a little bit more torque to yield...) and a bit, say 1/8 more of a turn. You'll be pretty repeatable if you do that each time, just don't go too much.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Trout

Drill a 1/2 hole in the end of plastic stock and fill up with liquid polystyrene.Let it set as it expands out of yr drilled hole,file off and tape over hole.Your stock will be a lot stiffer.:D

---

With the action in place?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by No.3

Roughen the inside of the foreend, and use a small amount of boatbuilding epoxy resin with microballons in it to lower the density. Hugely stiff, impervious, and sticks like poo to a fancy bed covering. Then pillar bed the thing, job done as good as you can with one of those stocks.

Re: torque settings, the plastic in the stock is compressible so unless you pillar bed forget setting to a torque. Just tight (that's the 'just' tight not mechanic red face tight then a little bit more torque to yield...) and a bit, say 1/8 more of a turn. You'll be pretty repeatable if you do that each time, just don't go too much.

---

I've got some of Nathan Foster's stock stabiliser, that should work?

Yep... Denser though, meaning heavier.

Bugger - team out bunny shooting tonight - they'll pop 50-100 and I'm not with them :( :( So - time for some basic thoughts for your JW accurising:

* When you begin to tighten the front king screw or bedding screw, ensure first you are holding barrel in centre of barrel channel as you do so. Avoids side channel contact and uneven barrel pressures. (You don't need to free float sporter 22s - test them thoroughly first. Floating sometimes works - at other times you're left trying to recreate barrel pressures.. True.)
* 25lbs is alot of torque. Max pressure is not necessarily max accuracy. Start alot lower - maybe 5-10lbs, then shoot two groups, then 15, another two groups (one group can be random), until you find its torque sweet spot. This varies between rifles.
* Don't worry about synthetic forestock flex. This only happens when you apply lateral stock pressure with forearm, and this is something you do not want. Whether standing freehand, sitting, prone, or off the bench, principal job of forestock hand is to cradle rifle steadily - with at times perhaps just a tad of pressure back into shoulder. If you are pressuring forestock laterally enough to bend it slightly you are creating unwanted barrel pressures - wrong positional pressures - and what you impose at forend of rifle has to be offset at butt end of rifle. You don't want any distorting pressures. Don't worry about possible bends to forestock - just get your front and rear positional pressures onto rifle dead right with firm steady secure grip with pressure into shoulder and cheekweld, but no compensating for uneven hold pressure anywhere. Reducing variables helps consistent accuracy...Single good group may win a shoot-off, but it'll never get us there. Positional pressure balance.

For your accuracy - given reasonably calm conditions - three significant variables:
* The rifle - you're finding out its capability as you test. Accuracy varies with any make. JWs usually around 0.4" at best - worst I tested was about 1". Yes a Polytech or GC one.
* The ammo - alot of present hunting ammos are poor. Keep trying makes - sometimes we test 10-20 types. JWs usually like one or more of the older higher quality hunting ammos eg Aussie Powerpoint, Mexican made Fiocchi, Mexican made Aguila Superextra, and CCI. If not having much luck try and find some of this. Remember its an accurate hunting round you need to shoot in rifle - we don't use match ammos in field. Not alot of difference with quality hunting ammos between HV and Subs for 50 and 100m groups - for standard barrel sporters. Match subs of course better - usually.
* You - if you're an experienced past/present competition shooter, or spend regular time on the range, you may well get the best from your JW. But if you don't do this, do limit your expectations. Once you've found its preferred ammo, time and range practice are needed to get best from rifle - and you. And the rest of us.

Hope this might help.. Cheers mudz (Note - others may have slightly different positional balance ideas to mine.)

Thanks Mudz, I do appreciate your input. I'll have a play around with the torque on that front screw next time out, hopefully tomorrow.

I don't think anyone nearby stocks the Aguila but I'll look around next time I'm at the local. I didn't measure any groups today but I've got some target photos in here to show what I mean. CCI subs were by far the best I tried today. Groups were shot at 50 yards from a bench with sand bags, possibly would have been better prone but there you go.

Photos are not cooperating so I'll measure...each ammo got two 5 shit groups.

Winchester supers 2.35" and 2.2"
Winchester subs (USA) 1.43" and 2.12"
Browning supers 1.71" and 1.71"
CCI subs 1.02" and 0.92". Both CCI groups had 2 through one hole as well so may improve with torque experiments?

If the rifle has not been used a lot, it may need a few hundy rounds through it before it settles down. Don't despair!

CCI subs worked best in my old jw,touching holes at 30yds.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ranger 888

If the rifle has not been used a lot, it may need a few hundy rounds through it before it settles down. Don't despair!

---

No despair :D it'll kill rabbits and hare just fine with all the ammos I've put down it so far, the CCI will hit what it's pointing at out to 50 yards, maybe further and that's plenty for my purpose.

I think the rifle has not had much work judging by the stock, it looks almost new! The action needs a bit of smoothing out but I can do that over time, time may do it for me :)

I'm going to try these ammos again but I'm pretty happy with how it shoots with the CCI subs.

If it doesn't settle, and the stock tension adjustment doesn't change things look at the barrel and crown. If it's dirty give it a good clean, sometimes .22's (and I know most people think don't clean rimfires) actually do get a layer of crap built up in them which can affect accuracy and there is always the possibility of a bit of rust building up over time due to combustion byproducts. Clean the action and bolt and breech faces including the extractor groove, and then check the crown for unevenness or nicks/damage. Sight mounts, make sure they are tight and can't move. Trigger assembly, had a couple of these that were loose as hell, and that's not ideal! And last one is check the barrel out for bore straightness and bulges, you might be able to feel bulges with a cleaning rod.

Last one is suppressor, if it goes to the pack with the can on but is OK without it that's probably the cause - but it might not be the can itself as well. Might just not like having something hung on it's end!

checking a JW-15 for "bore straightness" is a waste of time - the bore wanders considerably inside the barrel - just ask anyone who has ever shortened the barrel on one .

Is the trigger case hardened? I'm thinking of polishing the contact points, but if they're case hardened maybe that's a bad idea.

Identify your target beyond all doubt because you never miss (right?) and I'll be missed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by No.3

If it doesn't settle, and the stock tension adjustment doesn't change things look at the barrel and crown. If it's dirty give it a good clean, sometimes .22's (and I know most people think don't clean rimfires) actually do get a layer of crap built up in them which can affect accuracy and there is always the possibility of a bit of rust building up over time due to combustion byproducts. Clean the action and bolt and breech faces including the extractor groove, and then check the crown for unevenness or nicks/damage. Sight mounts, make sure they are tight and can't move. Trigger assembly, had a couple of these that were loose as hell, and that's not ideal! And last one is check the barrel out for bore straightness and bulges, you might be able to feel bulges with a cleaning rod.

Last one is suppressor, if it goes to the pack with the can on but is OK without it that's probably the cause - but it might not be the can itself as well. Might just not like having something hung on it's end!

---

I haven't tried with the suppressor off yet, it's on the list :thumbsup:

Shortening may be in it's future, it's still full length with the "iron sights" fitted.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sportco62

checking a JW-15 for "bore straightness" is a waste of time - the bore wanders considerably inside the barrel - just ask anyone who has ever shortened the barrel on one .

---

Well, it can be the difference between a passable barrel and one that you sell off to someone else to stress over...

this is a typical JW-15 barrel at about mid-point along the length of the tube . Cut off my wood stocked version that shoots CCI subs at way past minute of rabbit .

Not trying to start a fight , but definately disagreeing with your above statement . sorry for the shitty phone pic.

Attachment 237651

Even if it did shoot good it would annoy the shit out of me just knowing its off center

My one was way off centre,lucky the gunsmith noticed it when threading for suppressor,still shot bloody well though..I have a spare wooden stock from my Brno 22 which I would say your jw15 action and barrel will drop straight into,pm me if you are keen.

Attachment 237672Attachment 237673

I have found off centre bore makes no difference to accuracy with Norincos. One of my JWs had a 15" barrel, was well off centre, but still shot 0.4s (5 shot groups at 50m) at best with HV hunting ammos, and averaged in the 0.5s. About the same as our Brno and CZ452s on the bench. It shot 2-3000 bunnies very efficiently to 100m. Deadly wee shooter.

M4Magnum - a suggestion - DON'T OVERTHINK THIS! Having polished/prepared 20 or so JWs its a simple process - never takes us much time but we do get excellent results from barrel chopping, recrown, safety polishing, trigger jobs, magazine prep etc. Beware of too much information - often leads to confusion.

Many processes are dead simple - eg your JW15 trigger. We did one this afternoon on another JW project I'm finishing. It had a heavy two stage pig of a trigger break - hard, heavy, 4lbs or so, and no feel to it. Cobber and I did just a few simple things:
* Removed action from stock, and tapped out keeper pin to remove trigger assembly from receiver.
* Took out and hand-pressure tested the main spring - very heavy. He picks up a few spare springs from an occasional visit to Mitre 10 (they have a spring rack), so we picked another lighter spring of comparable size. Hand testing.
* We then lightly polished the sear to give it even travel under bolt, and put a wee dot of grease on it.
* We then removed the blog of epoxy sitting on top of grubscrew hole (on trigger rocker) above the wee screw, then adjusted it downwards to eliminate 2 stage, and dotted in some Locktite.

We put this back together and now it really is perfect - a light single stage trigger at about 2lbs. Time spent 40 minutes, cost $3.00 Great little fix. Hope this helps somebody.

These rifles are easy to work on, very easy to convert into polished efficient wee hunters. The JW15 is a scruffy Chinafied Brno model one. Provide the missing quality control, and you'll bring out the Brno DNA. They often have quite good barrels. Example - last one I sold couple months ago after some prep shot beautifully - 0.43" at best, average (3 groups) of 0.54" with old Aussie Powerpoint, 0.59" with old Mex Aguila Superextra etc. Great little performer - and that's with hunting ammos - not match ammo. Easy to do. And that's about average for ours. Suggestion - avoid getting confused with 68 opinions. And if you want some tips on this one send me a PM. Happy to help.

PS I don't know if currently available Aguila Superextra is same recipe as 10 years ago. Then it was an excellent round - one of my 22s averaged well under 1" at 100 with it for consec groups. Had distinctive Eley rotten egg smell primer gel. Don't know about stuff today.

Update time. I set the action torque to 15 inch pounds, filed and polished most of the machining marks out of the bolt, lubed the magazine spring, swapped out the trigger spring for a lighter one from Mitre 10 and tried a couple of different ammos.

I managed to get out yesterday and throw some rounds down range.

First was the CCI subs again. 4 into one cluster and a rushed shot to muck it up (the one in the bull)

Attachment 238350

Next was the Super extra from Aguila, pleasantly surprised by this. There are 6 in that cluster and two shots where I wasn't concentrating on my trigger pull off to the left.

Attachment 238351

I tried the Browning again and it was slightly better than last time out, just over an inch down from 1.7 last time. I didn't take a photo of this one, similar pattern to last time just tighter.

Trigger needs some more work, will shorten the spring and adjust the grub screw to reduce travel. Once I tackle that, it'll be out on the field doing the business.

Mine will shoot the Eley subsonic hp stuff guncity has just as well as the cci standard