Thread: Borderline useful .22lr info

Hey team,

Mrs Larry had two of her sweing machines out this morning, so I am hiding out in the shed.

A fella at the range the other day looked at one of my 10 shot groups, and said I should try weighing my ammunition. So yea why not, the house won't be safe for a while. I weighed 20 rounds on the balance scales, set to 50.4 (seemed to be the average) and worked away.

Of 150 rounds of cci standard velocity from the same brick
50.3 x35
50.4 x45
50.5 x43

So that means 27/150 fell outside of the .3 I could gauge
on the beam scale.

A quick spot check of those 27 showed none heavier than 50.7, and none lighter than 50.1.

I'll take a picture of my 100m group with sorted ammunition hopefully tomorrow. Im unsure how useful this info will be as a .22 may show up more environmental factors

Attached is a 50m target with the same batch of ammunition unsorted from a fortnight ago.

Watching with interest

My tikka T1X does 75mm groups at 200 yrds and your findings will be of serious help to me

Thanks for the info

Originally Posted by 7mmsaum

Watching with interest

My tikka T1X does 75mm groups at 200 yrds and your findings will be of serious help to me

Thanks for the info

My .22 is also a T1X 20 inch, standard sock.

I was part of a conversation a while back where the discussion was not only around weight of the loaded rounds but also rim thickness. They turned a gauge up on a lathe (basically a snug fit hole with a slight square cut on the edge of the snig fitting hole so any variation in the curve at the case rim doesn't affect the measurement). They then set up a digital vernier zero'd on the guage block, and could take a caliper measurement of the rim thickness in a repeatable way if that makes sense.

I recall something in the general run of conversation about the different weight groups lining up with different rim thickness groups, and after that the loaded rounds were split up between two mates. One of them had a rifle that liked the heavier stuff with thicker rims, the other's handily hated those but performed acceptably with the stuff at the bottom of the range. It was the difference between 1/2-3/4" and 1-1/2" groups if I recall.

I'd continue on with what you've done so far and if it tightens things up look into the rim thickness idea as well as it might show a preference in your rifle that might help you in finding ammo that it likes in future. Interesting post though!

Originally Posted by 7mmsaum

Watching with interest

My tikka T1X does 75mm groups at 200 yrds and your findings will be of serious help to me

Thanks for the info

Just for reference, mate got BSA 12/15 the other day.
I kid you not it is doing 11/2" at at 200yerd with aperture and winchester subsonic. Managed to get it for him through the same good bugger I got my international.
Heap of elevation.
Still to properly try mine but if it does as good as that I'll be stoked

Well team, results are in and they are not conclusive.

I used the 50.4 grain bullets

Shot 10 sighting rounds to blow the cobwebs out, and then shot 10 on the target pictured. Five of the shots were impressive, but the rest were not as I would have hoped.

There was a bit of a breeze, nothing terrible, unsure of the affect this may have had, the midgies were out in force, you guys know the rest of the excuses for non-optimal shooting, so fill in the rest.

Long story short, average shooting, average conditions or maybe the rifle did not like the 50.4 grain weights. More testing needed for a conclusion

Thanks Lars

I also made a rookie mistake and changed my point of aim, trying to protect my score by chasing impacts, which makes the data a little faulty

That latter one could be the most telling. Try the rim thickness one as well...

Watch Eagle Eye shootings vids on it, he's the best 22 accuracy resource on the interweb. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LOHvOX8AYEw he explains why ammo sorting by weight or rim is a waste of time. His explanation matches my experince exactly.

Originally Posted by Tentman

Watch Eagle Eye shootings vids on it, he's the best 22 accuracy resource on the interweb. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LOHvOX8AYEw he explains why ammo sorting by weight or rim is a waste of time. His explanation matches my experince exactly.

Well... I watched his video following your comment. His theories seem to make sense - if you accept that he is the expert on this topic.

...But then I watched his videos where he was actually shooting his custom rig. I honest cannot say they shot noticeably better than stock stuff.

The channel that actually pull off very good shots (and is not a self-claimed expert, simply wanting to learn and explore) is Pursuit of Accuracy.

Here is him shooting through a barrel at 100 yards.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08ZA...suitofAccuracy

Anyway, I digress. My point is that weight measurement may or may not be useful, but Eagle Eye shootings saying it is not helping is not conclusive...

Nothing wrong with "Pursuit of accuracy's skills or videos, but you do realise don't you that the video you posted a link to is entitled "Trick shot" which has a fairly specific meaning in the american shooting lexicon . . . . another example of this sort of expression is "there is a sucker born every minute"

You probably have to explain your point about the video titled "trick shot". I do not see any issues with it other than it is a very difficult shot and the guy pulled it off.

There are other cool videos of him:

* shooting a 50 yards KYL at 100 and 150 yards.
* shooting a 50 yards KYL at 94 yards with a semi.

Righto team, reading about the .22lr "uniforming" dies a member is making got me intrested in pushing this thread.

We do a mini F class at our local NZDA, 50m, conditions were not ideal.

I cracked open a new lot of cci std velocity, I think the last brick was not to my rifles liking maybe????



98/100, it was the best score that day, but it's a far cry from pulling 1 inch at 100m that many others seem to do. I'll be honest, if I could get 2 inches at 100 every time I would be super happy.

Is there a case that the uniforming dies could tighten this up? Or is it likely a rifle by rifle ammo by ammo case?

I'm time poor, and cci std is in my price range for what I do, hopefully someone had tread this road to make things easier.

Thanks Lars

Gidday. I'm far from an expert but I have spent a lot of time and coin shooting 22s (only modestly priced rifles, I leave to top shelf stuff like Annie's for those with "taste").

However I've bought and tested a lot of ammo over the years. I've proved to my own satisfaction what the guru's on Rimfire Central keep coming back to . ... "your 22 is only as accurate as your current batch of ammo" . My Lithgow shoots extremely well but with the batch of ammo I used for Rambos challenge, it was phenomenally accurate (5 consecutive 5 shot groups with an average of 0.293 at 50M). However the next batch of Eley match wasn't as good. This batch thing is why the 22 Benchrest guys in the USA send their rifles to the Lapua or Eley test centres, which shoot dozens of batches through the rifle to find the best one. Then the shooter buys as much of that batch as he can afford!

Another way to think about the above is when we developed a load for a centrefire we adjust the internal ballistics by adjusting the charge weight and seating depth - neither possible in 22RF.

The next thing you are up against is the standard the ammo manufacturer is using, I think I've read that CCI specifies that SV will shoot 2" at 100 yards. Most times it will do a lot better than that but it's not going to compete consistently with something like Eley the likes of R50 or Tenex. No amount of weighting/sorting/whatever is going to convert SV.

Just occasionally if you test enough batches you'll find a plum . . . I recently bought a swag of some S&B subs, usually it's very average but this particular batch has shot really well in three of my 22s and some other guys rifles too.

I suggest careful reading of the excellent info on Rimfire Central and the rimfire section of Snipers Hide (where there are several guys with real knowledge of things 22, along with many others who only think they know anything, and batch test till you're broke like me!

PS - that's an excellent effort at 50M, nothing wrong with your shooting!