.222 Remington Magnum

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I decided to crawl into bed with good book last night. I turned on the night light and opened the Nosler No.4 Reloading Manual. I came upon the .222 Remington Magnum. I have given that chambering thought in the past, but not too much recently. I recall that several European manufacturers chambered it at one point - Steyr-Mannlicher's fine little SL, and Sako comes to mind. Maybe Anschutz too?

Then of course there is the Remington 700 BDL, which I think is porobably as rare as hen's teeth in that chambering. That would be slick classic, wouldn't it?

Do any of you have one? Is brass still available? I guess you could just reform .204 Ruger brass, right?
 
204 brass is necked down .222 i believe, not the magnum. I have actually seen a BDL in .222 rem mag, nice guns and apparently shoot amazing. Standard .222 is my preference, had good experiences with that cartridge.
 
I had one in a 700 BDL a few years back. I had a reamer in my posession at one time also,...thought it would make a good alternative to the 223AI and it would feed better.
 
Midrange said:
204 brass is necked down .222 i believe, not the magnum. I have actually seen a BDL in .222 rem mag, nice guns and apparently shoot amazing. Standard .222 is my preference, had good experiences with that cartridge.
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Nope, .204 is the .222 Mag case. While curious, the brass acquisition / forming challenges would make me choose either the .223 with a hair less performance, or .22-250 if you wanted more. The .222 Mag seems like a perfect chambering for those with an interest in doing things the hard way. I fall into that group myself from time to time.
 
Ardent said:
While curious, the brass acquisition / forming challenges would make me choose either the .223 with a hair less performance, or .22-250 if you wanted more. The .222 Mag seems like a perfect chambering for those with an interest in doing things the hard way. I fall into that group myself from time to time.
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Two points: the curious/doing things the hard way should be enough in and of itself. But if not, note that we are talking about a MAGNUM here. And one without a belt to boot. Although with your kink for the .375 H&H I suspect the lack of a belt may be a negative in your books!:p

gunrunner100 said:
I have an early Steyr Mannlicher SL in that chambering, with a fair amount of brass to boot. Have not shot it much.
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That sounds nice - I assume it is the stutzen, correct? Did those have a 1:14 twist?
 
I have a SAKO L461 chambered in .222 mag. Its a recent acquisition and while I haven't done much with it yet, it does look promising. The cartridge has the capacity of the .223 combined with the neck length of the .222 making is a bit better than either. The fellow I bought it from used it to dust a fox he lazed at 500 yards, so it has the potential to stretch its legs. Who says you need a .22-250 or a Swift for those long shots. The 1:14 restricts me to light bullets, but when I need more my .243's waiting.

These little micro action rifles (SAKO, CZ/Brno, Kricos etc) feed much better than Remington 700s with their blocked magazines. You'd have thought that when Remington developed this family of cartridges, they'd have designed a more suitable scaled down rifle for them.
 
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222RM2.jpg

L to R: 222 Remington, 222 Remington Magnum and 223 Remington

My Steyr Mannlicher SL-
222RM.jpg
 
Boomer said:
These little micro action rifles (SAKO, CZ/Brno, Kricos etc) feed much better than Remington 700s with their blocked magazines. You'd have thought that when Remington developed this family of cartridges, they'd have designed a more suitable scaled down rifle for them.
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While I agree that a scaled down version of the 700 action would have been a nice touch, I have owned several 700 Short action rifles in 222 and 223, plus one 222 mag [Should have kept it], and have never had even the slightest feed issues with any of them.
My present 222, a 700 Classic, feeds as slick as can be, and I have had zero issues with it.
The fact that it will put 5 - 50 V-Max Hornadys into less than ½moa on a regular basis endears it to me.
Regards, Eagleye.
 
Would have been interesting if the USA adopted the 222 mag instead of the 223 :)

Although in this day and age, a 222 RM doesn't offer enough over more common cartridges that I'd ever bother with one unless I already had one. Only about 100 fps speed advantage over a .223, less speed than a .22-250. Heck, I'd even go 223 AI before a .222 Remington, and I'm not a real AI fan :)
 
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Eagleye said:
While I agree that a scaled down version of the 700 action would have been a nice touch, I have owned several 700 Short action rifles in 222 and 223, plus one 222 mag [Should have kept it], and have never had even the slightest feed issues with any of them.
My present 222, a 700 Classic, feeds as slick as can be, and I have had zero issues with it.
The fact that it will put 5 - 50 V-Max Hornadys into less than ½moa on a regular basis endears it to me.
Regards, Eagleye.
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I was so frustrated with the way my my 700 in .222 fed that I had it converted to a single shot when I had the Gaillard installed. The factory barrel gave ho-humm accuracy compared to what I expected, but after installed the custom barrel and truing up the bolt, it was the most accurate rifle I had ever owned.
 
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