Ammo Discussion All Rimfire Brands

Max Owner

Max Owner

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Hey all. I read some stuff last week that made me realize I know nothing about rimfire ammo.

What got me thinking, was mentions that Remington Thunderbolts are a dirty, kind of junk ammo. Ofcourse I bought 10,000 rounds to shoot in my GLock 44. Cause it shot well.

So this year I plan on shooting ssooooo much more rimfire in handgun and rifle. Rifle, most will be for precision and accuracy. Some other rifles will be plinking type stuff. Hnadgun will be plinking in a semi and a few revolvers.

Outside of Lapua Center X being the top "gold standard" for accuracy. And CCI Standard velocity being the "gold standard" for budget accuracy, I don't know much. So looking for details like cleanliness. Some ammo brands gum up rifles. Typical accuracy of makes and models. Characteristics. Looking for a whole education on ammo as I am ordering stuff of varying kinds to try out and see how things go. This is open to all opinions, brands and models.

One thread in this forum, someone posted that they pulled a 3" piece of lead out of the rifling of a handgun barrel. Think it was suggested it was related to a particular brand of ammo.
 
Standard velocity ammo is usually the most accurate, for rifle and top tier handgun competitors the Lapua and Eley brands are a good choice. Most of us will do just fine with any economy standard velocity ammo some guns are picky about brands/lots. For practice/training I use federal standard velocity, for matches I’ll use cci or eley sport.
 
Max Owner said:
I am ordering stuff of varying kinds to try out and see how things go.
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This is the key, every rifle is different. A few years ago I had a CZ that shot the cheap American Eagle every bit as well as the SK Rifle Match. Try it all out. Of course, the good stuff is much more likely to shoot well. :)
 
I have had good results for benchrest match shooting in CZ and Anschutz rifles with SK, Eley and Lapua, in all the mid-range priced ammo versions. My favourite target ammo is SK Biathlon Sport, which I use summer and winter. SK Biathlon is slightly higher velocity that most "standard" subsonic target ammo, just under the supersonic threshold, and I find that little extra speed comes in handy for dealing with wind holds on target, and of course it does well in the cold. This is not plinking, this is precision benchrest with a 45 power scope and fully supported rifle on BR rests. There are however crazy fliers, one guaranteed in just about every 50-round box, so you need to be prepared to lose a BR match because of the ammo. The only consolation is that the other guys will also likely have a crazy flier or two in their mid-range priced ammo, evening out the flier effect.

Splurging occaisionally for BR matches, I have tried Lapua Center-X, Lapua Midas, and Eley Team, but I have not seen overall better performance with these more expensive target ammos compared to the SK line.

For grouse hunting I use Eley Subsonic Hollow Point ammo, and am very pleased with it.

I started out with CCI, but I find when using repeater mags (not my single feed adapter mag for benchrest), that CCI ammo has feeding issues and fail to feed in my CZ's. Something the CZ 5-round mags don't like about feeding the 5th round. I killed alot of grouse with the CCI Subsonic Hollow Points using my CZ's, but the feeding jams just became too irritating, and were the cause of many grouse escaping on me as I fumbled with jammed CCI rounds. Once I switched to the Eley SS HP's, feeding and ejection was smooth as silk. My CZ's seem to like the European ammo better than the CCI. I have not tried the CCI line in my Anschutz target rifle, as it seems happy with the SK, Eley and Lapua ammo.

For plinking on spinners and gongs and reactive targets, anything goes. I have a large backlog of supply of old CCI, Thunderbolts, Aguila, Winchester, and various other junk ammos that are fun for the reactive targets where I don't care how inaccurate they are. The cheapo ammos typically produce 2 to 3 inch groups or larger at 50m. In fact some of these junk brands are so bad I don't even bother shooting them on paper targets to find out how bad they are. I just use them for the reactive targets.

For the cheapo ammo, be prepared to clean your rifle more often to get the carbon out. The Thunderbolts deserve special mention as the dirtiest carbonizing ammo I have ever used!
 
just picked up a new TM22, I've only used CCI in the past, but I'm just about to purchase a bunch of different budget 22lr ammo. I will report back once i've completed my testing.
 
For rifle wrt to LR PRS... I practise with SK Rifle Match... I compete with Lapua CenterX, Midas+ and XACT. Most of the time, it is CX. SK and Lapua use similar powders/lubes so going between types is easy.

For semi HG, I have a Ruger and usually run CCI Blazer or Fed HV.

Jerry
 
I've never found .22 ammo quality to be nearly as important for accuracy in handguns as it is in rifles. Ever since the Obama presidency caused panic to set in the USA where it's made, what the cheap crap ammo has affected in semi auto handguns AND rifles is actual operation, things like failures to feed, stove piping, double loading and failures to fire. That is because of the remarkably low quality control on some of the stuff, tolerances are almost a joke. I actually use such stuff to my advantage as the defective rounds give lots of training opportunities to train in how to clear the handgun while maintaining shooting. I guess that's what you call making lemonade out of lemons.

As far as handgun accuracy goes, most of the problem with that is no doubt at my end but I do quite well with Federal Champion; it's almost flawless, as I say within my own limits. If I was ever competing in .22 handgun, I would be shooting the brands already mentioned, Eley at the top then SK, RMS, etc.
 
^^^ One more note about budget .22 ammo (or any cheap stuff), which is that you have to be particularly alert to weak underloaded rounds that only send the bullet halfway down the barrel; you might not even hear that with ear pro on. You can't just keep shooting when that happens, you have to stop and check the bore to ensure it hasn't been blocked, as clearly wasn't done in the case of the 3" of lead that was removed from the handgun barrel mentioned in the OP. Stop shooting, eject the magazine, check the problem round to see if the bullet is still there. If it isn't, check the chamber and then the barrel. In a safe manner, keeping the possibility of hang fires in mind.
 
Competition in BR50 lead to starting a 100 Metre Rimfire Benchrest, as well as 100 Yard at another club and now extended to 200 metres.

One of the more famous quotes I often site is "My rifle loves Blazer". The love affair ends at the first 100 Metre match.

Speed Steel is more to finding the right ammo that functions the action so Blazer, ThunderBolt, CCI MiniMags and CCI SV have been mixed over a period of time because there was a question as to origin.
The 10/22 meet my needs and sighted in at 25 yards with a RedDot works in this environment.

A Ruger MkII with 10" bull barrel was a bear to clean with a complete disassembly so it was shot until there were function issues. All high velocity and CIL Canuck were the mainstays.

Finding the right ammunition for every firearm remains a matter of testing to find the right combination.
 
Max Owner said:
Hey all. I read some stuff last week that made me realize I know nothing about rimfire ammo.

What got me thinking, was mentions that Remington Thunderbolts are a dirty, kind of junk ammo. Ofcourse I bought 10,000 rounds to shoot in my GLock 44. Cause it shot well.

So this year I plan on shooting ssooooo much more rimfire in handgun and rifle. Rifle, most will be for precision and accuracy. Some other rifles will be plinking type stuff. Hnadgun will be plinking in a semi and a few revolvers.

Outside of Lapua Center X being the top "gold standard" for accuracy. And CCI Standard velocity being the "gold standard" for budget accuracy, I don't know much. So looking for details like cleanliness. Some ammo brands gum up rifles. Typical accuracy of makes and models. Characteristics. Looking for a whole education on ammo as I am ordering stuff of varying kinds to try out and see how things go. This is open to all opinions, brands and models.

One thread in this forum, someone posted that they pulled a 3" piece of lead out of the rifling of a handgun barrel. Think it was suggested it was related to a particular brand of ammo.
Click to expand...

With respect to ammo/accuracy, if you're a reloader (?) and have worked-up loads...that's kind of the way to think about rimfire/ammo options. A better comparison might be if you've had difficulty coming up with a good load for a rifle, and have cycled through a number of powders/charges, bullet types/grain weights...then had to play with seating depths. Maybe even switch primer types. Meaning, there may only BE one or two ammo types that shoot very accurately from the gun you've chosen=it's up to you to load test and figure out which one it is. I've been shooting rimfire pretty enthusiastically with only a couple of brushes with fine rifles. My (limited) experience is that when you start getting up there...often the best guns are the fussiest. Not a problem, just depends on your budget/goals.
 
Big Bad said:
^^^ One more note about budget .22 ammo (or any cheap stuff), which is that you have to be particularly alert to weak underloaded rounds that only send the bullet halfway down the barrel; you might not even hear that with ear pro on. You can't just keep shooting when that happens, you have to stop and check the bore to ensure it hasn't been blocked, as clearly wasn't done in the case of the 3" of lead that was removed from the handgun barrel mentioned in the OP. Stop shooting, eject the magazine, check the problem round to see if the bullet is still there. If it isn't, check the chamber and then the barrel. In a safe manner, keeping the possibility of hang fires in mind.
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In the tens of thousands of rounds of 22LR I've shot, I've never once had a squib, and never heard of anyone that has. The lead in the barrel was likely due to leading from shooting uncoated bullets, not from piling rounds on top of a squib. I learned that my crap 22 1911 didn't like bare lead bullets, and I pulled a slug of lead out about an inch long that was partially obstructing the barrel after watching accuracy degrade pretty rapidly at a match.
 
Scotty454 said:
In the tens of thousands of rounds of 22LR I've shot, I've never once had a squib, and never heard of anyone that has. The lead in the barrel was likely due to leading from shooting uncoated bullets, not from piling rounds on top of a squib. I learned that my crap 22 1911 didn't like bare lead bullets, and I pulled a slug of lead out about an inch long that was partially obstructing the barrel after watching accuracy degrade pretty rapidly at a match.
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I've had 3-4 squibs shooting Winchester and Remington .22 LR and two with Winchester 9 mm. If I'm correctly reading what is stated in another post here a 3" lead rod came out as the result of merely cleaning an ordinarily fouled barrel, I have to bow out because I cannot suspend my grasp of the possible that much.

This is the kind of possibility I'm talking about:

omamfciqg1uiper3pdrj.jpg
 
Max - I just want to mention that there are many other forums for rimfire 'advice', ranging from 'By Brand' ie CZ, Savage, etc. on to 'Benchrest accuracy' to Long range shooting. I've found lots of info on various sites.
 
Biologist said:
I have had good results for benchrest match shooting in CZ and Anschutz rifles with SK, Eley and Lapua, in all the mid-range priced ammo versions. My favourite target ammo is SK Biathlon Sport, which I use summer and winter. SK Biathlon is slightly higher velocity that most "standard" subsonic target ammo, just under the supersonic threshold, and I find that little extra speed comes in handy for dealing with wind holds on target, and of course it does well in the cold.
Click to expand...

This was surprising and caught my attention. Why do you say that ammo with a higher velocity "comes in handy for dealing with wind holds"?
 
Max Owner said:
Hey all. I read some stuff last week that made me realize I know nothing about rimfire ammo.

What got me thinking, was mentions that Remington Thunderbolts are a dirty, kind of junk ammo. Ofcourse I bought 10,000 rounds to shoot in my GLock 44. Cause it shot well.

So this year I plan on shooting ssooooo much more rimfire in handgun and rifle. Rifle, most will be for precision and accuracy. Some other rifles will be plinking type stuff. Hnadgun will be plinking in a semi and a few revolvers.

Outside of Lapua Center X being the top "gold standard" for accuracy. And CCI Standard velocity being the "gold standard" for budget accuracy, I don't know much. So looking for details like cleanliness. Some ammo brands gum up rifles. Typical accuracy of makes and models. Characteristics. Looking for a whole education on ammo as I am ordering stuff of varying kinds to try out and see how things go. This is open to all opinions, brands and models.

One thread in this forum, someone posted that they pulled a 3" piece of lead out of the rifling of a handgun barrel. Think it was suggested it was related to a particular brand of ammo.
Click to expand...

It may not be clear as to exactly what kind of inforrmation you are looking for.

Are you looking for information on what ammos are cleaner than others? Or for ammo that doesn't cost much and will shoot reasonably well and cycle through your semi auto handgun? Or for information on ammo performance in rifles that are supposed to shoot well?

The answers for each will be different.
 
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For me I have found the ammo to be gun-specific and even then, what one person's experience may entail may not be another's.

I will say that over the years, I have developed some feelings towards certain brands and types of ammo, less regarding accuracy and more towards usability/functionality. For instance, Remington Golden Bullets feed terribly through my Savage bolt, but they ran fine through my CZ bolt. I haven't bought anymore, since the 525 pack sales years ago.

Yes, Thunderbolts were really trashy quality. Forget the accuracy portion - I have had rounds that were slightly deformed, loose bullets...I'm surprised I never got a squib out of those. Winchester Super X was marginally better but not by much.

Standard stuff like CCI SV is great. I personally like the S&B Canadian match. The SK Standard (yellow) is superb but it's not budget ammo.

Personally if I were to have one kind of ammo both bolt, lever and semi auto rifles, it would be CCI Mini Mags. That stuff is the epitome of reliability, especially cycling in a semi-auto. And while some may hate it, the Aguila Super Extra has been pretty good as well, though it seems to run dirtier.
 
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