RIA / Armscor M22 barrel swap possibilities

[rommelrommel]

I couldn't pass up one of these at 139.99 clearout at Wholesale.

I pushed my barrel out with a home brew press (holy crap was it tight) and it measures 0.720~ on my somewhat crap calipers.

0.685 is spec, some barrels running to 0.688 or so at the most it appears.

I'm thinking nothing but a custom barrel would do that. You could turn a barrel down further and try to have a sleeve machined, but at best it would be a one time install.

I don't think I'll pursue this but thought someone might like the actual measurements. I've seen a few people claim to run Ruger barrels but it seems unwise.

 

[wayupnorth]

i picked up 6 RIAs last year (couple for me rest for friends) and when i had them apart for their initial cleaning i was farting around with barrels.
i tried a stock ruger and it was loose of course.
but then i tried a TacSol barrel and it was almost there.
in fact i shimmed where the V block goes and it tightened up real good.
i didnt go shoot it because that barrel was destined for another build but it got me thinking......

when you buy some brands of after market barrels they come over sized so you have to sand them down and really work to get them in, tighter the fit the better.
i wouldnt be surprised if some of those fit in the RIA nice like.

but really, who wants to put a $250 barrel on a $130 gun?
unless of course you just happened to have a extra barrel laying around not being used.

 

[rommelrommel]

Yeah, I think I might just put the barrel back on (and fix the crappy indexing) and just throw a better stock on it.

I have some 10/22 projects in mind but messing with barrels on these receivers seems to be a waste of time.

The only thing is, 0.720 is a loooot bigger than 0.6875

 

[kjohn]

Hardly worth fiddling with. I have bought and sold several of these. I cleaned the WW2 Russian tank primer paint off mine and gave it a few shots of BLO. I did another one and it had beautiful tiger stripes, as well as a couple of body putty repairs. That one I stained a bit then BLO'd it. The rifle got a lot of attention at the gun show that I sold it at.

I shot a pile of gophers with mine and haven't cleaned it yet. I still have one in the box, but it is missing the scope rail and screws. I might doll it up as well, and will likely have to adapt a Ruger rail.

Not sure why people find it necessary to fault the little rifles. They are, after all, just cheap rifles. At $140 + tax, they are a pretty good deal. But what do I know!

 

[P of PDent]

When we handled Volquartsen parts I installed several of their barrels in standard 10/22 receivers and found out they were an interference fit. I had to use the old millwright trick of freezing the barrel in the home freezer and then poured boiling water over the receiver that would give about 10 seconds of adjustment time to align the barrel correctly. This made for a very tight fit and you really didn't even have to use the V block mount. So if you can find an original Volquartsen barrel you might be able to mount it properly with a little gasket maker to fill in the small gap in the receiver. I was quite disappointed when we ordered these (RIA) in initially during the great Ruger 10/22 shortage a few years ago and then found out regular barrels wouldn't fit and on top of the really ugly wood and stain we didn't order any more. The price the WSS is selling these at retail is less than we paid wholesale so they clearly are a decent price. Phil.