22LR Ammunition Availability

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22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 24 Oct 2022, 4:01 am

Buying a new rifle. Want to put a few different makes through it. Anyone in Victoria know where I can reliably get a good variety including SK. PM if you want, I'm not going to empty the shop. There's plenty of CCI sub around, RWS, Eley, but this SK stuff just eludes me and I really want to try it.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by bladeracer » 24 Oct 2022, 9:34 am

madang55 wrote:Buying a new rifle. Want to put a few different makes through it. Anyone in Victoria know where I can reliably get a good variety including SK. PM if you want, I'm not going to empty the shop. There's plenty of CCI sub around, RWS, Eley, but this SK stuff just eludes me and I really want to try it.


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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by deye243 » 24 Oct 2022, 12:44 pm

Try the Norma tac 22 I think you will be happy with that stuff
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 25 Oct 2022, 6:12 pm

There just isn't any of what I want to be had, anywhere in Melbourne or country Vic. The cupboard is bare. Shall have to be content with what I've got and can get.
.
NOW....we all know what we do with a new Centre fire barrel to run it in. is there some secret formula to run a rim fire barrel in, or just go for it? I've got a couple of hundred rounds of who knows what in the safe. I was thinking of using it up, giving the action a clean and the barrel a swab then getting serious.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by bladeracer » 25 Oct 2022, 8:06 pm

madang55 wrote:There just isn't any of what I want to be had, anywhere in Melbourne or country Vic. The cupboard is bare. Shall have to be content with what I've got and can get.
.
NOW....we all know what we do with a new Centre fire barrel to run it in. is there some secret formula to run a rim fire barrel in, or just go for it? I've got a couple of hundred rounds of who knows what in the safe. I was thinking of using it up, giving the action a clean and the barrel a swab then getting serious.


I don't do anything to run any barrel in, push a patch through, grab some ammo and go shooting.

With .22LR I've found that it's difficult to test ammo for accuracy within the first thousand rounds or so in a new barrel. I recommend spending that first thousand rounds getting acquainted with the rifle and scope shooting whatever cheap stuff you have available. After that you can start testing ammo to determine which it prefers. I start the test session at 50m with five or ten groups with CCI Std velocity to confirm I'm in the right zone for shooting fairly well. Then I start with ten 5rd groups of a manufacturer's bulk or cheapest stuff to coat the bore with that lube. Then shoot five 5rd groups with each of that manufacturer's ammo (this just lets you shoot two tests from a single box). Then finish off the session with another five groups of CCI SV to ensure I'm still on my game. Anything that shoots well can then be tested again at 100m. Anything that shoots well at 100m will very likely shoot okay out past there.

I have found very few types of ammo that care what ammo you've fed the rifle before, but there are a few odd ones that can be finnicky and take a few groups to settle in. I've found my rifles tend to maintain their group sizes up to somewhere in the 800rd to 1500rd region before the bore needs cleaning. Any ammo that either needs settling in or prefers a clean bore is useless to me.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by deye243 » 25 Oct 2022, 9:37 pm

Just clean it and shoot it and then when accuracy drops off clean it again going to send you a p.m. about ammo availability to
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 26 Oct 2022, 8:27 am

Gentleman, thank you all.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Mattraff » 26 Oct 2022, 9:39 pm

I have wanted to try SK as they have a stack of different rounds but have always found supply to erratic. I have however tried a few of their rounds but none were much better than anything else I have used.
In general I think since covid and the change in government in the US we have seen a greater variety of rimfire ammo and some shortages. There seems to be many more offerings from Remington readily available. Magtech and Aguila are brands that have not been seennfor many years and Selling & Bellot have a few offerings. I have become a fan of Eley ammo as it really performs well in all my rimfires. For the range I'm using the cheap Eley standard bulk pack and find it to be more than acceptable easily putting 10 rounds in 10mm groups @50. For the field I'm using Eley subsonic hollow points as I have found them to be one of the quietest and have excellent accuracy. I think value for money CCI subsonics would have to be one of the best field rounds available as they are extremely consistent performers and well priced.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Oldbloke » 26 Oct 2022, 10:55 pm

SK were the best in my brno m2.

But, hard to come by and almost twice the price of RWS club.
So guess what I bought 1k of?

Trouble is club are not HP and are primarily used for hunting. Life is about compromise unfortunately.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by bladeracer » 26 Oct 2022, 11:02 pm

Mattraff wrote:I have wanted to try SK as they have a stack of different rounds but have always found supply to erratic. I have however tried a few of their rounds but none were much better than anything else I have used.
In general I think since covid and the change in government in the US we have seen a greater variety of rimfire ammo and some shortages. There seems to be many more offerings from Remington readily available. Magtech and Aguila are brands that have not been seennfor many years and Selling & Bellot have a few offerings. I have become a fan of Eley ammo as it really performs well in all my rimfires. For the range I'm using the cheap Eley standard bulk pack and find it to be more than acceptable easily putting 10 rounds in 10mm groups @50. For the field I'm using Eley subsonic hollow points as I have found them to be one of the quietest and have excellent accuracy. I think value for money CCI subsonics would have to be one of the best field rounds available as they are extremely consistent performers and well priced.


Same with SK, hard to find them and none of them shoot so well for me that I'm going to chase them up.

Remington is one that I find has both very good and very poor ammunition, I don't mind it. Even the Golden Bullets and Cyclones aren't too terrible.

Never seen Magtech .22LR ammo, but I've tried all of the Aguila except two types, mostly okay but nothing special.

S&B doesn't shoot well for me in anything but it's not awful.

Eley is very, very good, but expensive. I've used around 5,000rds of Eley Standard in the past twelve months and I find it pretty good in two rifles, but it has far too many low-powered rounds, so low as to spit gas back out past the bolt and drop the bullet short at 100m. I would guess around 10% are such rounds. It is far below all of Eley's other ammo. The price is good but not great. I'm impressed that you're seeing such consistency out of this stuff. I primarily use it for practicing offhand lever-action Silhouette because it shoots quite well in my Henry H001 (I also use CCI SV and Federal F510 in this rifle). I'm down to less than 2000rds now and struggling to justify buying more of it. The price is around $1100 a case currently so it's not even particularly cheap. Still undecided on it.

Most of CCI's offerings shoot very well for me. The Subsonic is decent but falls short of the accuracy of Standard Velocity. CCI Quiet is very quiet while still being reasonably accurate.

The cheapest stuff I've used is Highland and it shoots very well considering its price. But the truncated bullets tend not to feed well in some things. I still have a few thousand rounds but if I see Highland again I'll grab it as it's great cheap plinking ammo to keep on hand for when friends drop in.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by bladeracer » 26 Oct 2022, 11:14 pm

Oldbloke wrote:SK were the best in my brno m2.

But, hard to come by and almost twice the price of RWS club.
So guess what I bought 1k of?

Trouble is club are not HP and are primarily used for hunting. Life is about compromise unfortunately.


Don't be too concerned about hollow-points, millions of small game have been taken just fine with iron-sight, single-shot .22's with the cheapest round-nose ammo that could be found on shelves - it works just fine. The Short was invented in the 1850's, the Long showed up in the 1870's, and the Long Rifle finally arrived in the 1890's - I don't know when the first hollow-point bullet was offered in these cartridges but I don't think it was a game-changer :-)
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Oldbloke » 27 Oct 2022, 5:04 am

bladeracer wrote:
Oldbloke wrote:SK were the best in my brno m2.

But, hard to come by and almost twice the price of RWS club.
So guess what I bought 1k of?

Trouble is club are not HP and are primarily used for hunting. Life is about compromise unfortunately.


Don't be too concerned about hollow-points, millions of small game have been taken just fine with iron-sight, single-shot .22's with the cheapest round-nose ammo that could be found on shelves - it works just fine. The Short was invented in the 1850's, the Long showed up in the 1870's, and the Long Rifle finally arrived in the 1890's - I don't know when the first hollow-point bullet was offered in these cartridges but I don't think it was a game-changer :-)


We've had this discussion before. It makes a big difference.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Lazarus » 27 Oct 2022, 5:37 pm

Oldbloke wrote:
bladeracer wrote:
Oldbloke wrote:SK were the best in my brno m2.

But, hard to come by and almost twice the price of RWS club.
So guess what I bought 1k of?

Trouble is club are not HP and are primarily used for hunting. Life is about compromise unfortunately.


Don't be too concerned about hollow-points, millions of small game have been taken just fine with iron-sight, single-shot .22's with the cheapest round-nose ammo that could be found on shelves - it works just fine. The Short was invented in the 1850's, the Long showed up in the 1870's, and the Long Rifle finally arrived in the 1890's - I don't know when the first hollow-point bullet was offered in these cartridges but I don't think it was a game-changer :-)


We've had this discussion before. It makes a big difference.



I found some hv solids in my rimfire safe, if anyone's interested I can do a side by side gel test.

I have two more centrefire tests to do first.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Oldbloke » 27 Oct 2022, 5:50 pm

Club is a subbie
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Lazarus » 27 Oct 2022, 6:03 pm

Wellll, I have Center X and some S&B sub hp
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by bladeracer » 27 Oct 2022, 7:15 pm

Lazarus wrote:I found some hv solids in my rimfire safe, if anyone's interested I can do a side by side gel test.

I have two more centrefire tests to do first.


Can you determine whether the the bullet deforms within the first inch of the block to simulate it passing through the very light construction of a rabbit's head?
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Oldbloke » 27 Oct 2022, 7:45 pm

I wasn't clear.

RWS Club is a subbie solid.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Lazarus » 27 Oct 2022, 7:55 pm

bladeracer wrote:
Lazarus wrote:I found some hv solids in my rimfire safe, if anyone's interested I can do a side by side gel test.

I have two more centrefire tests to do first.


Can you determine whether the the bullet deforms within the first inch of the block to simulate it passing through the very light construction of a rabbit's head?



As the gel is just that, gel, without the bones and other tissue of varying density I can only provide a generalised qualification not a direct, clinical, quantification of the different expansion and energy transfer gradients of the real thing.

If this isn't good enough, I'll gladly forego the embuggerance involved.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by safeshot » 31 Oct 2022, 11:01 pm

madang55 wrote:Buying a new rifle. Want to put a few different makes through it. Anyone in Victoria know where I can reliably get a good variety including SK. PM if you want, I'm not going to empty the shop. There's plenty of CCI sub around, RWS, Eley, but this SK stuff just eludes me and I really want to try it.


:welcome: I have a Lithgow 101 and in bench rest I like the 'red devils' the SK Red ammo. If there is no wind then the SK Green pistol ammo is tops.
Eley in my experience is good for plinking little else.
CCI gives good results and is consistent. but my fav is the reds.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Marlin44 » 01 Nov 2022, 6:03 am

My dealer tells me there is an SK shipment mid November.
They also said it will 18 months to 2 years for next shipment. I would recommend if you see what you use BUY IT.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by deye243 » 01 Nov 2022, 8:46 pm

bladeracer wrote:
Lazarus wrote:I found some hv solids in my rimfire safe, if anyone's interested I can do a side by side gel test.

I have two more centrefire tests to do first.


Can you determine whether the the bullet deforms within the first inch of the block to simulate it passing through the very light construction of a rabbit's head?


Somehow I doubt it in my experience with several post shot autopsies on larger mammals round nose usually go in 3" to 4" and tumble then actually make as much or more damage than a hollow point reason why not a great choice for a rabbit.
you can actually hear the difference between a round nose and a soft lead hollow point ( like the old Winchester Subsonic or cci sub Sonic HP , cci suppressor) when it hits a rabbit in the shoulder one has more of a crack (solid) the other on the other hand has a Harwompa ( yep my redneck word) people here may not agree with my methods on vermin but I don't care rabbits I see gray i send it I see a fox I see Orange i shoot i don't care as long as they're on the ground dead so I don't use sub calibres on foxes or any vermin .
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 23 Nov 2022, 11:24 pm

1. anyone seen an improvement in 22LR ammunition stocks in the shops yet? The basic stuff is trickling in.
2. Who has a recipe for GEL blocks. i.e. Can Gel blocks be made, shot up, melted and re-made? That would be handy.
3. Have been using subs in the bunny wars for a few weeks now, and the CCI HP are nasty good.One head shot even resulted in a ricochet that sounded like I hit a rock. (hard headed rabbit)
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Lazarus » 24 Nov 2022, 7:38 am

madang55 wrote:1. anyone seen an improvement in 22LR ammunition stocks in the shops yet? The basic stuff is trickling in.
2. Who has a recipe for GEL blocks. i.e. Can Gel blocks be made, shot up, melted and re-made? That would be handy.
3. Have been using subs in the bunny wars for a few weeks now, and the CCI HP are nasty good.One head shot even resulted in a ricochet that sounded like I hit a rock. (hard headed rabbit)


I made my gel from food grade gelatin powder, 3kg of powder to 30lt of water.

I tried blooming the first batch it but it was cloudy so I just used 60° water and it came out fine.
If you want it to last, put some clove oil in the mix.
My 33kg block lasted nearly 6 months of use and remelting before mold invaded.

I reused it over 30 times.

Also, rub some cooking oil on the inside of your mould or it will be a bitch to get out.
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 24 Nov 2022, 9:44 am

Cheers, thanks for that.......blooming?
grease the mould, definitely...
clove oil? what that do?
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by Lazarus » 24 Nov 2022, 10:01 am

madang55 wrote:Cheers, thanks for that.......blooming?
grease the mould, definitely...
clove oil? what that do?


Blooming is mixing the powder with cold water and letting it swell into a thick flegmy shyte before melting and pouring into the mold.

I did try it but the result was less than spectacular.
I ended up using a big cast iron slow cooker and as stated, 60-70° worked for me.

I used the clove oil to prevent mould buildup, the recipe I found suggested peppermint oil but I had clove and it will kill the Alien.
I used 10ml in the 30lt.

Any sort of lubricant in the mold should do, but the lighter the better, I used cooking oil.

On the mold, avoid anything that has internal ridges or such, obviously the smoother the better.

I would use the 10% mix, that's FBI standard, also, any less and the gel is too fragile to handle.

If shooting it with a centrefire, wrapping your block in cling wrap helps stop major fracturing.

Good luck :drinks:
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Re: 22LR Ammunition Availability

Post by madang55 » 24 Nov 2022, 10:39 pm

Now the fun starts
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