10-22 After-market parts

1

1911A1 fan

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I bought a 10-22 some months back for plinking and squirrel hunting, you know I had forgotten how much fun a .22 can be! After the Marine Corps my interest in guns went more towards fighting guns. It's nice to come back to my roots. My question is,can anyone give me some advice on after-market parts to improve accuracy without braking my gun bank? I would like to keep this under $200. Thanks in advance for any help you all can give.
 
Braking the bank is fun!

I just spent an insane amount of money on a Ruger 10/22. MY main focus was at these two sites. On Target Guns and Volquartsen Custom.

I personally got the Volquartsen 16.5" THM barrel, Volquartsen Trigger Guard 2000, Hogue Overmolded stock, and just recently got a Volquartsen barrel mounted scope mount to fix my zero problems on my Burris 4-12x32 Compact Target scope. This is a very adequete squirrel gun. Here is the proof.

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IMO, the biggest improvement in accuracy for the 10/22 is to replace the stock barrel with one of the aftermarket or even the factory bull barrel. These can range anywhere from $75-$400. Again IMO, you don't really need the higher end barrels to get down to 1 MOA. To fit the barrel, you'll need a new stock or mill out the factory one. Another $60-$500 depending on how nice it looks or add-ons like adjustable butt, accessory rail, etc. A number of manufacturers like Butler Creek sell barrel/stock sets for sale to simplifying the purchase.

The next thing is the trigger. There are plenty out there and you can actually improve it yourself to a point by a little grinding.

Everything else is gravy that will make the 10/22 only slightly more accurate. You can thread the barrel to the receiver, bed the barrel/float the receiver, bed the receiver/float the barrel, two stage trigger, square the bolt to the barrel, bolt the scoperail/base to the barrel, bolt the scoperail/base to the receiver and the barrel, you name it. These will, of course, cost more money, usually a lot more money.
 
We've a couple & I've played a bit w/'em. Dropped a $150+ on a match grade bull barrel, those Hogue overmold stocks are nice, Volq trigger (might as well add in the bolt hold back feature while you're in there) ....

After all said & done, I've ended up going back to the factory barrel & stock (this one the Delux 10/22) - kept in the new trigger/bolt thing. $200+ worth of stuff in the closet I'm not using & ended up with a much nicer trigger for around $35 or so. Also, by going back to the standard, dropped about 1-1/2 lbs or so. Got a bit sick of lugging the extra weight of the bull bbl, etc.

The Wife's is a standard 10/22 w/4X kinda cheap-o scope & in a Hogue overmold. She was doing 10 for 10 at 25 yds on 7.62X39 empty brass last time at the range. Won't win any matches, but head shots on rabbits to around 60+yds is no sweat - plenty accurate.

I've no doubt that a Volq (& there's a couple other mfgrs that make some wonderful 10/22s - saw a feather weight I'd love to have), but for what I've experienced so far (with minimal playing) is first splurge for a decent trigger package & then, if you feel the need, drop some more. YMMV
 
It depends on what barrel you buy.

My Volquartsen THM 16.5" barrel is very light and makes the gun very handy while plinking targets from inside the car (theoretically since that of course is illegal). I went to the gun show a while back and they had a really expensive carbon bull barrel that was seriously like only a pound or two. It was so light it was amazing! My barrel was just a little heavier than it. Then there were steel bull barrels that probably weighed 8 or 9 pounds. I could see how that would not be fun!
 
Don't get me wrong. I'd love to have a coupla or so custom Volqs - lighter & more accurate the better. Pricey though & outa my range for "just a .22"

Original question was "best accuracy thing" for cheap.

Sounds like a trigger/target hammer job first - about $35-50 depending. After that, heck, it might start shooting better just dumping the factory crap trigger.

Think after that, I'd start running different ammo through it to squeeze out the best I can get. That alone could eat up the rest of the $200 ;)
 
great idea.

I would say that fixing the trigger and then spending money on different types of ammo would be a great idea. The thing is that spending all of that money on ammo is not necessary. Just buy one hundred rounds of each ammo that you want to test and that is enough for 10 10 round groups. A 10 round group out of your rifle is a very good indicator of how it shoots. I found that Federal 711B shoots very good out of my gun and I found that I liked the Winchester .22 hyper velocity hollow points the best for shooting critters. The CCI SGB (small game bullet) shot maybe even better than the target 711B, UM1, and 900. Problem with them is that their performance on small game is not very good. Another fun thing to try out is the CCI Quick Shot. The actual case on these shells is about a 1/16 to an 1/8" longer and they are hot little .22 LR loads. I would equate their performance to that of a .22 magnum. They are very effective on squirrels. Heck, they actually made my 10/22 kick and have felt recoil!

Work on that trigger and then go to a gun shop and just get as many different kinds of ammo as you can. You only need a 100 rounds each. Then when you figure out what you like best, then buy a ton of that stuff. Good luck and have fun.
 
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