22 ammunition - better or worse than years ago?
- Thread starter bedbugbilly
- Start date
Johnnymurad
New member
When my main shooter was a sig mosquito I thought all .22 bulk ammo was garbage. I would have duds and multiple jams per session with all of them, sometimes multiple jams per magazine... now I shoot ruger pistols and the duds have became very rare... maybe couple in a brick... no matter the brand...
22-rimfire
New member
You can't necessarily attribute jams or the commonality of jams with ALL bulk pack 22 ammo. You need to look at the specific brands. But more importantly, you need to look at your handgun. The Sig had a lot of problems.
My sense of the marketplace these days is that shooters have a much larger choice of 22 ammunition. The growing popularity of e-commerce has placed an amazing array of 22 ammunition available to the average shooter.
It is not all junk. But if you have problems with jamming and FTF's (fail to fire), I suggest you do not buy promotional bulk pack 22 ammo unless you are willing to accept some FTF's.
I believe the FTF rate was less in the 50's through 70's with the major US manufacturers.
My sense of the marketplace these days is that shooters have a much larger choice of 22 ammunition. The growing popularity of e-commerce has placed an amazing array of 22 ammunition available to the average shooter.
It is not all junk. But if you have problems with jamming and FTF's (fail to fire), I suggest you do not buy promotional bulk pack 22 ammo unless you are willing to accept some FTF's.
I believe the FTF rate was less in the 50's through 70's with the major US manufacturers.
Slugthrower
New member
Most of the problem with .22 rimfires for me originate in the bulk packages. When I buy the smaller packs of 50-100 by the brick there are far less duds in them. I also find pistols tend to not strike the primers as hard further increasing the tendency to misfire. If they are put back in the pistol and made to strike a different part of the primer they tend to fire on the second strike, though not always.
Since rimfire ammunition has the primer spun into the rim it is very supceptible to the packaging and distribution process. When you consider that the typical bulk pack is nothing more than a brick of ammo dumped into a box. The tiny fragile rounds are colliding at random and the process is likely dislodging the primer in the rim. You can figure that the primer is knocked about quite a bit.
Take into consideration that the rounds have been jarred around going into a bulk pack much more than the small 50 round packs. Add to that the rounds bouncing around inside the bulk pack as it moves down an assembly line and then being delivered in a truck that again beats the tiny rounds around in their box and it adds up to misfiring ammo.
By way of contrast the smaller boxes of rimfire ammo are not just tossed about in the same fashion as they have to be put into their trays, which by it's nature will not be as traumatic to the cases. Those rounds don't beat their rims and side walls against eachother as they are divided and seprated by their trays. When being transported they are not having as much stress placed on them as bulk packs without trays. I also think that 10 little boxes inside of a larger box tends to have a much better shock absorbing effects. When you compare it to the loose stuff.
There is also the volume of rimfire being produced to include in this tendency. It would be a pretty safe bet to assume that there is far more made today than 40 years ago. With that increase in volume there is a greater chance for bad rounds to get through the QC process. Bulk no doubt is a different production line and it proable they look less closely at those during QC.
Just as others have stated the cost of the rounds are very cheap in relation to the what they cost 30- 40 years ago too. This cheapness results from some cost cutting along the way and ends up showing up in the form of duds as well.
It is frustrating to get misfires in the ammuntion, but that is to be expected in rimfire ammo. I get very few so long as I avoid the bulk packs. They seem to be the real culprit in my own experience. IMO bulk packs offer no savings at all when they tend to cost you in lost rounds overall. It adds up in the long run.
Since rimfire ammunition has the primer spun into the rim it is very supceptible to the packaging and distribution process. When you consider that the typical bulk pack is nothing more than a brick of ammo dumped into a box. The tiny fragile rounds are colliding at random and the process is likely dislodging the primer in the rim. You can figure that the primer is knocked about quite a bit.
Take into consideration that the rounds have been jarred around going into a bulk pack much more than the small 50 round packs. Add to that the rounds bouncing around inside the bulk pack as it moves down an assembly line and then being delivered in a truck that again beats the tiny rounds around in their box and it adds up to misfiring ammo.
By way of contrast the smaller boxes of rimfire ammo are not just tossed about in the same fashion as they have to be put into their trays, which by it's nature will not be as traumatic to the cases. Those rounds don't beat their rims and side walls against eachother as they are divided and seprated by their trays. When being transported they are not having as much stress placed on them as bulk packs without trays. I also think that 10 little boxes inside of a larger box tends to have a much better shock absorbing effects. When you compare it to the loose stuff.
There is also the volume of rimfire being produced to include in this tendency. It would be a pretty safe bet to assume that there is far more made today than 40 years ago. With that increase in volume there is a greater chance for bad rounds to get through the QC process. Bulk no doubt is a different production line and it proable they look less closely at those during QC.
Just as others have stated the cost of the rounds are very cheap in relation to the what they cost 30- 40 years ago too. This cheapness results from some cost cutting along the way and ends up showing up in the form of duds as well.
It is frustrating to get misfires in the ammuntion, but that is to be expected in rimfire ammo. I get very few so long as I avoid the bulk packs. They seem to be the real culprit in my own experience. IMO bulk packs offer no savings at all when they tend to cost you in lost rounds overall. It adds up in the long run.
bedbugbilly
New member
Slugthrower - you make some very valid points that i hadn't considered. When I was a kid, all of the 22s we bought were packed 50 to a box - 10 boxes to a case (brick). Until I got back in to shooting new fangled cartridge guns a couple of years ago (I shot black powder since I was 12), I'd never purchased "bulk" ammo. My thinking was that the process of applying priming certainly hadn't changed much in the past 50 years - I never considered the "jostling" that the bulk 22s get when you consider their introduction into the bulk box/container, jostling during shipping/handling, etc.
When i got back in to shooting cartridge guns, most of it was 38spl and 9mm. I find myself shooting more 22s now - for plinking and target practice - mainly due to the ammo being cheaper. I'm not going to be too upset with some FTFs (which I have read quite a bit about) as it isn't a big issue for me - and so far, I haven't had any. I was basing my original post on what I'd been reading. Your comments on the "bulk ammo" make a lot of sense and is well taken. Trust me, in all the years that I've been shooting black powder, I have had more FTFs with the thousands of percussion caps that I've used than I probably will ever have with the "modern stuff".
When i got back in to shooting cartridge guns, most of it was 38spl and 9mm. I find myself shooting more 22s now - for plinking and target practice - mainly due to the ammo being cheaper. I'm not going to be too upset with some FTFs (which I have read quite a bit about) as it isn't a big issue for me - and so far, I haven't had any. I was basing my original post on what I'd been reading. Your comments on the "bulk ammo" make a lot of sense and is well taken. Trust me, in all the years that I've been shooting black powder, I have had more FTFs with the thousands of percussion caps that I've used than I probably will ever have with the "modern stuff".
Slugthrower
New member
Can identify with that Bedbug, in regard to primer caps for black powder firearms. They are real similar to a rimfire and can be problematic sometimes. Especially if you like to toss a bunch in a pouch and go out in the field with them.
Yeah. I think it is more common these days with production volumes as they are. Plus sometimes there are bad batches out there. Had a bulk box of Remington Golden Bullets a few years back that had a failure rate in excess of 10%. Decided after that one to just stick with the regular bricks. It was the right path for me as I use pistols a bit more than rifles in .22 LR.
If anything they seem to be put through a better QC than bulk and the few dollars more per brick is fine by me.
Yeah. I think it is more common these days with production volumes as they are. Plus sometimes there are bad batches out there. Had a bulk box of Remington Golden Bullets a few years back that had a failure rate in excess of 10%. Decided after that one to just stick with the regular bricks. It was the right path for me as I use pistols a bit more than rifles in .22 LR.
If anything they seem to be put through a better QC than bulk and the few dollars more per brick is fine by me.