Lead free / non-fragmenting .22lr ammo

S

simonrichter

New member
When I do backyard plinking with my .22lr, I try to collect the lead so it doesn't get into the soil. Alas, the .22 bullets tend to splinter and crack into (in some cases very small) pieces even if shot into relatively soft targets like telephone books.
Is there any sort of .22lr ammo with a harder bullet that is more likely to stay in one piece?
Of course, a lead-free variant would also be worth considering, although other metals aren't that much more environmental friendly...
 
Maybe change your target to better collect the bullets?
Aren't there bullet traps available that capture the bullets, fragments and all?
Shouldn't be all that hard with .22s.
Maybe a container full of sand would do the job.
 
g.willikers said:
Maybe change your target to better collect the bullets?
Click to expand...
Although I can't find it now, I recall seeing plans for a simple bullet trap consisting of a sturdy plywood box with a 1/4" steel plate hung at a 45° angle above a thick bed of sand. The bullets ricochet downwards into the sand. Recovering the fragments would be a simple matter of periodically sifting the sand through an improvised sieve made from standard window screening.
 
^^^^
A friend who used to test his reloads in his basement had such an arrangement for .45 and .38super.
So, it ought to work well for .22 rimfires, too.
 
you may be referring to my box. although i still have it, and occasionally use it, that 45 degree angled metal sheet would cause the bullets to slide down to the back some of the time, had to add another straight slab of metal in a V at the base of the sheet.

here is the original thread and the flaming that insued. i guess the pics are in another folder. ill put one up.
http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=549808

i assume .22LR would be very easy to capture though.
 




that's a peice of 24x24 stell that i had made at a welding shop. i just bought a full 8' sheet and had them cut into a bunch of 2x2' squares for target shooting, and one ended up in here. i don't think i paid even 60$ for all of them. it works great for .38 and other low velocity, but any fast 9mm would slide and imbedd in the wood. but if your shooting at 25yard or greater, just use a less severe angle and your .22's would be fine.
 
I shoot into a 8X8 post and they stay there unless I miss terribly. I have to replace it every few months because I also shoot 9s ad 380s into the same post. You just cut off a 4' piece, put a board across the bottom to keep it stable and a brace to the rear to hold it upright.
 
I would only caution that a single plate trap like that can bounce bullets back at a shooter.

Depending on the space one has available, one could have a sheet of steel slanted upward at a shallow angle terminating more than halfway up the backstop, and a sheet slatned downward terminating more than halfway down the stop but set further back.

The shallow angle should help to make penetration less likely, and the overlap of the termination point should both prevent any direct impact to the back and insure that every shot spends energy bouncing at least twice before heading for the sand.
 
thanks for the interesting ideas - an installation where you don't have to sieve the fragmented lead out of sand or soil but just collect it at the bottom of a box would terminate the problem...
So I take it there simply isn't such kind of .22lr ammo?
 
I would think a harder bullet would be worse for both fragmenting and richocets, along with costing much more than standard lead.
 
http://www.sportsmansguide.com/product/index/do-all-bullet-trap-black?a=720367

188217_ts.jpg
 
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