Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Rimfires Ruger 10/22 sporter barrel advice............

I am considering a new barrel for my deluxe sporter. I have 4 factory 18.5" barrels here. I plan on keeping one, selling 2, and giving the other to a bud.

The current barrel shoots well enough. Not spectacular, but good. I have only tried 3 ammo types in it.

Here is the kicker:
The current barrel likes the Remington Golden Bullet best. I have like 3000 rounds of the stuff. I am afraid that if I get a new barrel, I will have to possibly switch ammo and be stuck with 3000 rounds. My other 10/22 uses different ammo, and my other .22s do not get used nearly as much as the 10/22s.

Barrel I want to get is a Green Mountain 20" fluted sporter. Blued. Does anyone have experience with said barrel? Or know what ammo they like?

Thoughts?

no barrel is the same regardless of being the same brand you have a 50-50 chance of the same brand barrel shooting the ammo you have the best. It will be a hit and miss thing and you will just have to take your chances.

another option is to send the factory barrel off to Randy @ CPC and have it set back, re-chamberd and re-crown. that being said i have the Green Mountain SS 20" sporter on my 10/22 and i am very pleased with it.

GM barrels seem to shoot as well as the Shilen, Dlask, ER Shaw .


I had a 18" GM fluted stainless sporter barrel.

It liked CCI Blazers, Bulk Federal HP, and CCI Mini Mags.

Never shot any Remington ammo.

I currently have a 16" GM blued sporter that prefers CCI Blazers.

After owning many 1022 factory and match barrels the only thing consistent is they all had a decided preference in ammo, both accuracy and function wise.

Flyer

Yes, exactly. Every rimfire I own, or barrel I switch, likes something different.

The " new and improved" Remington Golden Bullets do seem to be just that. I haven't had one fail to fire yet, they definitely burn cleaner (the old ones were very dirty), and accuracy has been better than the 2 Federal loads I have tried in 2 different rifles. I bought 2800 rounds for $180 a few months back before ammo became plentiful again.

Jim, what does your 20" GM like best?

Norma Tac-22 shoots really well in it. i have only shot the Tac-22, mini mags and some CCI standard velocity out of it up to this point.

Thanks.

I have too much 22LR ammo. Gonna get this thing nailed down, then sell or trade the stuff I don't use. Put that into what I do.....

Even though most of our gun laws make no sense, we can easily own short barreled rifles such as this. You can not shorten an existing factory barrel to less then 18", however you may purchase barrels as short as 8" , as long as the overall firearm length exceeds 26.5"

This a 12.5" Dlask Barrel in a modified carbine stock. Bentz chamber it shot really really well with CCI Blazers





Flyer

i thought all rifles had to have a barrel of 16" or greater. i have also always thought that you can modify any barrel as long as you do not shorten it less than 16". guess i'm going to have to go re-read on the rules and regs to see if anything changed or i'm not remembering correctly. if we're lucky, maybe we could get Bricktop to chime in. this is the kind of stuff he knows and is free with sharing his view on.

Just to ensure everyone's clear. I'm talking about Canadian law. We can't carry handguns but we can own short barreled rifles

Here's a sample from a 16.5" fluted target Green Mountain barrel, Weaver K4 glass. Remington golden bullet, bulk pack. 60 yards. Top group, clean bore. Bottom group, fouled bore.

Dang that is short. Did you buy it 40% off?

I don't see a need to spend more money than the GM barrel costs for this little sporter. They have always shot very well IME.

My heavy barrel 10/22 has a Volquartsen snake barrel on it. But that is a whole different beast.....

I didn't catch your location when I responded. Thanks for clearing that up.

I have a Clark Midweight barrel on mine. They use Lothar Walthar blanks. It shoots most anything well but really likes Aguila Pistol Match.

Flip a coin.

You're not going to miss anything based on barrel brand for a 10/22.




Travis

I like the looks of that rifle. Looks like that barrel is about 22" long. I know some of the guys at my club use GM barrels and they don't seem to be very finicky. My Ruger factory hammer forged target barrel is the most finicky sob I've ever had. I'm glad I finally found some ammo it likes:

It was good enough, with 4x scope, to win the Tonto Arizona 'fire rendezvous thus year.

I have a Green Mountain Heavy Taper 19" on the way.

http://www.gmriflebarrel.com/19-blue-heavy-tapered-sporter-22lr/

Replaced recoil buffer with a homemade one. Turned the bolt telease into auto bolt release with a little file work. Now doing trigger job.......

As you can see, I have 4 18.5" barrels already. Plan on selling at least 2 if anyone needs one.......

Sorry for the derail but EdM, where did you get that stock? I really like the looks of that.

SS

Had the bolt on my 10/22 trued and it shoots most anything into very decent groups.

I bought it many years ago when Midway bought out Fajen. It was rough but finished out pretty well.

That bolt release mod is the only way to go buddy. I've done trigger jobs on most of my 10-22's as well, but decided to go with a match grade hammer from Volquartsen and have been pretty happy with it. It breaks real clean at 1 7/8 pounds right now. You'll be pretty happy with the GM barrel, but keep in mind you might have slight problems with extracting a live round. The guys at the club deal with that problem with the "fire to clear" request... Not a big deal, but something I'm glad I don't have to do with the factory barrel...

Look hard at Tony Kidd's stuff. By far the best I have ever used and I have used a bunch.

http://www.coolguyguns.com/BARRELS_c_8.html

My Kidd stainless tapered barrel shoots really well and I would buy another. That said, my buddy has an ER Shaw that prints pretty groups with junk Golden Bullets. Sounds ridiculous but it's true.

The Green Mt. arrived last night. It will need some fitting as the barrel channel will need opened up a tad near the forend.

BSA--- Do you think a Volquartsen extractor will help with the Bentz chamber? Was considering it.....

Just finished whittlin' on the sear and hammer. Polished them back up.

Think I will deal with trigger overtravel next, before reassembling and trying out the trigger pull.

2 Methods I know of doing this. The right way, and the faster/easier way.

Not sure which way I am gonna go yet

The Kidd Im running now seems to shoot everything good, like REAL GOOD. I had 1 Shaw that was all or nothing. Green Mt is always a safe choice.

I have heard nothing but good things about Kidd.

I consider GM barrels one of the most solid values out there. They cost less than most custom barrels, and they always seem to shoot well. Plus the folks at GM have never been anything but helpful nice to talk to. I like them. It has actually been years, but always got that "family type atmosphere" feeling from them.

As for this gun, I am extremely happy with my decision thus far. Haven't shot it, but all reports seem to be better than good on barrel selection.

This heavy taper 19" (Bentz chamber) seems to be just what I was looking for. It really makes the rifle balance sooooo much better. It adds just enough forward weight, but not too much, and it really points and holds well. Very happy with the feel.

So anyhoo------I have the trigger breaking at exactly 3 lbs. Down from 5.25 lbs. It hasn't all that much creep. I may or may not address creep/overtravel. It really is not bad now for a "squirrel rifle". I may just change some springs. Have to keep reminding myself this isn't a match rifle like my other 10/22. My other trigger is far better.

I am very interested in seeing how my homemade recoil buffer does. It is made of coax cable.....grin. But it just may end up being badass. I don't see it deforming, and it should be even quiter than the aftermarket ones. We will see. I could be wrong. I thought I was wrong once, but it turns out I was mistaken.

So so far, have done trigger job, performed auto release alteration, swapped recoil buffer, barrel, and am about to install Volquartsen extractor. Not sure how much it will or won't help with unfired rounds in the Bentz chamber. It will obviously do nothing with fired ones. I have another custom 10/22 target rifle to compare it with.

She is getting close.....