Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Differences in .22WMR ammo?

I just bought a Henry .22 magnum with the hex barrel and good sights. About 10% of the rounds fail to fire, seems the firing pin spring is too weak. Has anyone seen this? I wanted a Winchester 94/22 but to no avail. It seems that the Winchester ammo misfires more than the CCI stuff I have, Muledeer, I was wondering if you have seen differences in rim thicknesses of the various brands. Thanks so much.

That is a high percentage, particularly in that I connot recall ever having a .22 Mag win round fail to fire and I shoot mostly Win Super X HSPs. I've had a lot of duds with other ammo, particularly the Rem bulk pack "Golden bullet" .22 LR ammo for a while a couple years ago. Maybe it is just a bad lot of ammo? Or did the CCI stuff also misfire a lot? I would contact Henry and see what they suggest - they have excellent customer service and may just ship you a stronger spring.

sounds like good advice check henry

I've fired thousands of rounds of 22MRF ammo and don't ever recall having a single misfire. Probably the rifle, rather than the ammo.

Jeff

Can't say that I've ever had a Magnum rimfire misfire either. Did you check the cartridges to see if they had a light firing pin strike?

I have a Win 9422mag lever and a Rem 597mag auto. They have never misfired a shell. I may have 6-8 different cartridges that I pick from for .22mag accuracy. My first thought is that it must be the rifle. Good luck.

I picked up a Henry in 22wmr a couple of years ago, and it has not misfired with probably 4-500 rounds of Winchester 40 gr. JHP ammo through it. As a matter of fact, the wife and I were shooting it yesterday, and it is IMO a fine, accurate, fun to shoot lever action rifle.

Thanks for all of the suggestions. I called Henry on New Year's eve and the friendly lady at the desk told me that someone from service will call me Monday. It appears to me that the firing pin is not striking the rim hard enough. We have found that if the round does not go off initially we cock and fire the gun again and so far every round has discharged. I thought about tinkering with the spring etc, but thought I should wait until I hear from Henry. It shoots well and is handy to carry on walks, and to be honest it makes one a better shooter when you do not know whether you gun will fire or not. I just hope I'm not attacked by a killer jackrabbit!

Yeah, you have to watch out for charging jack rabbits. Better carry a backup.

Just a question: Has the rifle ever been given a complete breakdown and thorough cleaning?

On rim thickness: 22 ammo often exhibits considerable variation in rim thickness even within a single box. Some serious shooters construct jigs for quickly assessing thickness and sort their ammo into consistent batches.

I shoot two 22 LR's frequently, and I suspect ammo variation is the source for 80% of group expansion I see at 50 yrds. Some brands generate softball sized patterns while a couple off the shelf makes will give me quarter sized groups. High end target ammo (like $16 per box stuff) will generate 10 rd cloverleafs (usually lower than commercial stuff) that can be covered with a dime. Even the lowly 22 is sensitive to ammo variation.

I've not heard of rim thickness variability hindering firing potential though. I shoot thousands of rounds annually and can only remember 1 missfire. I suspect there is an issue with the rifle.