Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters .22 RF alternatives

Revisiting an idea tried before in different iterations and looking for thoughts. In days past there have been several straightwall .22 CF cartridges, the most recent failure being the Cooper .22 CCM. They were in circulation and competing with an abundant supply of cheap RF ammo and fell by the wayside.

We have been on the wrong side of the price/supply equation for some years now and I ponder the viability of pursuing the idea once again. Rather than trying to recreate the Cooper round I'm thinking that the target for performance should or might be the .22 LR at the standard velocity range with 40-45 grain cast or jacketed .224" bullets, something that would be suitable for the handloading crowd.

Some of the numbers I ponder:

Depending on a few variables, 3,500 - 7,000 loads from a pound of powder. Assuming $25/# we are left with about .35-.71 cents/round.
Assuming $2/# for lead, the cost per bullet is 1.15 cents per round.
Primers will cost about 3 cents each at current prices.

Total cost per round, excluding brass is about 4.85 cents per round. I figure brass life to be very long due to low pressures and on assumption of compatibility of die/brass dims. Lighter bullets or round balls might be driven with only a primer, thus presenting some additional cost reductionns.

Thoughts?

Don't be bashful, I can take a jab or two.

Not straight walled but the .22 Hornet can easily load down to whatever velocities you want.

True, and having traveled that path with mediocre results it does not inspire. Thinking load density is key to success and a straight wall case has some advantage. I suggest, based on experience, this endeavor would favor cast bullets for the most part. Pounding a stuck jacketed bullet from a Hornet barrel is not a lot of fun. They tend to start doing that around 1100 fps in a Ruger #1.

I just make low velocity hand loads for my 223 bolt action.... 1800 FPS, 55 grain FMJ bullets I paid $.05 for, so really more like the 22 WMR. And cheappppp.

I download a .221 FB for small edible game. 13.o gr H4227 w/ 55 FMJ for about 2,100 fps

How do you get 'em slowed down that much? Pistol powder?

I went through this at the peak of the rimfire "shortage," and ended up with a Lyman mold that casts wheelweight bullets that weigh 43.5 grains. Supposedly they're gas-checks, but I tried various alternatives and found they shot best from my Ruger 1B .22 Hornet unsized without gas-checks. I just cast them and rolled them around in Lee Alox, then loaded them the next day. Also found I didn't have to resize even the necks of cases, as the "oversize" bullets (around .225") seated just right in unsized brass. The best accuracy turned out to be with 5.0 grains of Accurate 5744, for 1080 fps and sub-inch 5-shot groups at 50 yards. All my wheelweight metal came free (and still does, when I pick 'em up off the street), so the total cost per round is about a nickel. One of the best parts is that when the 3-9x Burris Fullfield II on the rifle is sighted-in 1" high at 100 yards with full-house varmint loads using 40-grain plastic tips at around 3000 fps, the cast load shoots right at the tip of the bottom post at 50 yards, with the scope set on 6x.

Also worked up a .22 magnum equivalent load with 8.5 grains of IMR4227 and some 45-grain Remington round-noses I got really cheap somewhere years ago. This load shoots even better at around 1750 fps.

When the rimfire shortage hit I just kept shooting my 38 special's, a K38 revolver and a S&W 52-2. Loads were cheaper than over paying for 22LR. Latest is a S&W Model 53 in 22 Jet. Not as cheap as a 22LR, but WAY more Bang for the buck..

Thanks for that info. I have not tried cast in a Hornet yet, it something to ponder.

I wonder if Mr. Kilbourne's spirit will be angered if I do this in a M54 he did some work on?

Nah, but if it makes you feel better, make some jackets out of 22 cases. On the left is a 43 gr. .224 bullet made from a 22LR case. Trimmed to approx. 0.6 of an inch (8 grains weight). The rest is yer led. That should assuage the guilt.

7.5 grains AA#5, magnum primer, 55 grain FMJ.

I favor the .22 Hornet for such work. Using a 55 grain Lee Bator cast bullet (actual weight with gas check 52 grains, cast from cheap or free wheel weights, sized .226), 2gr. Bullseye= 1080fps, 2.6gr. PB= 1200fps, and 6gr. 2400= 1600+fps. As per others results, the most expensive component is the primer (CCI small pistol) but whereas others opt out of using gas checks I do use them which increases the per shot cost another 2.5 cents. But, I haven't had to buy lead in years so that balances things out. I'm blessed with a superb 26" barrel on a (German) single shot, with a gain twist that ends in 1-9" near as I can tell, but with a large throat hence the large diameter bullet. It will shoot the low velocity loads into an average of an inch at 50 yards, 10 shots, which is ok but not great. Where it really shines is with the 2400 load which provides groups nearly half as big. Not really .22LR performance, rather more on the order of a .22RF Magnum. All in all I'm quite happy with the Hornet and cast bullets for cheapness, accuracy, and squirrel killing ability.

Accuracy with the Lyman 45 grain 225438 isn't as good, for me. Accuracy with a 60 grain RCBS mold is good but not quite like the Bator. The 52 grainers seem to fall into a sweet spot for my rifle.

I laid in several hundred new cases for this rifle. So far I'm still working on the first hundred, and the rest are getting dusty on the shelf. Without going back through my log and adding them up, I think each case has been fired around 20 times each and still going strong with only a couple failures due to operator error at the loading bench.

That said, I've often pondered the viability of dramatically shortening the Hornet case into something like the .22 Squirrel, only shorter. Say, something to perfectly contain 2-3 grains Bullseye/Red Dot/Clays, and with a nice long neck per the Hornet to nicely hold long-ish bullets. I like a heavier .22 bullet for added wind cheating ability when shooting at what passes for long range with such rigs. A barrel twisted faster than the standard Hornet 1-14 or 1-16 would be wanted for it too for dealing with longer bullets. So many ideas, so little time/money!

Pardon the sideways shot...



The charge weight isn't quite accurate either though the rotor info is correct. I think it actually throws 5.6 or 5.7 grain of Lil'Gun. The charge was purely accidental but it seems to work very well with the Lyman 55 gas check bullet noted on the target. I did try using some 'softer' primers, but Lil'Gun in light loads doesn't seem to ignite well; CCI 450s are the ticket.

(BTW, this target fired at 50 yards.)

With decent .22 pellets costing 1.5-4 cents apiece, as opposed to 8-10 cents for .22s, a decent PCP airgun would pay for itself eventually, and knock the snot out of small game.

Good springers can be had for less, but they're trickier to shoot, can't be left cocked for long periods, and require "airgun scopes".

Here's a project you might take on Gary. Build a 25 ACP rifle. Go ahead! It'll be fun.

Have plans to try some trailboss in 223. Got a little CZ carbine loads of cheap brass and bullets. Data suggests a 55 gr at about 1075 with 4 grains of powder. Plan to play around with cast probable a little bit lighter weight. Figure I should end up with a cheap plinker somewhere between 22lr and mag levels. Not 22 lr rifle cheap. But cheap enough to be a fun high volume shooter. Also can keep my stash of 22lr intact.

When I was a young teenager, growing up in the sticks and knowing no one with any real knowledge about guns or reloading, my only source of info was whatever gun-related books the local library had in stock, and they were old then. I read everything I could get my hands on gun wise. I had a pretty vivid imagination too, so one day after probably reading an article on something like the development of the .357 Bain & Davis, I considered the posibilities. I wondered if I could be the first person to invent a necked-down .17/600 Nitro Express, and at the other extreme, why no one had built a .25 acp revolver or rifle?

Yet another factor is that with Trump's election, rimfire ammo is becoming abundant and cheaper. So it depends on whether dinking around with low-powered handloads is worth it, as opposed to just buying a bunch of rimfires.

Personally, my wife and I are going out this weekend to shoot up a bunch of rimfire ammo at ground squirrels, and are not really worried about how to replace it.

I tackled this a bit differently, using the .25-20. I found both a Marlin 1892 Classic and an original Stevens 44 that has a relined barrel. Need to revisit load development for both of them.

The Ruger #1B is a bit heavy for a .22 Hornet, IMO, but I've heard they usually shoot well. I have a .218 Bee in the same and it is quite accurate, at least with full power loads. The Bee is arguably a bit better designed case, but maybe not so great at rimfire equivalent loads.

Brass was a headache for both the Bee and .25-20, but at least now Hornady has starting selling Bee brass, which can be necked up to make the .25-20

My oddball answer to the question is an "0" buckshot loaded flush with the mouth of the case over 1 grain of Bullseye and shot out of a Martini Cadet. I dab a bit of liquid Alox on the buckshot after it's loaded into the case.