Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire It's an ill wind & the rimfire shortage...

Never was in danger of running low on rimfire ammo, but I did use the retail shortage to experiment with some brands I never tried or heard of before.

Chief among the standouts is the Armscor .22LR HVHP. This is good ammo that shoots as well as CCI of the same configuration in most of my rimfires. I do wish it came packaged like CCI but the 50 round cardboard boxes are no real problem. The Armscor stuff is available just about everywhere that I buy ammo, and the price is right in line with what I paid for the better ammo before the shortages started.

Have also had good luck with the American Eagle, but it still isn't as widely available as the Armscor, and I like the packaging even less...

Who else disc overed good stuff due to the shortage?

Hey John!
Like you, I was never in danger of running out though I did cut back on shooting .22 and shot more 9mm.
I read good things about Aguila Super Extra so I purchased a box to add to my collection of good .22 ammo for when I want to see what a rifle is capable of. I have not fired any of it, though.

I never ran out but did end up shooting a bunch of different types as it came available at decent prices and my main take-away was that Remington Golden Bullet HP has really gone downhill in the last 30+ years. I shoot Federal Bulk and CCI Subsonic HP or Subsonic Segmented HP and don't see any reason to switch now....

I had about zero rimfire when the shortage hit. So I was very pleased when I found a couple of buckets of the Golden Bullets.

I bought two and still did not have any rimfire! That stuff was junk. I used to like it too, that and Thunderbolts.

For what ever reason we never did get much CCI up here, mainly just Super X's and American Eagles.

Recently I bought a case of that Troy Landry CCI stuff....my first mini mags. I like them.

Also tried a couple bricks of the Armscor stuff and it is good too. The Browning BHP hollow points are a new one that I like as well.

The Golden Bullets had some of the most inconsistent priming I've ever seen. They said they fixed it a few years back, but I wasn't willing to risk, at current prices, checking it out. I'd have 1 out of 15 or 20 fail to go boom in several different guns. Hard hits on the rim. Eject it and put it back in. Boom. The priming must not have been getting distributed all the way around.

Yeah, with the GB's I would load ten, and if they all went off they all sounded different and landed in different spots.

I kind of wish I could peddle them, not even good enough to teach a kid to shoot with.

My experience pretty much mirrors that, as well as a full spectrum muzzle blast / report note variance,.....

Lousy ammo.

GTC

I heard that Remington had improved their rimfire ammo.
I was not willing to risk my money to find out.
I will continue to avoid Remington rimfire.
It was easier to shoot the Remongtons I had on hand during the shortage and not worry about replacing it.

I seldom shoot RF at paper, but do appreciate precision when on the hunt. Couple of boxes of trash for the grandkids when they show, they aren't yet ready for serious schoolin'. Been with CCI for some years, the LR SV and HP do yeoman work on pigs now and then, but the CBs carried the freight for some years. Ample supply before the storm hit, haven't purchased any in the last decade. What am I bid for the old cardboard box WW Power Points? 2 bricks awaiting the call from the 10/22 and they shoot very well in that gun. Do have an old yellow box of Winchester with a $1.29 sticker on it. It'll last until I run out of lead for the Sneezer.

I went into the shortage with about 97 rounds.... but who is counting? I came out of the shortage with about 90 rounds. I et a half-dozen grouse...

I probably should buy a thousand rounds or so....

I bought one of the Golden Bucket of ammo during the shortage just to have it.

I've always liked the CCI/Federal HP's.

Got to shooting the other stuff to save my good stuff, and quickly found that the Winchester bulk ammo was purely unreliable on any plane. Dud's and short stroking my semi-autos.

Broke open that Golden bucket and was really surprised at how consistent, powerful and accurate it is now. No misfires. No duds. In fact, I like it as much as my beloved CCI/Federal ammo now.

I'd have to be real hard up before buying anymore Winchester ammo in rimfire now, though.

I had about 10,000. I was ok.

I ran out of CCI CB caps when the shortage first started. I have been looking for 3 or 4 years and finally found some last week. I ordered 600.

Aguila. My pistols like it, my rifles like it- even a 10/22T with a very tight chamber that won't feed Stingers likes the
Super Maximum, and kills stuff like a WMR. I'm sorry to use ammo en espanol, but it was what I could find when the shartage began to threaten,
and it turned out to be some of the best I've had.

I had enough, but did cut back on shooting 22's. The cheap bulk ammo still isn't available here. None of the local Walmarts have had a box of 22's in a couple of years, maybe longer. But I was able to find a steady supply of some of the better ammo. Now that I've gotten used to actually hitting what I aim at I don't see me going back to the cheap stuff. CCI Mini Mags at about $10/100 rounds is the cheapest I've found that shoots well enough. I've found a steady supply of Norma TAC-22 ammo sold for about $7/50 rounds during the shortage. I can now get it at about the same price as CCI.

I mounted a scope with dials on it to one of my more accurate 22's and have figured out the settings out to 200 yards. I'm getting about the same size groups at 200 that I was getting at 50 with the bulk ammo.

I have a couple boxes of Rem Thunderbolts that I bought in desperation. They aren't nearly as accurate as the Wins or CCI's I've shot. They have a lot of fliers.

I had more than 10,000 rounds when the shortage hit so i didn't run out

Not from the shortage but just before it I discovered Federal Automatch. It's the most accurate .22 RF I've ever used in my Shaw heavy barrel 10/22 and I have tested many brands.

What part of Remington hasn't?

I had to really cut back on my rimfire shooting, but I still had a couple of thousand rounds at the end. Just bought my first brick in four years yesterday.

What I am almost out of, however, is shorts. Only have enough for about 20 more varmints.