Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Rimfires Cheap, uh, I mean inexpensive .22's

Everybody loves to brag on their primo .22 rifles, who doesn't? But do you have any garden variety ones that hold a favored place?

Reason for asking is I'm on somewhat of an old .22 rifle kick these days. Not the fancy ones, but the kind that you'd get at Sears or the "Hardware and Sporting Goods" store for $25-$35 back in the day.

Last week I found a Marlin 80DL, a magazine fed bolt action made in various iterations from 1935 up through 1971. My research on this one puts DOM between 1957 and 1961. It originally came with a Marlin peep sight and hooded bead front but someone had replaced those with a Lyman 55 peep and 17A globe front.

Whoever owned it took good care of it. Bluing and wood finish are still in great shape, I'd rate them together around 96-98% maybe. Best 50 yard group so far is .592" with Norma Tac-22 but otherwise it's unremarkable, Federal Automatch, Super-X, CCI Mini-mag and such are good for 3/4" to 1 1/4" groups. I could probably blame my eyes for that, maybe I'll put a 35 year old Leupold 12X scope on it to see what it will do, or maybe not.

I didn't get it to shoot groups next to the T1x or the 457 Varmint model, I got it because it's a neat old rifle that I would have drooled over as an 8 year old kid. It's very lightweight at 5 lbs 4 oz with great ergos and balance, it comes up with a solid cheek weld and the sights are lined up dead on target. I do have a 1946 Remington 513T that will shoot groups alongside the Tikka and CZ, but it's kind of heavy.


Currently got my eye on an older Remington 512 in great shape on gunbroker. I talked to the seller and he gave me the back story on the guy he got it from. Or maybe a 581 like I used to have, or a 582; local stores want too much for examples of the latter two but we'll see.


Anyway, among your Annies and Vudoos and $1000 10/22's, you got any JC Higgins or Glenfields that still get taken out and enjoyed?

I've got Dad's old Stevens 86D, an old boltgun that Dad used for market hunting back in the Great Depression, and then for practically everything else that walked, flew, or swam. I used it to kill my first rabbit and squirrel, and learned how to shoot with it. It's bore is still excellent, but the sear and safety didn't work any more, until this spring when I found a real, genuine gunsmith who knew and understood the old guns, and he refurbished it to like-new status.
For Dad, it was just a tool, it stood behind the porch door, or rode in the pickup's gun rack, or even in the bed of the truck, along with the bleeding coons and such. The metal finish is poor, to say the least, but it works just fine, and my stepbrother had refinished the stock on it some time ago, so it doesn't look real awful. It's just a good old rifle, but it'll still kill a coon (I've shot a few this fall with it).

I've also got an old Remington M24 Short only, but it's bore is really, really BAD, from LESMOK ammo use, and lack of care for it. It'll still kill a coon, but the bore is half-gone. It was in an old shooting gallery back in the day, and only has a five round capacity, but that's enough for my uses.

Everything else I have, aside from my old Marlin 60 (1971 vintage), is rather new. As long as I only load 15 rounds in the tube, it works fine. I'd left it with Dad while I was in the Army, though, and he carried it in the same gunrack in his pickup, and a lot of the bluing is worn off the barrel. No matter, it shoots okay.

Dad was pretty hard on his tools, and the rifles show that.

The first firearm I learned to shoot with. Dad's old Savage.

I just bought a "cheap" one, and I'm loving it!!




Was shooting another "cheap" Savage yesterday. This one cost me $199.99:

That is very cool. I have an old Coast to Coast 285N, that my grandpa gave me when I was 12, that is the same thing as your Savage model 7. I need to get it out and totally go through it though. Replace the stock and probably barrel too, and extractors and springs. I wore it out, as a kid shooting tons of jackrabbits with it.

My dad was fairly easy on his rifles, and taught me to keep very good care of mine. My grandpa was also a stickler on how you treated your rifles. Here's an old Mossberg 642KD Chuckster that my dad used in Pennsylvania. He had it worn out, when he gave it to me. It would not extract or eject spent cartridges anymore. I replaced every spring, extractor, ejector and worn part in it. I also fine tuned the trigger, so it is a safe and clean 2.5 pounds For as many rounds that my dad fired through it, she's still a shooter!!!

I also added the aperture sights, as shown in the pic..

It's been a few years now, certainly pre-Biden, but I have less than $400 in a pair of a old Remingtons, a 512 & a 550-1. Both in great shape, function well & I enjoy them as much or more than most of my others.

The older rifles are a hell of a lot of fun to shoot. Sometimes they even hang with their newer brethren. Just got back from the range with the 320.. Cheap Tasco scope checked out all right. I've always said, you don't need to run a really expensive piece of glass on a 22lr. Here's proof. Keeping in mind, this is for a budget rifle/budget ammo challenge:





Then this cheap ammo for comparison:





So, budget rifle, budget hollow point hunting ammo, would be minute of squirrel head at 50 yards, and a hell of a lot of fun shooting it too..

While I very much enjoy the higher end rimfire, the ones I've been enjoying lately have come at a much lower price.

A couple sporter weight Winchesters with peeps sights are getting some love.

There is one model 57 and one 75 have been a blast to play with. A little more pricy, but ithe 75 target is a nice departure from the Annie and Vudoo game.

The 57 is well loved and needed some small parts to make it whole...but it's a neat little rifle and a blast to shoot.

The Glenfield Model 60 "Squirrel Gun" was the 1st gun I bought (well, dad actually bought it) with my own money in '73 when I was 14 yrs old. K-Mart had 'em on sale for $35. Back then, $35 was a 7 weeks allowance. I still have it.

MIC, I saw a Savage Model 7 for sale recently, but it was no near as nice as the one you have sir

Mossbergs of almost any flavor work for me with my favorites being 42Ms…….also have a “beautiful” Norinco JW-15 that I have around $100 in that will shoot with much more expensive rifles……seems like almost any .22 from around 100 years ago will shoot extremely well - the older Remingtons and Winchesters that I have can be spectacular with the right ammo. Really haven’t ever met a .22 I didn’t like though so I may be biased.

PennDog

I have a cheap savage that shoots very consistently. About an 8" pattern regardless of ammo. I will never buy another cheap firearms.

Minute of barn door shooter

Sounds like you got a lemon. That is very non typical for a Savage 22lr.. Most shoot damn well..

Here's the cheapest rifle I have bought to date, or in the last 10 years.. It cost $199.99 back in 2019. It's a single shot Savage MK1 FVT. It's set up more as a youth target rifle, in factory form:


With irons sights, this was the first 10 shot group from that rifle:


It likes the older Norma match ammo. I later put that in a Boyd's laminate stock, and it's still a damn good shooter. It gives rifles that cost 10 times what I paid for it, a run for their money.

The Savage MK2 FVT, that I sold at the beginning of this year shoots just as well. Here's a group I shot, to confirm it is a shooter. I threw a scope on it, to test it's true potential:



This was the first time that rifle had been scoped:


I always just used the factory supplied iron sights. Here's another with cheap American Eagle ammo:


And another, just for fun, with some different/better ammo:


I traded that Savage for a CZ457 American, a few weeks after I shot those targets.

So, can cheap rifles shoot? Hell yes they can!!

My favorite is still my Marlin 989M2. Light, accurate and dependable to this day. Will still put 5 Mini Mag hollow points in a group you can cover with a nickel at 50 yards. It has killed everything from chipmunks and bullfrogs to deer in my hands. This was my first .22 purchased from the hardware store in town with money I earned mowing lawns when I was 14. Best 59.95 I ever spent.

Tube or box mag?

7 shot clip according to Marlin. Of course campfire gun nerds would insist on calling it a detachable box magazine. The 99M1 was the same rifle with a 9 shot tube magazine. The clip magazine is much handier in a State that doesn't allow loaded firearms in or on a motorized vehicle.

BSA.....I have a Savage Mk 1 like yours; gave $100 for it last year. My results are pretty much like yours.
I bought it off the Iowa Boy Scouts Council. They went to the newer magazine rifle. Being a Boy Scout gun, who knows how many thousands of rounds have been shot in it? And it still is crazy accurate.

Have an old Marlin tube feed 22 mg bolt GU I haven't shot for years. Used to make some long for me shots on tree rats in heavy oak timber in NW Misery. I am looking for one of the old single shot 22 RF guns like I used to shoot. Remington or Winchester made the one I remember. There was a Springfield one as well. It had the cocking piece that was pulled to the rear. The barrel and action were machined of one piece. Every one I shot was a precise shooter. RZ.

Until recently we had all kinds of crazy rules about that, but they’ve mostly been changed. We can pretty much tote what we want, no permit required. One remaining one is that guns used for hunting can’t be concealed, so your squirrel pistol has to be visible while hunting.

I traded an old handgun for a new Savage B22. Box magazine, carbon wrapped barrel threaded, thumbhole synthetic stock. Shoots well, but no photos. Installed a 16X scope for the fun of it. Thinking about a 3-9x40 LEUPOLD rimfire scope. Have a 4x36 euro scope that has a really bright light aspect. NO, GLASS DOES NOT GATHER LIGHT. It transmits light. Would like a top euro or Japanese rimfire glass on top. RZ.

How does a scope 'transmit' light? Do they have little flashlights built in?

Light transmission is defined as the amount of light that can pass through glass or other materials.

What if it's dark out?

Like sands through the hourglass, so are the rays of our lives.

Big R is selling an RIA @ 139. Black Friday they were 100 bucks they told me.

Have been adding to my collection of "non-premium" rifles over the last few months by going to gun shows and watching gunbroker, guns.com and guns.international for something in very good to excellent shape at a lower than average price. Managed to pick up a 1968 Remington 582 and a 2007 Marlin 981T on guns.com for considerably less than what I saw them going for on gunbroker.

Was toying with the idea of a Ruger American Rimfire in the standard 22" barreled version, their model 8301, but couldn't justify the price of a new one. Finally a couple weeks ago I found a NIB one at a gunshow that a fellow had bought at Cabelas several years ago and never fired. Managed to get it for less than half the price local stores want.

I replaced the trigger spring in the Ruger and treated the Marlin to a Rifle Basix trigger, that brought the pull weights down to 1 1/2 and 1 3/4 pounds respectively. They will go just over 1/2" for 10 shots at 50 yards with their favorite ammo but are basically 3/4" to 1" rifles with the other stuff - the Marlin shoots better overall than the Ruger but I suspect some of you would expect that as well.

The Remington is surprising even though it's the lightest weight rifle with the heaviest trigger pull. A trigger spring swap there only took the weight from 4 1/2 down to 3 1/2 pounds but it will put 10 shots into the .4's and overall averages better with all ammo than the other two.

Obviously, these aren't Tikkas or CZ's but I didn't buy them for precision rifle shooting. I like to collect different .22 rifles and mostly because they're still a lot of fun to shoot. Being cheap to feed don't hurt none, either. I do most all of my shooting from the kneeling position and if I miss the 3-4 MOA steel targets at 100 yards it's my fault, not theirs.



Sure wish Savage had bought some of the Marlin stock patterns. I really like my Mark II's but their factory stock ergos aren't very good. The Marlin wears a typical late pattern tupperware but even that has a better feeling pistol grip, better comb height and better checkering that any Mark II plastic stock.

How about a Marlin 925 M? Or a Remington 511? Full sized rifles with great triggers and excellent accuracy. I paid $140 for a 511 (1953 manuf date) and another $100 to have it drilled, tapped and bore sighted with a Simmons 1.5-6Xscope. The trigger breaks like glass and it prints 3/4" groups with mini-mags. $200 for the Marlin and it performs equally well, (but is less picky about ammo) with a cheap Jason 3-9X made in Japan optic.
Keep in mind, I'm no great rifleman, and I suppose many of you folks could do MUCH better.

The Remington 51x series are great rifles, even if they were considered more "budget" type firearms in their day. Had a Remington 510P for a while and it was a good, accurate rifle but I didn't want to d&t it and my eyes finally got to where even the peep sight was harder to use. Mentioned the 1946 vintage 513T in my first post, that's an extremely accurate rifle. Found a no-drill scope mount for it and with my trusty 1984 vintage M8 12X on top it will hold it's own with any modern rifle short of the multi-thousand dollar specimens.

Not really looking for any particular brand or model these days, just whatever strikes my fancy, but it needs to meet four criteria - be a bolt action sporter, be something I've never owned before, be in very good to excellent condition and be offered at a bargain price. Also it needs to have the ability to mount a scope, even if that's just a grooved receiver. There are one or two smiths around town I might trust with a simple drill and tap job on an older rifle, but as you note that's going to run $100 at least - one guy quoted $200 for four holes - and that would add another 50-100% to the OTD purchase price of the rifles.

I have a good T1x, a couple of CZ 457's, heavy barreled Savage Mark II's and Ruger 10/22's if I want to impress myself on paper. These run of the mill bolt action sporters are just for fun.

The last years of the Remington 512 were grooved for a scope mount,
I have one of those, but I'm not sure what other Remington 5xx models were

I love the old Mossbergs, just picked up a really nice 42mb for $125.00, all original . shot it today at 25 yards with CCI standards, it's a shooter

Old Remington model 41 single shot. My go to rockchuck rifle. Made in the early 40’s. It’s a tack driver.

I have a Marlin Papoose that is crazy accurate and fun to shoot.

Nice gun with a history.