Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 22 Trail Guns....

What about rifles? The Winchester 61 and 62A were both take down modles as was the Remington 121. All were accurate and light....

I bought a S&W 317 not to long ago and it seems to be the perfect trail gun for me. Fits in my coat pocket and you never notice it.Does take some practice to shoot accuretly.

Had to send it back to Smith because it was out of time.Now it shoots minute of ptarmigan.

A lot of great input.

I like revolvers. Have had & used a single six, a Colt SAA .22, two
Smith & Wesson M17's, and two Ruger Standard autos.

My current favorite is a 1953 K-22. Light enough to carry, big enough to shoot
well.

The 317 Smith has a SS barrel liner, and an alloy clynder. Weighs 12.5 ozs. empty. It's grip fills the hand alot better than the does those on the older steel kit guns. Have owned both.
I find I can't consistantly shoot accurately, say 2 inch groups much over 15 yds. That's plenty for an occasional grouse or a rabbit, however.
A big step up is my SS Ruger Convertible. With a 5.5 inch barrel and a load of .22 JHP's, it weighs 37 ozs. That one shoots 2 inch groups all day long at 25 yds.
Because the .22 mag ammo is designed for rifle velocities of 1900 fps, when shot from a handgun at 1400-1550 fps., they hold together very well and penetrate alot better than you'd think. Out of a handgun, they anchor jack rabbits reliabily, for instance. Lots of treed lions have met their end with the same 40 gr., jacketed HP load.
Wouldn't be my first choice to argue with a black bear, but some have done that and more and made it work. I've carried mine for years in black bear country. Pretty rare to have a problem with a black bear. BTW, at close range, the shot load will kill small rattle snakes.
For an 11 yr. old, I wouldn't start him out on a really light .22. At 11 yrs., I started out on that old Woodsman and am glad I did. Pistols are much harder to shoot well than rifles. Make sure he gets one with a first class trigger, easily seen sights and enough weight to hold it steady. Frankly, that isn't the Smith 317. E

I carry a Smith 317 AirLite almost everywhere I go and I find it to be close to the perfect "carry, when you wouldn't normally carry, gun." As such, it also comes very close to the perfect .22 trail handgun.

In spite of its lightness, I can shoot the 317 tolerably well.

I never shoot it double action, so I'm seriously thinking of having the silly bobbed hammer replaced with a normal 'kit gun' hammer. The existing one is really hard for an old fart like me to cock and it tends to rip the skin off my thumb. Like a million other things in my life, I just haven't gotten around to doing the hammer replacement.

Steve

The Ruger standard with either 4" or 6" barrel at 35 & 37 oz.

S&W model 34 or 63 with square butt grips at 26oz. S&W makes a 5" version of the 63 right now at 28.8oz/

Buckmark Challenge at 25 oz

Great info, not known it was still running.

Nice pics, Mackay, nice array of 22s for sure, the PP 22 was always a 'want' of mine, with an aftermarket adj. site. So I sprung for an Astra Constable for less dough.

It seems overall, many older guns no longer mfg. are in many ways to my mind superior to what is offered now. Thanks for all who shared what is working well for you.

Happy New Year.

I didn't read all of this.... but I'll toss in my thoughts anyway.
A trail gun means many things to me.

If it's the only firearm I'll be carrying that day, it'll be my Ruger SP101 with 180 gr Black Talon loads. A speed loader full of .38 spcl goes along.

If I'm carrying a rifle, I'll pack my SW kit gun, a model 63 SS with 4" barrel in .22Lr.

If a bow - back to the Ruger.

Whether protection or plinking, those two handguns cover a lot of ground.

nah...
this post aint old... last year this time i happened across a post from 2000-2001, on which a several of the posters had either passed on to the next world or stopped frequenting this board....
that was an old post... but the subject interested me so i formed my reply.....
here's a link to that one... http://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=14557

My Bearcat just got too hard to hit with as the sights blurred during my graceful ageing. Maybe someday I could get a Hamilton Bowen model with visible sights.

The model 63 Smith and Wesson is my favorite .22 and always will be. Many, many grouse came to dinner at the point of that gun.

But if I was starting over I would get a Smith in 22 Magnum, or a Bowen 22 mag Bearcat for a trail gun, and might get one for walking about during the golden years.

But, for trail guns I really like a cat, bear, deer, and scum caliber like my 625. That Taurus Tracker would make a great trail gun too. Not the best for grouse, but I have a lightweight T/C Contender carbine in 28 Gauge that makes up for my poor eyesight right handily.

I've had a Beretta 87 (now called "Cheetah") for 15 years or so. (A pic of somebody else's at: http://boldt.us/PAGOA/beretta_87_cheetah_22LR_2.jpg It weighs 19 ounces, is well made, smooth to cycle, and has never bobbled anything I fed it. I did recently spend some money to have a gunsmith extend the trigger stop on the back of the trigger to prevent excessive overtravel, but since I'd had it that long, I guessed I was going to keep it.

(The same relaibility and smoothness was true for my 70S, with either the 3.5" or the 6" barrels, but I could never get used to the funky looks.) (Off topic, but rumor had it that Mossad used the 70S on all of the 1972 Olympic terrorists they tracked down - team set them up, surrounded them, and all fired many shots at the same time. FWIW, but if believable, it's evidence of pretty fair reliability.)

I had a nickel Smith 34 25 years ago during a period of Smith's QC problems. It was a nice, neat package with apparently good fit and finish, bit the chambers must have been pretty rough - almost had to hammer the extractor rod to remove empties. I never could get used to bright, reflective sights, either - couldn't see daylight on either side of the front, but maybe that was just me.

i guess you could say that i'm on the trail of a .22 trail gun...
i actyually walked a piece of the .22 trail yesterday... alas, lacking a .22 handgun, and my right arm immobilized in this confoyunded sling, there was no shooting done....
i did pick up a bearcat at a hasrdware store later in the day and i do believe that i coukld shoot it left handed... mentioned it to my wife as a possible birthday ghift and got "the look".... oh well, hrer birtday is a ways off yet, anyhow...

I would think for hitting plinking/small game targets that Walther would also need a major trigger job. I am on my second PPK and while it is fine for a defense piece, it wouldn't do for a trail gun because of the trigger....and the sights, as you mention.

If I'm going to carry a .22, its either a Ruger single action (usually with the mag cylinder) or an old Browning Challenger with a 6 inch barrel. If I'm feeling really lazy, I carry my daughter's Bearcat.

65BR,
My Ruger auto is a standard blue frame with the 4" BB. Balance is perfect for me. It has checkered thumbrest target grips on it, robbed from a goverment slabsid that was traded. I was at a gunshow last month, and saw a MK 111 stainless standard frame w/ fluted 4" BB Now that really grabbed my attention! If I'da had the loot it would have follered me home!
Virgil B.

My experience with the Walther is a little different than Steve No's. I've used a Walther PPK in .380 on quite a few critters,mostly skunks, groundhogs and poisonous snakes, and only because it was what I've had on hand the most. The 380 with Fed Hydra Shok works suprisingly well on varmits.

For .22s I like the Ruger standard auto as it is accurate and reliable or the S&W 63.

However the best for me has been a Smith 631 in 32 mag. The 32 with light loaded wadcutters is very effective on small game but you can use magnum loads for varmits or town. My .32 has proven more accurate than the Model 63 in 22lr.

I'd like to give the Ruger sp101 in .327 a try and a little single action in that caliber would be extra nice.

Virgil, agreed, its a sexy looking piece, if you can call a gun that....BUT, the MkIII turn me off, hate the changes and will not own, nor come to like or accept them. They 'shot themselves in the foot' IMHO when changing something that was fine 'as is' other than barrel/sight config.

That 327 esp if mfg in 4" sp101 looks to be a nice dual role small game/varmint/2-legged varmint in a compact package. Had a 380 in college, the France assembled Manhurin Walther PPK/S, and kick myself as then they made a nickel in 22, and it would have been much more economical and I think accurate. Sold it off but 88 and 90 gr Hps went zing, 231 powder and unique, had loads clocked over 1100, pounding slide had to back down but it was fun. Have 3 5.5 Bull and 1 slab side MKII but all too heavy as they are, Pac-Lite would be an option to look at. Like Smiths but again as Ruger, they had to change a good thing for lawyers and do a key lock which is not attractive and reports on rare occasion there are problems, so I'll look for older models.

IF Smith did a no lock k frame 327 as the 617, 4", that would be handy, nice action and trigger. I could see a niche for a Single Six in 327, 5.5 and 4 5/8" models, SS of course. Bearcat could work with 5 shot cylinder I believe. Be a handful perhaps with full loads.

I'm kind of partial to J frame S&W's

I picked a S&W 18 many years ago and still do today....

Another 22 trail gun would be the Kimber 1911-22LR. Alumnum frame and slide. Don't recall the weight, but it's lighter than my MK11 4" BB. Mine seems to have some jaming problems. If a new magazine dosen't fix it, it's going down the road. Might have to try the Beretta.
Virgil B.

I have yet to find a .22 trail hand gun that pleases, or satisfies me as well as a S&W model 34 or 63.