Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Rimfires Accuracy of Ruger 10-22 with open sights??

Hi guys, I just got a new to me ruger 10-22 stainless synthetic. It is one of the older ones with the metal trigger housing. It belonged to a friend of mine so I knew it was accurate from previous range sessions. He was hard up for money and asked if I wanted to buy it and I jumped on it. Take a look at the target and tell me if your ruger shoots like this with factory sights and factory barrel. I have polished out the sear and lightened the trigger a bit, but other than that it is bone stock:

Target shot at 50 yards with cheap value pack 36 gr. federal hollow point bullets.
I'm also looking for suggestions on a good peep sight for this thing. BSA.

Sight:
http://www.midwayusa.com/viewproduct/?productnumber=846604

Hard to tell if it is the shooter, rifle, sights, or ammunition, without more testing

I have a general rule to not evaluate rifles with cheap bulk pack ammunition.

Bruce

Yup, go with the Williams sight--pretty good, short money.

IMHO, an avererage 10/22 you could expect about 1 1/2" at 50 yards with a 4X scope and decent ammo such as CCI Std. Vel, or a Federal target load not bulk HP's). 10/22's can be great guns, but on average they are not real tack drivers--that's why there is a cottage industry to make them so!
On average a 4X scope reduces groups about .5 MOA, so at 50 yds that would give you 1.75" avg. groups without a scope, maybe a little more for open iron sights. I'd then add up to another 1 MOA for the bulk ammo you shot, so at 50 yds you'd be adding another half inch, so the 1.75 becomes 2.25"--that's center to center. Outside to outside, you'd add the bullet dia. of .2225 so now you'd be at about 2.5" at 50 yds., iron sights, bulk ammo, off bags on a calm day. If the 10/22 is more accurate than most you could take .5" off that.
Looks to me like the left and low shots are flyers--take those 2 or 3 out and you'd be looking pretty good!
Your flyers could easily be the following in order of probablity (most probable cause to least probable)
1) Cheap ammo
2) Wind
3) Bore not cleaned or seasoned or had some oil left in it from your cleaning prior to shooting for score
4) Trigger nut (behind the trigger )

I'd recommend getting some Wolf MT, SKJagd Std+, RWS Target Rifle or a mid price Eley and see what happens (most of these will go you about $5 to $7 per box of 50 at a gun shop) then go from there--most of those will eliminate the ammo question

As always, this is just my opinion and others may differ--your results may vary!

Thanks guys, I've had my eye on the williams peep too. I think part of the shooting can be blamed on the nut behind the butt. I've been fighting an eye infection in my shooting eye and things are a a bit blurry. In all, I'm pretty happy with the accuracy of the rifle. Thanks for the coments. BSA.

Did a project back about 12 years ago with a dust collecting 10/22 Deluxe.

In order of occurrence, all groups at 50 yd, bag rest:

Factory iron w/Remington ammo type unk: ~2"
Full length glass bed: 1.5"
Power Custom trigger: 1-1.5"
Weaver K2.5: ~1"
W-W Power Point ammo: .5" for 10 shots.

Sadly I did nothing else with it except save it from mutilation previously planned. I had intended to use the action as a basis for a V-Firefly, glad I didn't now. Except as noted above, it remains stock and still shoots the same.

YMMV

Personally if it was me.

I'd stick the damn thing in the back of my safe and wait until times get better for him and sell it back. If times don't get better in a few years, would make a good Christmas present.

ymmv

Don't know where you are, but I'd not waste my time on astern Oregon's beldings ground squirrels. One would be shooting about 40%.

There's a reason I know that pilgrim.

Christmas this year for the grandkids: One hammer and a box of small pistol primers.

I have eight 10/22s of which 3 are stainless. All of them shoot better than that. At 50 yds I can hit a squirrel everytime. I doubt you could hit a squirrel with yours at 50yds. Try removing the barrel band. Make sure the stock isn't touching the barrel. Is there a nick on the muzzle? Did he scrub the barrel with wire bristles? I hardly ever clean a22 barrel and never with wire when I do. Check the chamber. Maybe he overscrubbed it and the brass has a loose fit in there. There has to be some repairable issue with with yours which could eliminate the high incidence of flyers. It can be fun to fix a problems like yours. Take the entire gun apart and reassemble including the barrel lug and the two screws securing it. Check the bolt face for burrs.

Definitely try different ammo before doing anything else.

I thought my 42 year old 10-22 was worn out since it would shoot about like your target even with a 4X scope on it. That was with Federal bulk pack .22 HP�s. Then I tried some Winchester Super-X and suddenly my old inaccurate 10-22 started putting them all into an inch again at 50 yards.

Tried the Federal bulk pack in a known super accurate Kimber and it shot like crap in that rifle too.

Even among so called target ammo there can be a big difference in what a rifle likes.

I have an original early 70's 10-22 with the factory barrel. In my younger years, with better eyes, factory open sights, and trigger, empty 30/30 cases at 40 paces were a breeze to hit. With a scope on it, and little wind, steady rest, Remington subsonic hollowpoints shoot easily inside 1/2 inch, more like 3/8's inch, at 50 yards. Squirrels, rabbits, ground hogs, feral cats inside 100 yards are easy targets with .22 stingers. Super X, CCI pistol match, Eley TenX, Green Tag, SGB, and Velocitors have all worked well in this rifle. Remember, it takes 20 rounds or so down range before the "new" ammo will start to settle in to really show it's potential in your rifle. The trick is to find what works and stock up on it.