Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters What's the best twist rate for 22 shorts

For a long time I have dreamed of a levergun that will hold 25 rounds and is chambered only in 22 short, my idea of the perfect squirrel gun. Of the rifles I've shot none shot the shorts very well and I wondering what the best twist rate may be for the stubby little pills?

IIRC, 1 in 24" was the old standard.

I had a Browning BL-22 that shot CB shorts very well.
I'm guessing it was the standard 1 in 16.
I think the dedicated .22 short barrels were 1 in 24.

I doubt a 1:24" rifle would sell well in a regular lineup but it'd surely be nice to see a TALO run by one of the makers.

You can get a liner from Brownells for 22 shorts. I had an
old Flobert relined with one. It shoots ok but I have nothing
to compair it with.

I would think it is more in the quality of mfgr of the shorts than the twist rae.Are not the lead bullets still 36-40 grs. Try the Remington sub sonics if you are looking for an accurate bullet with less power.

Are you thinking about rebarrelling one of your lever actions?

By the way, Digital Dan has a TC he had barrelled for .22 shorts. Be sure to consult with him.

The best chance of good accuracy would seem to call for a .22 Short chamber. Re-lining with the short chamber would seem to be the way to go. Remember you want reliable feeding, also.

We have an old 510 Remington SS that does rather well with shorts. It is currently in the care and custody of #1 grand daughter (with supervision). It is LR chambered, but I will check the twist anyway next trip out. If it is not 16, I will report back.

On the conversion, seems like the barrel could be set back a bit and the chamber re touched with a short reamer. But then, I do not remember running shorts through my Marlins for function. I have used a good bit of standard velocity target ammo. jack

The first person I would ask is DigitalDan here on the fire. He has done a lot of work with the .22 short, and has killed some big hogs with that round. he had a good thread on the subject in the rimfire section a pretty good while back. PM him if he does not see this thread.

diden't 22 shorts come with the 40 grain bullet a long time ago ? I used them to kill hogs when I was young. but I also used long rifle shells but it seems like the short had the same bullet in a short case as the LR. at the distance I shot the hogs from 3 feet , a LR was not needed..

A quick check on Midway's site shows 27 and 29 grain loads for the 22 shorts. I shot hundreds of trapped coyotes with CCI's CB 22 shorts out of an ancient Winchester 1902 single shot. They simply fell over with little blood or thrashing. Long rifles, especially hollowpoints tended to do more damage than necessary and caused a lot of bleeding.

I have to agree with the OP that a lever gun specifically set up for shorts would be a fun gun. Great squirrel rifle and like they said about the old Henry's, "you could load 'em on Sunday and shoot all week".

Mart

Thanks for the replies folks. I have an olderHenry that I'd like to do something with. I'll PM Digital Dan and invite him to comment.

Have seen both 20" and 24" twists referred to as standard rate for shorts, and think you can spend too much time debating the merits of either in about 3 seconds. The barrel I have for shooting shorts is a 16" twist, but has what T/C calls a match chamber.

There is no doubt in my mind that having the gun chambered specifically for shorts is the lion's share of what is needed to have accuracy with the round. Plenty of S, L, LR chambered RF guns have demonstrated that freebore is not conducive to fine accuracy with shorts.

As mentioned, the short path (is that a pun?) is to have the barrel of a gun which functions with shorts re-lined and chambered to that end. Of course other avenues such as a new barrel or setting the existing barrel back will work. Don't worry about twist rates.

Last comment: When I got my barrel from TC I was a bit disappointed early on regarding accuracy. Turns out it just didn't care for Remington or Wincherster ammo. It is however quite fond of all CCI short ammo and will group 5 in 1/2" at 50 yards from a rest and with optical glass rather than the red dot I use.

Great info Dan, thank you.

On the other side of the question...sort of....buddy of mine had an ancient Remington .22 pump that was chambered for .22 shorts when we were kids. Not much rifling still showing. All we ever shot out of it were long rifles. You had to load them single shot and really slam it to get it to go into battery. Shooting paper or tin cans it was obvious the bullets usually hit side on, on long shots you could hear them buzzing...didn't hit much but on the rare occassion we connected with a chipmunk it would kill them pretty dead...

i burned though a ton of shorts though my squirrel gun when i was a kid (old 514 Remmy single shot.) always enjoyed shooting them, with the low muzzle blast felt like i was in "stealth" mode.

Belgian TD-22 Short and a Rem 121 shooting shorts, are 2 of the most accurate 22's I've ever owned. I have no idea what the twist rate is on either. Back when shorts were 3 boxes for a dollar, inside a 100 ft. you could strike a match with either.

DMc

Things have always gone best for me when I DIDN'T get my shorts in a twist.

I'm sorry for that there Lord . . .