Monday, May 11, 2009

Shooty stuff...

A side effect of the current ammo situation is that my guns in oddball calibers are going to get more of a workout. I brought my Smith 544 to the range yesterday to use up an opened bag of .44-40 I found in the attic. It means I'm down to only 100-150 rounds of .44 WCF in the house now, but in the oddball calibers, I'm generally happy if I have one box on hand.

All those years of Glocks and SIGs and Berettas in .40 cal mean that I have several hundred rounds of odds & sods in .40 S&W ammo. I guess I should take that as a signal to drag my lone .40 to the range and burn it up. Especially since I don't currently have a loaded round of 9mm FMJ to my name. 9mm JHP? Oh, I've got half an ammo can full of that, but I feel bad shooting my bowling pin ammo at paper.

I have probably half a case or more of .32 S&W Long, which is a clear sign that my Model 31-1 needs to come to the range more.

Incidentally, Shootin' Buddy discovered this old Remington "Mohawk" stuff for sale in scenic Lafayette. The dealer swears up and down he just got several cases of it from RSR. I have no earthly idea where RSR would have turned up .22 ammo that was at least 30 years old, but there you go. I was in for a thousand rounds. It seems to work fine. Besides, it will feel appropos to shoot antique .22 ammo in my K-22.

Incidentally, while the Mohawk worked fine, a more recent batch of Remington .22 didn't. Shootin' Buddy buys Remington blue label target stuff to shoot in his suppressed Mk II. I wish I'd thought to scribble down the lot number of the stuff he was using yesterday, because the brass was brittle and not up to par. He had several hard primers and multiple split cases, some of them rather dramatically split...

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ugh! That Remington blue label stuff was frustrating-split cases, dead primers, inter alia. It was the stuff I bought last time we went to the Mountain of Geese.

Next time we go shoot I'm bringing all that old Green Tag that I've been squirreling away. The Green Tag may be 15 years old but I bet it works just fine.

Shootin' Buddy

Tam said...

I don't think the primers were dead, I think the brass was just too hard for the firing pin to squish. Even my K-22 hardly left a mark on that one I tried.

Anonymous said...

You're right. I single loaded a couple of those in both 22/45s so the primer could be hit from a different angle and the SW M17 that I brought--no boom.

I thought it just might have been me and my "special gift" to guns (you know, "I am death: Destroyer of Guns").

Shootin' Buddy

Owen said...

Remington rimfire has been pretty hit and miss for a long time. The relebaled Eley stuff is good, but the Remington stuff? usually 2-3 duds in a brick, and only so-so accuracy from M41, MKII, Domino and Pardini pistols

USCitizen said...

RSR lists exactly five types of 22LR today from two manufacturers, all of them 40 Gr.:

1. Federal Ultra Match,
2. RWS/Umarex R50,
3. RWS/Umarex R100,
4. RWS/Umarex Subsonic and
5. RWS/Umarex Target.

(No 30 year-old Mohawk to be found here).

Tam said...

Yeah, I'm a mite skeptical of that, and it is a tale heard at one remove.

Blackwing1 said...

So what is considered to be an acceptable "dud" rate in .22 ammo? My wife and I were at the range yesterday shooting relatively new (2005-vintage) Remington "Golden" in the 525-round brick (no individual boxes, just rounds loose in the box). Out of about 300 rounds expended we had 4 duds. They were fired in a Ruger 22/45 (2 duds), a Ruger 10/22 (1 dud), and a Marlin 39A (1 dud), and all had good firing pin strike marks.

I've never had that many duds from Remington ammo, but I have had that many from a brick of Federal, which is why we switched over a few years back.

Are they doing something different in their manufacturing process to try to reduce costs, but unwittingly increasing their failure rate?

Vaarok said...

I am also using odd calibers, shooting 6.5 Carcano and 7.65 Argentine because it's cheaper than .308 or 8mm.

Anonymous said...

I have been giving a great deal of thought to buying 1 or 2 more guns in .40, maybe something that I could buy 1 or 2 other barrels for on down the road when ammo returns to normal

Anonymous said...

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Anonymous said...

I've found Remington's .22 ammo to be made of nothing but sadness and tears.

For general plinking and Steel Challenge, the Federal bulk packs seem to be the way to go, if you can find them. (Yeah, right.)

Recently, I picked up two bricks of .22LR from Centurion. According to the box, it's hecho in meh-he-co, so there's no telling if it's good or not. (I've had good luck with Aguila in the past.)

Ed Foster said...

Definately agree with jbomulti. Aguila, when it's priced right, is the best stuff I've found, especially that 38 gr. highspeed hollowpoint.

Remington .22 is kinda lame, but I've never had a split with Winchester, and it seems to group better in most of my artillery.

Federal's the most common ammo here in CT, and I've had almost no FTF's with it.

The most annoying think I find about Remington is how dirty it is.

phlegmfatale said...

I lurves the packaging.