All these .22 duds

81Z4ME

Sergeant
Full Member
Minuteman
Feb 14, 2010
181
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67
VA
I read a lot about certain brands of .22 ammo being worse for duds than others. I wondered about it sense my rifles seem to do well with one of the brands with a bad reputation.

Last year, in April, I was at an Appleseed in WV. There was a family on one end of the line with three .22's. Two were 10/22's and one was an old single shot Remington bolt action (can't remember the model).

Anyway, the mother and daughter were ocassionally having duds with a couple different brands of ammo they were using in the 10/22's they were shooting. They had several one hundred round boxes of CCI ammo and a brick of Centurion (?). The son was using the single shot Remington. Over the course of the morning I'd helped them several times with duds/jams, etc. and they were getting a little pile of dud rounds on the mat between them. Then the pile was gone. I noticed the son (with the single shot Remington had a little pile of loose .22 shells on his part of their mat. He was grabbing up their duds and shooting them. I asked him about it and he said he hadn't had a dud round all morning and decided to see if their duds would shoot in his rifle and he said every one of them was going off.

I got to wondering it the design that allows the more modern .22's to be dry fired (firing pin made with an internal stop in the bolt that keeps it from contacting the chamber edge when dry fired) might be the difference. A slight difference in the length of the pin past the stop (either that part being to short or the stop being cut to far forward - same results)or the inside of the bolt not being cut deep enough or even powder residue build up inside the bolt(.22 semiautos are way dirtier inside than the bolt actions ever get) were causing the problem instead of the ammo itself.

I understand its a good idea to stay away from ammo that doesn't work in your rifle but the idea here is that the rifle would be more versatile/reliable if it could shoot more brands of .22 ammo.

Just something to think about.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

I would bet it has more to do with the strength of the FP spring than the length of the pin itself.

The 10/22 needs a weaker spring to be overcome by the bolt when the gun cycles.

Plus, you don't know what kind of aftermarket, light weight, high speed, low drag, zantanium, parts they were using that could have been causing this.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

Using Remington Golden Bullets, my 10/22 will experience a failure to fire at least 1/50 times.

Using Federal and Winchester, it is more like 1/100 will FTF.

With any of that ammo, my Marlins (60 & 795) have yet to fail to fire.



I must add - I have never fed CCI to my 10/22 - it's like throwing the good food to the swine. My Marlins, however, love the CCI stuff (mini-mags & standard velocity), too!
 
Re: All these .22 duds

I get occasional duds and I use decent ammo,SK Standard Plus (same as Wolf Match). My theory on it is that there are sometimes air pockets in the rim that don't have primer material where the firing pin strikes.I believe a dirty weapon could be an issue but my duds always had a normal(deep)looking strike mark from the firing pin. I used to dispose of them but I always thought throwing them in a dumpster was dangerous,then one day I decided to rotate the shell and try again, to my surprise it goes bang. I have had many duds since and rotating it and re-firing has worked every time.YMMV

Steve
 
Re: All these .22 duds

My thoughts are.....
In my experiance most duds are from the firing pin not striking hard enough.
Clean your bolt/firing pin. check your springs. I have not had a failure to fire in over 4000 rounds, maybe more.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

Ida, I'm curious as to what type of ammo and rifle you run. I think I choose my words poorly when I said I have had "many" duds. My round count was just under 4900 last year and had probably around 10 FTF's, I didn't really keep track of them. I just get nervous when they occur and found this method worked for me. Last fall I was setting up at the bench and noticed a .22LR dud someone had left for me on the bench. I loaded it up and it went bang. I should break down my bolt though, it's been awhile. Interesting topic, how do you safely dispose of a rimfire dud?

Steve
 
Re: All these .22 duds

Steve,
Interesting post. I've tried this with Federal High-V 36g HP's I used to plink/squirrel hunt with. I would get a dud every 150 shots or so and by rotating it, I almost always got it to go off on the second try.

I burned up a lot of Rem 40g SP Thunderbolts through a Ruger 77/22 (?) this past summer on Nebraska P-dogs and then was unfortunate enough to find they also shot well out my dad's Savage MII-F. I experienced FTF about every 50th shot and they would Not fire when rotated.

The CCI 40g Standard velocity target loads I hunted with this past fall have yet to FTF in about 125 shots, but I realize that's not saying much.

In my experience, higher grade ammo is far less prone to FTF than bulk, but not immune.

Although I agree with with Steve that the "air pocket" theory has some credence -and certainly seems to be correct in my experience- I think ida's assertion that firing pin spring strength has more to do with it than anything. I've yet to experience a FTF with any load that I've shot through my NEF R92 revolver in over approximately 1500 rounds. Luck? Maybe, but I kind of doubt it's just luck.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

With the bulk stuff, it is about less QC to get the price down.
If you catch a good lot, or a sweet-spot in any given lot, it is not too bad. But then you get some on the outer edge of what the production tolerance is and then it sucks.
FTF is not uncommon in bulk pack ammo of any brand. A couple of guys I know are semi-serious plinksters, they go through many thousands of rounds of .22 per year, switching brands depending on price, availability, whim, etc. They will tell you if you shoot enough you can find problems with any of the brands.
I have found as stated above that rotating the round 90 to 180 will almost always result in ignition.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

I shoot a Savage MKII and CCI or Eley. I can't remember the last time one did not go bang.

A better question is how many serious benchrest shooters have a round that does not fire with top shelf Eley or Lapua?
 
Re: All these .22 duds

I've shot a good bit of rimfire over the years... 10's of 1000's. For me, bulk ammo has had a lot more problems than quality rimfire ammo. I'm not surprised by that though, and it's infrequent enough that if it keeps the cost down on the bulk stuff i can live with it. With the better rimfire (CCI stinger & velocitor, Eley, Lapua, etc.) I've never had an issue.

That said, the bulk stuff has been much more reliable in my CZ then it ever was when i was shooting it through a 10/22 i used to have.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Usagi</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Using Remington Golden Bullets, my 10/22 will experience a failure to fire at least 1/50 times.

Using Federal and Winchester, it is more like 1/100 will FTF.

With any of that ammo, my Marlins (60 & 795) have yet to fail to fire.



I must add - I have never fed CCI to my 10/22 - it's like throwing the good food to the swine. My Marlins, however, love the CCI stuff (mini-mags & standard velocity), too! </div></div>

I have seen similar performance. The Golden Bullets are not so good.
 
Re: All these .22 duds

Ever gotten a box that was 100% duds?

I was searching for what ammo my 10/22 build likes so I was buying a single box of anything I could find locally. One shop (typically known for being a rip off place on guns but OK on ammo) had a single box of Armscor at a decent price ($3) so I got it when I was buying some other stuff. Got to the range a week or so later and noticed these weird holes in the base on the Armscor ammo. Very weird. Turns out it was a box that slipped QC at Armscor (long drive to the UPS depot to send it back but they are waiting for it and "we'll make it good for ya" has been promised) and it was supposed to be labeled as dummy rounds... So 50 duds in a 50 round box...

22ammo.jpg
 
Re: All these .22 duds

heard of a box of 50 hollow points, but not 50 hollow cases!

neat story.

i've has approximately 1 out of 15 remington subsonics not fire, then re chamber and then they go off. abouot 1 in 25 doesn't go off at all.

thought it might be my firing pin, but i don't have that problem with wolf, sk, aguila, or even fed or win bulk packs.

savage mkii f and bv