22LR Black Powder Reloads - How to Make Them

[Ballistics in Scotland]

.22WRF? I have looked on the face of God - for the right barrel or liner would be easy to get. I think the chances of getting half a million at anywhere near a reasonable cost would be much less, though. Your best chance would be with something that pops out of one of their machines ready made, and would normally go into their own next stage.

[Traffer]

There may be a way to sell/use those 500,000 cases. It would depend of course on the price. I have an idea of who may be able to use that many. I will PM you about it.

Do believe you are one very lucky reloader! Other than the primed cases that sold like lightning one time on the Hunting Shack -there are no more. Primed cases only are scarcer than hen's teeth! Having contacted 5 commercial reloaders for primed cases, standard answer - "Sorry, Legal Liability" I even talked with ArmsCor. Was told make an order for 500,000 and they'll be yours!

[Tracy]

.22WRF? I have looked on the face of God - for the right barrel or liner would be easy to get. I think the chances of getting half a million at anywhere near a reasonable cost would be much less, though. Your best chance would be with something that pops out of one of their machines ready made, and would normally go into their own next stage.

WMR, then. I know Armscor makes that, because I have some. WRF shares all dimensions except length with WMR, though.

[Chev. William]

Length can be Trimmed if the Case is Longer so 'WMR' Length is more 'Adaptable' Than Ordering the 'WRF' length directly.

Best Regards,
Chev. William

[w30wcf]

If you guys ever find a place that has new primed .22 cases don't tell John Boy and w30wcf till you send your order in first I saw a post once that these two guys where pulling bullets to reload them with black powder so I told them just get 5000 of these primed cases and load them. I made a mistake and they beat me to what was left before I had a chance to re supply my 25 year old stock I had left in the coffee can LOL. They went to a good place with those two guys.

John, I found that 3F OE works best for me instead 4F Goex. It really shrunk the groups. I tested the black powder loads with some of the Wolf match. The black powder loads don't take the back seat with a lot of the factory .22 RF ammo.
Strange that my low wall shoots the black powder loads best with a fouled barrel then a clean one.
You can see starting at the lower target how large it is with a clean barrel then the second from the bottom as the fouling build up the group tightened and finally the third from the bottom put then all in contact. All of those groups are 5 shots at 50 yards shot off sand bags.
I shot a 100 yard egg match once using them and got beat out by one of those new 17 cal rim fire rifles.

Lead Pot,
Excellent! I have also found that best accuracy comes after several rounds have been fired. I can't recall what bullet you are using(?) Is it the 225438?

A belated thank you for letting us know that you had some primed brass bought, I think, back in the 1980's-1990's(?). I did a search and found that The Hunting Shack had some. Fantastic! At that time I think they had 5 or 6 boxes of 5,000 left. I bought one and let the other fellows who had ordered the David Mos molds know.

w30wcf

[w30wcf]

Lead Pot - here's why Olde E FFFg works best ... the grain ratio is near Swiss Null-B
Olde E FFFg:
10 mesh - Zero
20 mesh - 8.07% Hold
30 mesh - 44.72% Hold
40 mesh - 32.29% Hold
50 mesh - 13.66% Hold
60 mesh - 1.24% Hold
80 mesh - Trace passed

John,
The partial container of Swiss Null B that I had given you....
50 Mesh - 100% pass through.....

w30wcf

[Lead pot]

Good grief John here I blamed you and John Boy for snatching them all up LOL

My mould is the Lyman 25438BV. But I should look at it to make sure. I used that mould for the .22 hornet also. If I'm wrong about it I will correct this post.

[w30wcf]

Lead Pot,
Thank you for the update. 225438 is a great bullet for the Hornet and was one of the first bullets I tried in the .22 L.R. It is working really well for you.

w30wcf

[w30wcf]

Thought I would post a pic of my .22 L.R. bullet seating setup.
The straight line seater is a Lyman .225 H&I die used in conjunction with a standard seating die in my RCBS press.

The seating die stem is adjusted to the point where the bullet is fully seated in the .22 L.R. case.



w30wcf

[Traffer]

Here are pictures of the die used for seating and final sizing after powder coating. It was adjustable but when I got it dialed in I put super glue on it so it wouldn't move. Then I messed up the top punch so now I need to either make a new perfectly lengthed top punch or burn the super glue out of the threads and reset it to the proper aol with a punch that is not necessarily the perfect length.
Attachment 178730Attachment 178731Attachment 178732Attachment 178733Attachment 178734
First pic is the end of the die same as pic 4.
Second pic is the other end where the top punch goes. You may be able to see the top punch on pic 4 at the top right of the pic.
The last pic is the super duper professional hand squeeze 22lr press with the die in place to be pressed. lol
(Yes it is a Channel Lock or pump pliers)

[Lead pot]

I used a .22 hornet die for some time till I had a die set made for the rim fire. The Hormady dies used to have a guide sleeve for seating the bullet you can adjust down for the .22 LR and the .243 depriming stem with out the depriming pin would flair the case mouth. A cut down seating die would crimp the bullet.
The best setup is to get a die set for the .22 LR from CH-4-D and be done with it.
When I first started loading the .22 LR was when Herters had the proper dies.

[NavyVet1959]

So, for those of you who would like primed, empty .22LR cases, what would you consider a fair price for them (not including shipping)? I've been talking with a distributor of the .22 power loads (for the powder actuated nail guns and such) with respect to buying some of the various strength power loads. I've also mentioned to him that there might be a market for the ones with just the primer in them, but no powder. I'm not sure they will be that much cheaper since there really isn't that much powder in them. Assuming $12 per lb of powder and 2 gr of powder per cartridge, it would only be $0.34 less per 100 cartridges if you didn't include the powder in it. I have been quoted $2.67 per 100 round box in quantities of 50K.

[w30wcf]

Here are pictures of the die used for seating and final sizing after powder coating. It was adjustable but when I got it dialed in I put super glue on it so it wouldn't move. Then I messed up the top punch so now I need to either make a new perfectly lengthed top punch or burn the super glue out of the threads and reset it to the proper aol with a punch that is not necessarily the perfect length.
Attachment 178730Attachment 178731Attachment 178732Attachment 178733Attachment 178734
First pic is the end of the die same as pic 4.
Second pic is the other end where the top punch goes. You may be able to see the top punch on pic 4 at the top right of the pic.
The last pic is the super duper professional hand squeeze 22lr press with the die in place to be pressed. lol
(Yes it is a Channel Lock or pump pliers)

Traffer,
Nice work! Innovative! Since I don't have your talent, I need to use commercially available tools.......

w30wcf

[w30wcf]

So, for those of you who would like primed, empty .22LR cases, what would you consider a fair price for them (not including shipping)? I've been talking with a distributor of the .22 power loads (for the powder actuated nail guns and such) with respect to buying some of the various strength power loads. I've also mentioned to him that there might be a market for the ones with just the primer in them, but no powder. I'm not sure they will be that much cheaper since there really isn't that much powder in them. Assuming $12 per lb of powder and 2 gr of powder per cartridge, it would only be $0.34 less per 100 cartridges if you didn't include the powder in it. I have been quoted $2.67 per 100 round box in quantities of 50K.

2.67 per 100 would be .0267 ea which would be very good . We paid about .020 ea. when the Hunting Shack had them several years ago.

w30wcf

[Traffer]

I looked through my empty rimfire brass. 22wmr is 1" long but is .011 wider. The fine shot 22lt are just under an inch. That is probably what these cases are meant for.I wish I had some to experiment with. They may be able to be loaded like those old Russian revolvers that have the case cover the bullet. In that method one would have to make the heel in a way that the skirt would be easiily expandable and long enough to spread out to the rifling to create a bond with the barrel. Like the old minie' ball. Would be a fun project. If you want I could make up a few slugs that I think might work that way and send them to you for you to load and test.

I've got a large quantity of rather unusual Winchester-Western .22 rimfire cases which I bought on eBay for making bullet jackets, when it was easier to get them out of the US than it is now. The seller swore he would boil out the priming composition. But when I tried a few on a hot stove, they went off with a sharp crack. My trust in humanity would be improved by thinking the stuff had been fixed with something not water-soluble. The headstamp is modern, and I suppose they were intended for shotshells. There may well be some huge mine of them out there somewhere.

They are exactly an inch long, but of ordinary .22LR diameter, not WRM. I would be delighted if someone made a barrel blank of the right diameter for a non-heel, inside-lubed bullet. In fact I have always thought it is a great pity the .22 Winchester Rimfire (same diameter as the later WRM, but shorter) didn't become the standard .22 round. It was never as accurate as the .2LR, but with the same amount of development and investment I think it could have been better.

If I wasn't going to use handloaded rimfires in a repeating rifle, I believe I would make them without the crimp, which I think only came in when Stevens progressed to repeaters. I believe it is by far the easiest way for the amateur to build inaccuracy into these rounds.

[Chev. William]

Traffer,
SAAMI and CIP list the Case Length for the .22WMR as 1.055" so your Measured length might be a little 'short'. but might be Manufacturer Variances.
Long Ago I bought some 'Grade 7' Nail Gun Loads and they Measured to match SAAMI .22SHOT Shell dimensions, which is what I had a Ruger Standard Auto chamber recut to fit.
I had a "Blank Firing Furnace" made from 1" Steel Bar to slide over and Bayonet Lock on the Ruger's Front Sight Base with a Solid 1/2" front drilled with Six .093" Holes near the Perimeter of the Inside Bore. I used a Washer with a coil spring to both seal the Muzzle gap and keep the 'Furnace' Tight on the Muzzle. overall the Furnace was about 6 inches long.
Firing those gave a Night flame about 12 to 16 inches long out the front, Strong recoil, a LOUD Report, and Solid Ejection of spent cartridges. I used this in Reserve Training Training Exercises for about four years. Then I was transferred to another Amphibious Reserve Unit; and kept the Pistol and furnace until I finally had the pistol reworked with a 6 inch Bull Barrel and Target Sights. it is still in my Shooting Safe.

Best Regards,
Chev. William

[Traffer]

Chev. William, That sounds like a really interesting piece of equipment you made. Wish I could see it being shot. Must have been very cool. About my measurment, sorry I was rounding to the nearest inch when I said 22WMR were 1". The measured size is 1.053"
The measured size of LR "Bird Shot: is .1.000" when the case is opened. So apparently the cases that Ballistics in Scotland has are for "bird shot".
The idea that I was trying to convey is the the bird shot 22lr primed cases could be loaded similarly to the Nagant Revolver Ammo with the bullet all the way in the case, as seen here:
Attachment 178935
The 22lr needs to have a wider diameter than the inside of the case though. There are two ways to deal with this as far as I can see. One is to let just a bit of the 22lr slug in wad cutter form. stick out of the case with the diameter being the correct .240" to create a gas seal. The other way is to leave the entire bullet inside of the case, leave the bullet at .210" and make a "skirt" on the round similar to the skirt on a Minie' ball that would expand to fill the barrel after firing. I am pretty confident that both techniques would work. If Ballistics in Scotland would like to try either of these ideas, I would be happy to make up some of both kinds of bullets and ship them to him. Would love to hear about how they would work. In fact, I have some spent bird shot cartridges here. I think I will go ahead and do the experiment myself.
Here are pictures of a 22WMR case next to a 22 Bird Shot case:
Attachment 178936Attachment 178937Attachment 178938Attachment 178939

[Chev. William]

Traffer,
RE:"That sounds like a really interesting piece of equipment you made. Wish I could see it being shot. Must have been very cool."

Oh it Was! One time I was at a Public Pistol range with it and had the 'furnace' sitting on the Bench beside me while I was shooting the Ruger with .22LR ammo. Another Shooter noticed it and asked if he could try shooting my pistol with it fitted ( I think he thought it was a Silencer) so I loaded up a Magazine of the Grade 7 PTLs and fitted the 'furnace' to my Muzzle and offered him the chance.
It was fun seeing The Startled Look on his face when he touched the first round off and felt the recoil and heard the Report! He tried two more, then gave it back tome and walked back to his own station. a while later he came back and thanked me for the Opportunity.

Sadly, that pistol range has since been closed and 'redeveloped' into an Industrial site.
A company called "ARC Machines" is the occupant now.

Best Regards,
Chev. William

[Tracy]

2.67 per 100 would be .0267 ea which would be very good . We paid about .020 ea. when the Hunting Shack had them several years ago.

w30wcf

Agreed; that's not a bad price at all. It's about what we currently pay for centerfire primers. I would buy 5,000 (maybe more) at that price.

[stac]

Here's an extra step I've added:
* A 225 H&I die, bullet nose down to tighten the factory crimp up so the rounds will chamber in the Henry better without hanging up. To keep the metplat from not being distorted, I put a spent LR primer filled with lead on top of the die plug. Any flat nosed top punch works

But is not dangerous?, (sorry for my bad english)