Now possible to reload .22 LR easily

[tacklebury]

I just ordered one of these kits. I cannot attest to it's usefulness personally, but there's been a few reviews that are good. If I have decent luck I'll pass along the information as I try it. I heard about it in Backwoodsman Magazine and there's a coupon code BW101 to receive a free pack of priming compound if you use that code. Pretty sweet set-up and I cannot wait personally to try it out. Thankfully I've got a can full of spent cartridges I can test with. They have a die also for re-shaping the brass, but I didn't have enough to get both at the same time. Maybe next month will get the die. The mold has 2 openings. One for a 25 gr. truncated cone bullet which is designed for lighter loads and one is a 38 gr. RN. I personally feel that I will probably drill out the mold and make a flippable pin to make HP's or RN depending on which way it's faced. Will try some first though. I may not do this all the time, but it's definitely going to be going into my SHTF loading setup.




http://22lrreloader.com/

[rancher1913]

there was a thread on how to use that priming compound on here awhile back, even had a video. I ordered some to try but I have too much going on right now with calving to try it.

[Dtm870]

seems interesting but like it could be a lot of work for the # of 22 i shoot during a range session

[bangerjim]

Good luck! That thing has been around the net for several years now. I have never heard from anyone that used it.

I prefer to light load 223/38/44/45 and not mess with 22LR's. Cheaper, easier, more verstile that shooting those teeny carts.

[oldred]

Good luck about sums it it up, I have heard a lot of negative but have yet to hear anyone has who has tried one of those things have much good to say about them. Sure they CAN work and I suppose they could be a good idea, probably should be, in everyone's SHTF bag but for general reloading that's a heck of a lot of time and effort spent to make RF ammo, and corrosive ammo at that! I am not going to get into that match/primer thing again except to say that I just don't trust any outfit that resorts to misleading claims to sell their product and those "match heads for primers" claims are not just misleading but flat-out dishonest!

[Tenbender]

I just ordered one of these kits. I cannot attest to it's usefulness personally, but there's been a few reviews that are good. If I have decent luck I'll pass along the information as I try it. I heard about it in Backwoodsman Magazine and there's a coupon code BW101 to receive a free pack of priming compound if you use that code. Pretty sweet set-up and I cannot wait personally to try it out. Thankfully I've got a can full of spent cartridges I can test with. They have a die also for re-shaping the brass, but I didn't have enough to get both at the same time. Maybe next month will get the die. The mold has 2 openings. One for a 25 gr. truncated cone bullet which is designed for lighter loads and one is a 38 gr. RN. I personally feel that I will probably drill out the mold and make a flippable pin to make HP's or RN depending on which way it's faced. Will try some first though. I may not do this all the time, but it's definitely going to be going into my SHTF loading setup.




http://22lrreloader.com/

If you figure out how. I will send you my empties. *I have about 15 bricks in the RL room. lol

[duckey]

I saw that same add in that mag a week ago. Sparked my curiosit.

[Earlwb]

This is really fascinating. I might have to give it a try. I wonder if you can mix up the primer compound and store it wet or not. Or if you can just mix a small quantity up or not. I think that it would have been nice for their bullet mold to have had wood handles too.

[flyingmonkey35]

So as from my original post on it a year ago.

The mold is ****. And have not improved.

For all the work that goes into it.

I'd rather spend my time on 9mm or 45.

But I look forward to your review.

If any one wants to buy my set + resizing die I may be interested in a fair offer. Just pm me.

[6string]

I've been intrigued by this kit since I first heard about it. When it comes to reloading, anything this novel seems to beg for a try! But, I've been put off by the corrosive priming. Personally, my use would be for slow fire gallery target practice. I'm not running corrosive priming through the barrel of a nice Hammerli match pistol.
An alternative to the kit would be to use lead round balls. They are made in 22 cal for certain airgun applications. There was also an interesting video of a guy using nail gun cartridges in his 22 with a variety of projectiles.
So, there's probably a few ways to get a rimfire going if you're SOL regarding ammo.

jim

[Earlwb]

Yeah I was thinking that the bullet mold is pretty lacking. I still have some bullet molds that Dixie Gun Works made from old hair straighteners that worked better, albeit you needed to wear gloves to handle them. I was thinking that the bullet should have been longer with more lube grooves in it. But then that leads to using a luber on them and maybe resizing the bullets too. if I get ambitious, I might make my own bullet mold that fits my Lee or RCBS handles.

If I remember right, maybe there are some shotgun buckshot balls in .22 caliber. yes I was correct, the "F" size buckshot is .220 inch diameter in size. They still load shotshells using F size buckshot and it is available for reloading too. Unfortunately .220 inch size might be a bit small for .22 barrels though as the .22 bullets are around .223 inch size.

I looked up the .22 caliber nailgun cartridges and at present they cost about the same or more than .22Lr ammo, so that is iffy. Worse was all the nailgun cartridges that I saw were crimped like you'd use for blank cartridges. So trying to uncrimp them so you could use a bullet on them would be pretty iffy and risky. Of course with a single shot .22, maybe just slipping in a round ball bullet into the chamber and pushing in a nail gun cartridge behind it would work.

Yeah I agree, using this reloading setup would work Ok, if .22 ammo is difficult to impossible to get in your locale. Right now, it isn't too bad in my area. Most stores have some in stock, but some stores still ration it out. The local Bass Pro shop still has quite a bit of .22 ammo in stock and Cabellas further out was still having quite a bit in stock still. I remember seeing at the Bass Pro store several buckets of the .22 Remington Golden ammo on the table. I should have maybe bought one then, but I waited too long and they were gone later. They still had quite a few big boxes of the Federal Rimfire .22 Match ammo though.

Thus I agree this might be handy for those times .22 rimfire ammo is nearly impossible to get.

One other thought, is that the venerable .25 ACP round was designed to mimmick the .22 rimfire round. Maybe we really need guns chambered in 25 ACP for plinking and hunting purposes. Unfortunately they made all the guns for .25 ACP to be small pocket defense guns instead. I could see a handgun with a 6 inch barrel in .25 ACP being pretty useful in this respect. Maybe one of the wildcat cartridges based on the .25 ACP case. They have made .17, through .22 wildcats out of it already. Being a center fire cartridge the cute little .25 ACP might be the way to go for reloading.

[marlin39a]

I have been following this story for some time about reloading .22 rimfire. I've never heard about anyone that has done it successfully. Just not worth the effort!

[Earlwb]

Yeah I agree. I guess on second thought sticking with my old .22 Hornet as a backup for .22 LR rimfires is a better alternative.

[oldred]

I guess more than anything else I just despise scammers and clearly these guys are grossly exaggerating their sales pitch in order to play on everyone's shortage fears! They try to make it seem too simple and easy and use misleading tactics, bulk "reload for $8 per brick", well that might (or might not) be possible but considering the time and effort to load 500 of those (corrosive) things is that really a bargain? Then IMHO they just flat out lied about the match heads at first claiming originally that priming was quick and cheap using "easily obtainable strike anywhere matches" when they must have known full well those things, the ones that work anyway, are no longer available, how could they not know? I see they have now dropped that claim and I bet they were having a hard time explaining to everyone why that really can't be done anymore but they STILL show a picture of the worthless matches that you can buy today along with the caption "economical"!

They have to know those things won't work yet they show them anyway although they will now no longer claim that they can be used, so why the picture and "economical" caption? I guess I have about beat this dead horse to a pulp but but as I said I despise scammers and that site is loaded with half truths and misleading information obviously designed to play on the shortage fears, if they were willing to flat out lie about the match heads what else would they do/say to sucker people into buying that kit?

[ofitg]

Oldred, what amazes me is the price ($20) they're asking for that priming kit. Enough chemicals to prime 2000 cases..... so that works out to a little bit over 2 ounces of chemicals......

[oldred]

That priming kit is probably priced fairly enough BUT it is apparently a corrosive mixture, which they conveniently fail to mention just as they failed to mention in their earlier ads that the matches they were suggesting for priming simply weren't available anymore, even though they had to have known. My complaint about this outfit, and I readily admit I do not have one of these kits, is that they use what is IMO some very shady sales tactics and I base that belief on the "used car salesman" advertising approach they use, the matches are/were flat out dishonest as is the "implied" idea that you can easily reload a brick of quality 22 LR and thus beat the shortage. I have no doubt this kit can work and have never said it wouldn't but looking at it realistically there is nothing easy about it and if that priming kit becomes unavailable (that could be a real concern) I know from experience, not just opinion, that the matches they suggest simply are NOT an option! All this coupled with some rather unflattering reviews from people who have used this kit is good reason to at least approach this outfit with caution/skepticism, their apparent lack of honesty is quite telling.

They have changed their website and no longer try and push those unavailable matches, although they did at first even though they had been unavailable for several years, but they STILL as of now show a pic the completely useless matches that are available today and label that picture "economical", clearly they are still trying to get people to buy this kit thinking they can use matches for primers when it simply won't work anymore. If they are going to stoop to this kind of sales tactics can they be trusted? That of course is up to the potential buyer and it's their choice. My point is to be warned, several people who have bought this kit have pointed out the short-comings and poor quality, especially the mold but then that can be replaced with better quality from other sources. Another much bigger problem could be priming compound, that kit does not seem like a bad deal if a person is willing to accept corrosive priming and IF it remains available! These folks are selling a questionable product IMO, this amounts to a kit of components to produce a high explosive and there are many reasons why it could suddenly become unavailable. Once a person has these components they are free to do with them as they wish and that's enough explosive to get someone seriously hurt or killed if misused or into some serious mischief if the wrong people get it, especially if multiple kits are combined! Will this happen? Who knows but in this day of security panic I just can't see a kit for making what amounts to explosives remaining freely on the market for very long, maybe it will but that's still another risk the buyer takes -in spite of what these guys have claimed in the past and (suspiciously) still vaguely suggest those matches are not an option so that would leave the buyer to trying get chemicals and brewing up his/her own priming compound. That too is a possibility but it should be taken into consideration because it very well could be the only option the kit buyer may have before long.

[oldred]

These kits remind me of a few years ago, it pretty much predates the internet but magazines carried ads and there were radio "infomercials" on these things. I am talking about the Ethanol fuel distillers that the quasi-con artists were peddling during the gas crisis of past years. If you believed these ads/infomercials you could (theoretically) buy one of these things then easily and cheaply produce your own ethanol fuel and then laugh at the people who were paying extremely high prices for fuel and sometimes even waiting in line for it. "Use cheap and easily available corn and other grains to produce your own fuel and no longer be at the mercy of the big oil companies" they proclaimed! They failed of course to mention just how MUCH of that "cheap and easily available" corn or other grains you would need nor did they point out the enormous amount of time and effort it took to actually produce a usable amount of fuel, and as if that weren't enough it took more fuel to produce the ethanol than the ethanol produced could replace! Many of these things were sold but needless to say not many if any ever got used any appreciable amount and I doubt any are around today being used. So what does this have to do with reloading 22 LR? JMO but this shortage is a prime opportunity to sell gadgets of dubious value to those scared of being left without ammo and while these guys selling this kit may not be down on the same level as the fuel kit sellers I have good reason to suspect this kit is designed to take advantage of the buyer fears more so than to actually be an answer to the shortage! If a person wants to buy one with full knowledge that it is not top quality (as evidenced by buyer reviews) and ammo produced is of a corrosive type using the priming kit they sell, are willing to accept that obtaining priming compound may be a problem in the future, accept the time and effort involved then yes this kit may be just the thing for those people. However if a person is buying it as a way to avoid the high prices and spotty availability of commercially produced ammo they really need to read between the lines of those ads look at the real considerations such as time involved and continued component availability and what it REALLY takes to actually produce a usable amount of ammo with this kit vs the store bought ammo.

I am not telling people to not buy this kit, I am simply saying that IMO they should look at the real possibility's and not be influenced by enthusiastic and often inflated claims or the unrealistic suggestion this a cheap and easy way to avoid the 22 RF panic, expectations and reality can be two drastically different things in situations like this.

[Earlwb]

The big problem is I don't think you can reload 22 rim fire cartridges any cheaper than just buying the factory ammo to start with. The labor and time involved is even more than reloading center fire rounds. Plus that primer mix is very risky no matter what they say. Dangerous stuff. One needs to take a huge amount of care and safety rules to mess with it. Once upon a time reloading used to be cheaper than buying factory ammo. But the cost differences have closed up considerably. I think they realized there was lots of profit to sell the reloading stuff for higher prices than in the past.

[oldred]

Plus that primer mix is very risky no matter what they say. Dangerous stuff. One needs to take a huge amount of care and safety rules to mess with it

That was my point above about the sellers of that stuff selling a questionable product, think about it, how long before someone get's their fingers blown off or worse? Can't we just see the lawyers having a field day with that one? People being what they are (including me!) what else are they going to do with this stuff besides primers? I mean we are talking bomb making material here with just a little bit of imagination (I am talking the fun type), blowing up beer cans, M80s, etc, it's endless the kind of mischief people can get into even not meaning any harm and it's all to easy to get hurt doing this -enter that lawyer again!

Then there are those who may want an explosive for other more sinister purposes since this stuff is, or easily can be made into, a potent explosive and with multiple kits it could become quite powerful! The point is that it's really surprising they are selling this stuff, even if they don't run afoul of the law by doing so it looks like they could be opening themselves up to some serious damage liabilities. That's why I would have serious concerns about the continued availability of this priming kit.

[flyingmonkey35]

I can tell you from experience this time consuming. But you can do it.

A flint lock rifle and a lamented set of directions on how to make black powder. For end of world survival anyway.
And a few steel traps.

I did it just to say I can.