I spent a couple of hours at the indoor range today with three of my 22LR handguns and three different kinds of ammunition.
I was intending to simply work on my trigger control since that is my worst weakness(holding steady being a close second).
The handguns I had with me were a S&W 34 with a 4 inch barrel, a Ruger Mark II with the slab sided target barrel in stainless, and a S&W 22A target pistol.
The ammunition I was using was Winchester M22, Federal HV Match, and Remington Thunderbolts (newly purchased box).
I started off with the Winchester M22. The accuracy was poor to average in all the guns with the Ruger being slightly more accurate.
Next up was the Federal HV Match. This ammunition gave very good accuracy in all three guns with the Ruger again, being slightly more accurate.
Then I tried the Thunderbolts. I only fired these in the Ruger and the 22A. I wasn't expecting much since my results with Thunderbolts, previously, has always been mediocre at best and quite often poor.
Both pistols shot outstanding with the Thunderbolts Tighter groups than the Federal match by quite a margin. With this ammunition, the S&W 22A was really outstanding. Significantly better than the Ruger Mark II and gave the best groups I had fired all afternoon. I am talking a group 1.5 inches wide and about 2 inches tall at 10 yards, offhand without any rest. For me, that is superb. It is as good as I have ever done without a rest.
I have never had this kind of success with Thunderbolts in any of my 22 handguns before. This particular box was purchased about 2 months ago. All the rest I have used was purchased years ago.
They were a tighter fit in the chambers than I ever remember before. It seemed the projectile was a bit larger in diameter than before.
Has Remington upped their quality with the Thunderbolts recently or was this just a one off?