Casting for Walmart 22 xman pellet

[stephen m weiss]

I bought a walmart 22 lr, it says 1200fps with plastic pellets, which I assume are about 10 grains. I dont have it yet. I have been making 223 cast bullets and have my quality at 1-2moa at 1500 fps with a savage 223 22" . I am going to try shooting my 50 grain 223 pellets, lubed with either lee alox or some other combos I am trying.

I weighed my production pellets at 15 grains+/- so I expect 500-600 fps with 50 grain. I dont mind the drop, I want the energy, sized consistency, lube and home casting capability.

With my gamo silent cat I get 5moa with factory pellets, not counting scope mounting issues. With my own quality on pellets, I expect better. I do NOT want to spend $1000 up on a pellet gun at this time.

What can I expect for accuracy from the gun, Iron sights I guess, unless I put a scout scope on it?

[HARRYMPOPE]

About 10 years ago I tried the 225107 Lyman size .222 diameter im a RWS 48 .22 caliber I got dismal accuracy maybe you'll do better.50 grains for a spring gun is really out there as far as weight goes.I wouldn't be surprised if the velocity wasn't as low as 350 feet per second.with the 21 grain pellet my precharged Marauder only got about 800.if you're getting 500 feet per second out of the 50 grain you're pushing 30 pounds of muzzle energy which only the big guns like the Theobens will get or the big crude Hatsans.Walmart Crosman Premier 22 cal. are only 9 bucks per 500 and shoot into an inch at 25 in most reasonably quality spring guns.Good guns shoot them under 1/2".

[Newtire]

From what I hear, the rifling twist is a little slow (alot slow actually) to stabilize a longer .22 boolit, especially at so slow of a velocity. Pyramid air did some testing of that kind of thing. You gotta figure, if a 1-16" twist barrel in a .22 Hornet doesn't stabilize the longer .22 bullets well at a speed approaching 2000 FPS, an airgun would be worse still. Just my opinion..

http://www.pyramydair.com/blog/tag/twist-rate/

Maybe a short little slug like the old Sheridan .20 cal slugs would be alright? I had a Sheridan though and the newer Beeman Silver Jets worked alot better and were way more accurate in it than the Sheridan solid slugs. Apparently, the longer pellet with it's heavier-in-the-front section gets some help from that shuttle cock feature?

Be careful getting into airgun shooting, it can be about as addicting as casting. What good is living unless you can have a few gun related addictions?

[Avery Arms]

Don't attempt to shoot .223 bullets in an airgun, they are far too heavy and have too much bearing surface on the bore so they will most likely get stuck in the barrel and the gun may blow it's seals trying to push them. Also even if they do make it out of the barrel the velocity will be all over the place and nowhere near 500fps.

I have shot soft lead 50gr .25acp bullets in my big webley patriot .25 but they don't do nearly as well as the 25-30 grain pellets it was designed for and those are only about 100% heavier not 250% heavier like you are suggesting.

[W.R.Buchanan]

+1 on what is said above. There is too much bearing surface for this to work. If you look at a normal pellet you will see that it rides on a ring at the front and a ring at the back and the rest of it doesn't touch anything. This cuts down on the resistance to movement when going down the barrel.

My Beeman R1 pushes 21 gr pellets at about 750 fps. I doubt your 50 gr boolits would even clear the barrel on my gun. Your gun has little chance of doing more and about a 100% chance of doing considerably less.

Good article on this in the current Pyramyd Air catalog. Airguns are pretty much at the top of the performance spectrum right now. This is due to air pressure pushing the pellet and what they have got now is about it. you can get 4000psi behind a pellet, but even the weakest firearms are 3 times that.

Here's a hot tip. Shoot decent pellets in your gun and work on your accuracy and shooting skills instead of trying to make your gun into something it is not.

I guarantee you will be much happier and you won't have to spend $1000 to achieve the same level of failure.

Randy

[Pakprotector]

The powder burner boolits are too big in diameter; pellet groove dia is .216-.217...not .224-5...

A 22 cal marauder should be able to push an 18 gr pellet up near 1000 fps with no mods...if you mod, they'll push the big Korean pellets out super sonic.
cheers,
Douglas

[stephen m weiss]

Awesome tips guys! Don't worry too much about the shooting skills. I have and shoot nearly everyday at least one of xbow, hunting bow, buck bb gun, xman pump air gun, gamo silent cat .177, 22LR, AR, 223, sks, 308, 50cal muzzleloader, 20 gage pump. I do my own external ballistics spreadsheet for all these, as well as internal ballistics for the powder guns. I shoot double bags, prone, kneeling, offhand, lefthanded, moving targets, tree rest, treestand rest, bedpost-cabindoor rest... etc. I dont practice hangin upside down yet...but I do use scopes, irons, lazersights for night varmint elimination, and nightvision (some). I am no expert, but definately work on it.

I will: check the twist on my gun, slug the bore, work on an internal ballistics model for the springer. I have some variety packs of 22 pellets that have different weights. By seeing what speed they push, I can characterize the gun. Typically, the heavier the pellet, the greater the energy it will pull from the gun, but obviously fit is key. I measured my 22 pellets dia and they were coming in at .2243, a few tenths under my cast and sized .224's. I will look into a smaller sizing die if I need to. Sliding friction of 5 lbs x 15 inches of barrel is about 6 ft-lbs, so not really that great a fraction of delivered energy, but I wouldnt want it to climb to 30 lbs friction.

I know my rated for 1200fps .177 pushes lead at 900-950fps. I expect the same from the 22. My production 22 pellets were 15grains. At 3x the mass, the speed should drop by root 3 (50/15), but be higher because it picks up more inertia of the spring plunger, just as a heavy xbow bolt picks up more of the energy from the moving bow arms. That gives greater than 493 fps by how much energy it picks up by being slow and massive.

I know some of my production .177 pellets are loose slip fit for the barrel, and some are a super light press or even a close slip fit. I assume they were designed to expand the skirt from pressure and bore ride the nose. The loose ones shoot as accurate as anything. The most important aspect on accuracy seems to be the engagement length and bearing area. The domed 'penetrator' models produce 60% worse accuracy than the soup can style. A really thin driving band fairs worse than one with .03 to .06 engagement along the bore. I expect harder lubed lead will be more stable, but again, has to fit right.

Thanks again, cant wait to get it!

[Newtire]

Not saying people don't do these things because I see all the shows on these things but shooting a big African Hartebeest or comparable critter with a .357 pellet gun seems about like the same as using a .38 special. I agree with the poster who says to not try to make an air rifle into something it isn't. Heckuva lot of fun in their own right though.

[Multigunner]

Some 18th century airguns were commonly used for smaller deer, a few of the large caliber airguns guns (.70+/-) were used for wild boar. These were PCP types. European hunting traditions of the day were often inhumane by todays standard. They'd wound an animal with arrows or bullets but finish it off with a large dagger or hunter's sword.
It was based on the ideal that some beasts were "Noble Creatures" and a man must finish them with a sword or dagger as a sign of respect. Quite a few hunters paid the price for these traditions.
They also seemed to take pride in using the least powerful gun that would get the job done. Some early hunting rifles were no more powerful than the .38-.32 Tennessee squirrel guns, and had so little recoil that they had no butt stock to speak of. The comb was pressed to the cheek but nothing touched the shoulder. The later Jager rifles changed that course , these being heavy caliber powerful guns.

The general shape of some saboted shot gun slugs are somewhat like that of a waisted airgun pellet though the base is solid.
The type I speak of have a long narrow waist and disc like base.
If the slug wobbles in flight air catches the the base and rights it again. With the long narrow waist of such a projectile used without sabot in a rifled barrel friction would be greatly reduced.
Might be a good shape for a long heavy slug in an airgun.
If the action allowed for manual pre engraving while loading initial egraving resistence would be eliminated and velocity improved.

[stephen m weiss]

Yeah, I was thinking that pure lead, if pushed in the bore and allowed to creep anneal a skosh, would have a really stable bearing area. I am not trying to hunt anything bigger than fat squirrel with these, well maybe a porcupine or fox might get in my sites, I just know I can cast very precise sized 223's for 1.5 cents a piece but am paying 2x that for as-cast really light pellets which I have very little control of the supply. If I wanted to be really slow, I could muzzle load these, and thereby form them to the tightest squeeze spot.

As far as it goes, I almost always make things into something they were not. It was my career, it's my love, and I get it done by mastering every law of physics I ever learn and every bit of math that seems to be useful. To tell ya the truth, I figured the whole point of an airgun section of a cast bullet forum was to discuss how to cast your own airgun ammo to get as good or better than the best production stuff at a fraction of the cost. I know that casting 223 to be 1moa is challenging, but I have pretty much addressed that thanks to popper and many others on the main section of this site. Aren't others casting .30 to .45 airgun ammo here?

[Chev. William]

Do remember the Sniper Air rifles that gave Napoleon Bad Dreams.

Best Regards,
Chev. william

[Pakprotector]

I measured my 22 pellets dia and they were coming in at .2243, a few tenths under my cast and sized .224's. I will look into a smaller sizing die if I need to. Sliding friction of 5 lbs x 15 inches of barrel is about 6 ft-lbs, so not really that great a fraction of delivered energy, but I wouldnt want it to climb to 30 lbs friction.

I know my rated for 1200fps .177 pushes lead at 900-950fps. I expect the same from the 22. My production 22 pellets were 15grains. At 3x the mass, the speed should drop by root 3 (50/15), but be higher because it picks up more inertia of the spring plunger, just as a heavy xbow bolt picks up more of the energy from the moving bow arms. That gives greater than 493 fps by how much energy it picks up by being slow and massive.


Where are you measuring the pellets? the head or the skirt?

Also, you will find that springers( either metal coil, or gas ram have a different power delivery wrt pellet weight than PCP's. Where making the pellet heavier for the PCP nets higher ME, past the lightest of the lead pellets, the gas ram starts dropping delivered ME. For example, my Beeman RX2 5mm delivers the highest ME with 10 gr pellets( the Beeman wad cutters ), and even the 11.4 gr FTT drop the ME. I have not tried lighter...but I bet a 9 gr would get more power than the 10...
cheers,
Douglas

[stephen m weiss]

Its an xman ruger magnum 22. It has a .217 lead in. The pellet loading section is the tightest and it opens up past that and slides freely. The twist is 1:20, with my 50 grain bullets at 500 fps, that is a stability factor of .76. about half the minimum, so bad. A 40 grain bullet would run about 560 fps and have a little better than 1.12, so might be fine under 50 yards. If I select one of the NOE 45 grain gc molds, it will drop around 40 grains. I bought a couple of .2188 drill guide bushings for $5 each and hopefully I can push dead soft pure lead thru them when lubed with my best lube.

Hmm.. If I make a shear block mold to stick my bullets in so that .3inch stays in, I could heat it to 400 and shear off the back part of the 50 grain bullets and lose one driving band and the gas check section giving a 30 grain part with the nose and back band sized to .2188. A wood chisel would shear the stuff very easily. Subsequent sizing would clean up the OD. Shear force calc says it only takes 50 lbs to shear off the .18 dia part, I probably dont even need to heat the block.

[stephen m weiss]

I measured the head. The skirt is gonna expand anyway. I am gonna be bummed if there is such an 'optimal' energy weight and it's that low. Hammering momentum transfers behave like that due to the bounce of impact. But that optimum is when the hammer and what it drives are the same weight. The piston-spring sub assy is clearly much heavier than the pellet, just as a hammer is much heavier than the nail. Well, no more pontificating until I run the tests. I may have to file down the round nose to lighten a few pellets and tape together 2 to get more bandwidth for the test. Accuracy doesnt matter for this test.

[stephen m weiss]

Initial results show that doubling the weight dropped the energy by 25%. Some of that went to deforming the rear pellet that gets all the pressure.
Lowering the weight by 12% dropped the energy by 8%. So, I guess you are right. It kind of makes sense because the pellet must go much faster than the piston was because of the area ratios. So the pellet mass counts as much greater as the air tends to act incompressible.

I am still gonna make some 30 grain pellets and see how the accuracy does.