What is your main use for a .22 RF?

[uscra112]

For real close ranges, CCI Quiet (if you can find any) is almost silent from a rifle. I've had a guy walk over, (while I was shooting it at a range in Idaho), wanting to see my can. I was shooting a Ballard. With the right light you can easily follow the bullet all the way through your scope.

[gwpercle]

FUN !
Just plain old fun ... shooting targets , tin cans and in years past great Wild Rat hunting trips into the Amazon Jungle (city dump) . Teaching my two children how to shoot was fun too .
I bought a new Ruger Wrangler last year ...simply for fun ... no other reason whatsoever !
Gary

[dverna]

I am down to less than 500 rounds a year of .22 LR shooting. Just too expensive to shoot for plinking at $50/brick. Most of my fun shooting now is with PCP’s. Less than $10/500 for pellets and air.

Was using the LR’s for eradicating chipmunks and squirrels, but will be trying the air guns this coming year.

I have a good stash of .22LR, and will sell some off now that I have proven PCP’s are accurate. BTW, that means an average group size below 1” at 50 yards with econo Crosman pellets.

Looking at selling a few of the .22LR guns as well. They are not getting used.

[boommer]

I hunt Grizz and CHIPALOS and anything that walks crawls or moves !! and wont sell any shells or guns The world is a target rich environment 22's you can get them for 30 a brick now,, except at gun shows like today were these CLOWNS are are buying them at Wallmart and throwing crap at wall to see if it sticks with there 75-100 percent mark up.

[Jack Stanley]

Relaxing is the main use .

Jack

[wmitty]

I am using a rem 582 to take prairie dogs in south east Colorado. Friend and I drive 650 miles from n.e. Texas twice a year to hunt the pasture poodles. Shooting off crosssticks with the typical strong winds makes for “challenging “ conditions; and the hits, while few and far between, are much more satisfying than using either the .222 or .22-250…

[Rodfac]

With the high cost of everything to do with shooting nowadays during the Brandon administration, I'm shooting less .22 than in past years. Locally, long rifle hasn't been less than a dime a round in a year and last week, Cabelas has Winchester yellow box, HP's at $40/300 count...13.3 cent per shot. As I'm a caster for all of my short guns, this is way out of sight...the last primers I bought and tagged show $31/1000 and that was from Cabelas, not generally known for low prices. With cast wheel weights, I shooting plain based .357's for a nickel a shot. Anybody else feel like the world's been turned upside down?

After the Obama madness, I stocked up on a lot of .22...so I feel no pinch as yet, but do limit my range time here on the farm to a cpl cylinder fulls a few times a week. I do miss the daily plinking I used to do, and especially the soft recoil and low noise level....Hope it all gets back to normal...tho I have my doubts with inflation approaching the Jimmy Carter levels once more.

It's going to be tough to keep young folks on a limited budget enjoying our sport if this keeps up....

Rod...worried in KY

[BadgerShooter]

22LR used to be my goto yard critter gun but the 17HMR and 22 mag seem a lot better on things tougher than rabbits like wood chucks, coons etc. My main use is competition and practice. ISU 3-P 50 meter smallbore and some 100 yd mini-palma. Also a great intro gun when I am training new shooters.

[P Flados]

Primarily my 22LR guns are just taking up space in my gun storage areas.

I do have one current "use". My 6" Ruger original 22 semi auto is stashed upstairs with two magazines of ammo. It has probably been 6 years since I have shot a rimfire.

Most of my shooting is standing practice at an indoor range. Prior to Obama, I used the 22LR mostly for practice shooting to save cost over CF rounds. With the shortage in the Obama years, I started working on guns and loads as 22LR replacements.

I started with cheap to load 38s, but my lead source (WW) for cast boolits went away and I wanted to reduce lead consumption.

My first real 22LR replacement was to get a 4.2" Ruger SP-101 in 327 and work up a light bullet mouse gun load. It uses a BLL coated 55 gr NLG boolit from a mold I made myself. I shot a lot of these the first few years I had the gun, but eventually I moved on.

Next I made a stub tube 8" 32 ACP barrel for my Contender. It only takes 1.7 grs of TiteGroup to push the 55 gr bullet to 890 fps. I shoot this one quite a bit now days.

I also shoot a light bullet mouse gun load out of my 10" 7 TCU. This allows lots of practice shots with a barrel and sight combination set up for Production and Standing classes in IHMSA.

With no SPP readily obtainable under $0.11 each (Midway with S&H plus hazmat), my cost per round was about to take a big leap. Instead of buying a couple of bricks of SPP, I invested in primer reloading. My cost for these loads has now dropped to around $1 a box of 50. This is not far from the 22LR prices I remember from 40 years ago. It is a lot less when you consider the value of a buck.

[Scorpion8]

I generally always carry *at least* a 22LR when in the woods around my area, if not something larger. But in most cases a 22 six-gun (Ruger Single Six, Ruger Wrangler, Puma 1873....) will do especially if they can also do 22 WMR or 22 WRF. Just so handy for many things. And while 22 LR is just seeming to be coming back, most of us smarties stocked up on it years ago.

[Baltimoreed]

When I was younger and competitive I used .22s as training guns for ipsc and cas. I built a Colt ACE slide and bought extra .22 mags to go on my 1911 to practice ipsc and bought a Marlin Model 39 and a .22 Ruger Vaquero for cas. Nowadays I enjoy shooting a Winchester Model 52 at steel but do carry a 4.5 inch Woodsman MT when I'm in the woods. Still have some Y2k .22s on my shelves.

[1hole]

My "best and highest" use for a .22 RF is training my grandsons. (I was gratified when my oldest little 6'3", 190# young'un took the range record in his military basic training ... and he liked it too!)

Second best use for my .22 is to remove low IQ groundhogs and rabbits that insist on trying to harvest my wife's kitchen garden early. (Sadly, we now live just inside the "No Shooting" city limit, but a standard velocity round at about 50 yards does the needed job very well without being loud enough to set our local yankee liberal's hair on fire.)

[rockshooter]

whelp, maybe not anyones main use, but if you can find a really fresh cow pie and hit it (from afar, at an angle) it can be pretty entertaining.
Loren- old enough to have gone to Eisenhowers funeral but still not grown up

[BadgerShooter]

whelp, maybe not anyones main use, but if you can find a really fresh cow pie and hit it (from afar, at an angle) it can be pretty entertaining.
Loren- old enough to have gone to Eisenhowers funeral but still not grown up

We have to get older, but growing up is optional!

[elmacgyver0]

whelp, maybe not anyones main use, but if you can find a really fresh cow pie and hit it (from afar, at an angle) it can be pretty entertaining.
Loren- old enough to have gone to Eisenhowers funeral but still not grown up

We used to have jousting matches with semi-dried cow pies off motorcycles. that was 50 some years ago.
The best ones were still liquid in the center.

[GregLaROCHE]

Today only plinking. It used to be for seriously needed squirrel control.

[GhostHawk]

Frankly I don't have one. I cleaned and put away the Ruger 10/22 a couple of years ago. The last time .22 ammo was in short supply and expensive.

I have extensive stocks. Half of which is earmarked for my pair of Ruger Mk III 22/45's with Red Dot Sights. Now those are just plain fun. But with the covid, increasing age, decreasing energy, and the high costs of replacement ammo. I just have not been shooting them.

If I feel the urge to shoot I walk down to the basement, turn on the lights and shoot air rifles or pistols instead.
Roughly 1.6 cents per round compared to 8 or better for .22 rimfire. Primers are higher than that, not counting lead, powder, etc.

Beeman P17 set up with a dovetail to weaver adapter and a 50$ truglo red Dot. Shoots as good as I can hold it at 20'
Lets me shoot whenever I feel the need. No carrying gear, no outside clothing nor driving needed.

When I have satisfied myself that I can hit what I'm aiming at I turn out the lights and walk upstairs.

To be honest, .22lr prices seem to have settled into the 8 to 12 cents per round range for the last month. I think there is more than enough demand to keep those prices up there. At that price I'll sit on what I have and shoot air rifles/pistols.

(PS hit a 9mm brass at 20 feet offhand yesterday. Drilled it clean through both sides slick as could be. Now that was fun. Dang thing was so small I could hardly see it at 20 feet.)

[gunther]

Local Walmart has yellow box, collectors item, Winchester @$40/300. Seems to be the going price everywhere for that stuff. Did find Remington Golden @$40/525 a couple of weeks ago. Competition is a good thing.

[BadgerShooter]

The "good" thing about competition grade ammo is that it really isn't any more expensive than its ever been. Its still steep, but when you view it against the cost of your equipment, match fees, traveling expense, etc. it really isn't that terrible. Obviously, we would all like to see it cheaper but... Paying match grade prices for mass produced crap ammo is hurtful.

[Rapidrob]

Twice a year I hold a .22LR Military Trainer 200 meter match. We have two stages, prone and off-hand.
The members do very well and scores are high. Open sights only.