Cabalas had bricks of Thunderbolts today (to my suprise) and I couldn't resist. I have never shot 40 grain lead from my 617, I've only shot copper coated 36 grain. Will the 40 grain Thunderbolts cause any leading ?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts...

Will

The only problem I've had with Thunderbolts is that the powder charges seem to vary. One round will have a nice crack and the next one will just go pop. No leading though.

They still have a coating on them, not sure what, but they wont lead your barrel. Last trip out we took some T-bolts and surprisingly they did very very well. Accurate, even sounding, no leading, just a great little plinking round for us. I think there is a lot of tin in the heads of these, making the heads harder. The T-bolts dont not seem to expand much at all if any.

DR

Remington .22LR ammo is pretty bad, they have catchy names but they are for the most part misleading. Expect lots of duds no matter how many times you rotate them.

Thank you for your responses... since I will be shooting with a revolver, I wasn't too worried about duds... the leading was my primary concern. Still couldn't believe the several boxes of Thunderbolts at Cabalas this morning... just haven't seen bricks of 22s for a while.

Will

Remington Thunderbolt has been my preferred .22 LR ammo for over 25 years. I started using it when Sam's Club was selling it in 2-brick packs for around $14. My two primary .22s are a Ruger Mk-II and a 10-22. These guns get the most use and least cleaning of any of my guns. After tens of thousands of rounds of Thunderbolt I can recall no issues caused by the ammo. I cannot say the same for Feedral American Eagle and Winchester Wildcat.

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The last time I bought Thunderbolts will be the last time I buy Thunderbolts. A whole lot of misfires due to bad priming. And a lot of stove pipes in my 10/22. They were a bit better in my Buckmark.
Saw the same problems with 2 other friends who'd bought them. So as I said, I won't buy them again.

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Pete.

I bought four bricks of thunderbolts and got a lot of leading so much I couldn't get the brush down the barrel, I used a 17 brush to get most of it out, then switched over to the 22 brush, what I have done the last four times out and it seems to work, the last two rounds I put in the cylinder are plated rounds and when I'm done for the day I fill the cylinder with plated rounds and it seems to work. I have a 100 rounds left and I won't buy any more.

Honestly I have had NO problems with the lead thunderbolts. However, i have had a few problems with those Golden Bullets.

I'll buy those thunderbolts whenever i can. I'd much rather those than the golden bullets. At least to me they seem to me more dependable.

If I can get thunderbolts or anything in RF right now I buy them. They're not 1st class but they work 98% of the time. Feeding is the main problem with some of my semi-autos, but for play, I guess they're OK.

Thank you all for your responses... guess I'll cross my fingers and be ready to brush as necessary. I won't be able to get to the range for a few days, and will try only 100 rounds to see how it goes. It is good that the Thunderbolts have worked fine for some of you.

Just couldn't resist 2 bricks at reasonable prices from Cabelas, thanks again...

Will

Quite a few years ago I had a Thunderbolt slam fire in my 10/22. It went off before the round was fully chambered, blowing out the case head and my extractor. Not long ago at the range an odd looking case caught my eye, and it too was a Remington .22 LR with the head blown out, looking identical to what had happened to me. Remington's rimfire ammo was always the cheapest, so I guess you get what you pay for.

Dave Sinko

Just remembered a Thunderbolt story from January 1992. I was at the end of protracted divorce proceedings and two weeks before everything was set to be signed and sealed my ex-wife decided she wanted our drier and the Ruger Mk-II 22. I said fine she can have them.

The Mk-II is a literal pain to clean, so I took it out to my friend's country place with a brick and a half of the Remington Thunderbolt ammo. I told my friend I did not want to damage the gun I just did not want to hand it over clean. So the two of us just ran the ammo through the gun shooting at nothing in particular until we ran out of ammo. That pistol just kept digesting the stuff. I looked at my buddy and said, well it needs cleaning and she will not know how to clean it.

It ended up a week later the ex decided she wanted something else, so I said she can have it if I keep the drier and the .22. I cleaned the little Ruger and it still works fine with Thunderbolts today.

My Ruger 10/22 has had problems with Thunderbolts not always ejecting properly. So much so that I've stopped trying to use them in the 10/22.

My Ruger Mark III has only had a couple ejection failures with them. (And a few duds.)

The biggest problem I'm having with them right now is inconsistency, resulting in larger group sizes with he Mark III. My groups are largest with the Thunderbolts, slightly smaller with the Remington Goldens, and the smallest groups with the Winchester 36gr from the 555 bulk pack. These are what I've been able to get in any quantity lately at half-way reasonable prices.

I have a few of other types that are MUCH better, but nowhere near enough for practice and the competitions.

I'm sure it was an isolated occurrence, but I had some Thunderbolt several years ago that I actually threw away it was so bad.
It was a 500 rd. brick and I kept getting malfunctions, (FTF) in about every gun I tried'em in. Finally began to really examine the rounds and noticed the bullet was obviously LARGER diameter than the case.
Seems the bullets were not properly sized when loaded into the cases, ie., an approximately ~.23 caliber bullet sitting atop a .22 case.

Found that I couldn't even force them into elderly old single shot .22 rifles I had. Tossed'em all away.
Since then, I've used Tbolts occasionally, and for plinking, they're OK. Have sold millions of them at the LGS where I work, no real problems. A bit dirty, but most .22 ammo is other than a few exceptions.

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Ret'd LEO
SWCA #2275

That seems to fall into what I experanced. Some seemed a little over sized. We were using a lever, and a revolver, so they still functiond, but I can see issues using them in a semi. or something with tight chambers