Ever since I've had my M&P 15-22, my favorite ammo to feed it has been the Winchester M-22. It has always been reliable, clean and reasonably accurate. I was lucky that I had no boxes of the recalled lots.

Yesterday, I went to the range and took my most recently purchased box of M-22 to shoot ( lot #2GO52L purchased from Cabelas in January.) I fired 250 rounds. 30 were duds. There were no light strikes. I even had my shooting partner to try some of the dud cartridges in his Henry and they didn't fire in it either.

The cartridges that did fire were inconsistent and accuracy wasn't what I'd had with this particular round before. Anyone else having problems with recently purchased M-22? I'm afraid many folks are buying a lot of this .22lr up and stashing it away instead of shooting and not knowing the quality (or lack of) of ammo they are getting.

Like I said, up until now I've had good results with this ammo. Shot about 3000 rds of it last year and have much more on hand. Evidently, this craziness is causing a drop in quality control and many folks aren't seeing it because they're hoarding right now instead of shooting.

There can be extreme variations in 22 ammo from lot to lot especially in lower priced products. The high demand and accelerated production doesn't help matters any.

I just had some M-22 that I bought last week because I thought it was supposed to be more reliable than the white box stuff that I had problems with. I only fired 100 rounds but I did have one that wouldn't fire after two good rim strikes and several fail to feed issues. This was out of an M&P 22 handgun though.

I traded the rest away. Federal and Remington bulk stuff goes bang and feeds every time for me, I don't want to have frustrations at the range with unreliable ammo, it's my time to unwind. . I figured Winchester just didn't agree with my gun.. It must be working for someone. The guy I traded it to said his 15-22 loved the stuff. Hopefully he has better results than I did.

Yesterday I tried some M-22 rounds in my M&P 22 and had nothing but problems. I went through 60 rounds. 7 failed to fire and between 30-35 would not eject. I had 3 that I had to push the casing out because they were stuck in the barrel. I then ran 100 flawless Remington Golden bullets through it.

I forgot to mention that we shot some Remington GBs with no malfunctions. Things seem to have changed from what they were just months ago.

And to think much of this is being stored instead of shot because of what's going on. To announce a recall in late January for what was made the previous April is inexcusable.

I used to be one of Winchester's biggest fans, but I'm now more cautious. The fact that this may be bulk or 24/7 production lines due to the demands is no excuse.

The last couple boxes of M-22 I purchased have had more failures to fire than the ones I picked up in 2012. I've also had a few failures to eject with these rounds, which has not happened with any other ammunition, ever.

They generally shoot well, just not quite as dependable as before. If the factories are cranking out rounds 24/7, quality may be taking a hit.

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Semper Fi