Understanding 22lr (not a shortage question)

Can someone help me understand what could possibly justify the cost of some of the .22lr ammo I've seen? For example, a quick look at Midway shows Eley Match ammo for $19 for a box of 50. Given that there is a small piece of lead, a little gunpowder, a small amount of brass and a primer. Even if all components are top notch, what could possible make that round worth .38/rd versus the everyday ammo that runs about 8-10 cents per round? I just can't understand what could be done to make that round be that much more costly.

Another example to underscore my question is 9mm. One can get target ammo for about .25/rd. Premium defense ammo (Gold Dot) for about $1.15 per round. Both the 9mm and 22lr are about 4 times more for the better round, but in the 9mm, I can see why. The bullet is a much different upgrade, the gunpowder is better and the case is nickel plated.

I just don't see what one would get for the additional cost of the high end 22lr. You're still getting a simple lead bullet. Even the best gunpowder still couldn't amount to much given the amount being used and the case seems about the same. About the only thing I can imagine is that more time is taken with the primer to make sure every round goes bang but that alone just doesn't seem worth the premium.

The expensive 22s are all about shot to shot consistency that most of us wouldn't be able to take advantage of unless we were bench rest shooters with high dollar guns.

Well...22lr ammo is, by nature, pricier than normal these days. Then factoring in a match ammo (which I would assume has tighter tolerances, yada yada) the price goes up even more. Not saying it's worth it, but I think half the issue stems from .22lr (un)availability since things got rough a few years ago.

Accuracy.

The 10 ring in the 50 foot four position target is about 0.2”. To get out of the entry level Marksman classification you have to hit it virtually every shot fired prone. The better your rifle and cartridge accuracy the more room there is for human error sitting, kneeling and offhand.

Just like with foot ball and other school sports the best competitors on high school teams get free college tuition even at Ivy League colleges. There are also the Olympic games. If you were struggling to get one point ahead of the best in the world you’d jump at the chance to pay $19 for 50 slightly more accurate cartridges. Closer to home the ranges have .22 LR bench rest matches and you know how competitive grown boys are with their toys.

If you want to plink at pop cans in the gravel pit with your pistol most likely super accurate cartridges won’t make a noticeable difference and thus would be a waste of money.

There is far more quality control and testing done with high-grade match ammo to ensure a high degree of shot-to-shot consistency, and manufacturing standards are tighter, and normally require different production lines. And the market for match ammo is very small. Those factors justify the higher price. However, only the very uppermost tier of competitive .22 shooters can utilize all that precision, such as Olympic shooters. For anyone else, the additional cost is a waste.

Here is my experience of playing with 22 rf, in an attempt to answer the OP question of cost. Back 15 to 20 years ago, I played with the 50 yard BR 50 and other competition groups, shooting from a bench. In my experience, here is what I saw. The cheaper bulk ammo would do decent accuracy at 50 yards for plinking, lets say a 1 to 2 inch group size in an accurate rifle. Some times you could find a brand and lot that would shoot around 1/2 inch groups at this distance, but in a 50 shot box, you would see some 5 -8 shots that would be drastic flyers, some would go low, some would go right of left, up to 4-6 inches from all the others. This was not condition induced or shooter induced, this was the ammo. Then you step up to the lower end target ammo, which today sells for around $ 5- 8 for a box of 50. Accuracy would always be better in the group, some actually producing 1/4 inch groups when you find the right brand and lot for your gun. But some where in that box of 50 there is always one or two and sometimes 3 of those fliers, that go way out of the group for no apparent reason. But when you get to the,now, $14-18 a box stuff, all those fliers are gone, all 50 going where you want them. I my experience, I found some lots and brands of the $ 5-8 dollar stuff that would preform to the same accuracy on the target as the expensive stuff. When you are just shooting on a Saturday at a club shoot and do not have to "always win", shooting the 5-8 stuff works, just know that one or two shots are lost. The guy that wins is usually feeding his gun the high dollar stuff. If you are looking for better accuracy, now that all this stuff is in the 7-8-9 cents a round class, stepping up to the cost of say Wolf or SK match, which has always been around 10 cents a round will obtain you the best bang for the buck. The Match Extra, which is around 15-16 cents a round does produce less fliers and is all anyone needs for target work, unless you are determined to win the matches you shoot in, then go find a lot of the expensive stuff that will shoot 1/8 inch or less groups EVERY TIME in your gun. There are guns and ammo that will shoot every group less than 1/8 inch at 50 yards. That's what these guys are getting with that 40 cents a shot stuff and those are the guys that are in the winning trophy pictures in the news items. So you get what you pay for, after dropping a couple of thousand on a gun and shooting gear.

Back many years ago I did a lot of 50' 4-position rifle shooting. For practice, I used, mostly, CCI standard velocity, and for me it was about as good as match ammo, sometimes even a little better. I also occasionally used Remington standard velocity, and it was OK also. I have no idea if SV ammo is still made.

CCI Standard Velocity is the most popular cartridge for indoor bullseye leagues. It is widely recommended for 41s. FWIW, before other commitments forced me to stop shooting bullseye in 2006 I was getting scores into the 560s firing Wal Mart's $9 550 bulk pack Federal 36 grain through a 617 with iron sights. I don't think the ammo was holding me back at all. After the first Obama .22 ammo shortage the stores restocked lots of .22 ammo at almost double their pre-Obama price. That post first Obama panic federal bulk pack is absolutely horrid. I'm told CCI Standard Velocity is still good, when you can find it.

An Anschutz 4 position rifle deserves morecare fully selected .22s than a bullseye pistol.

Three things:
Supply
Demand
Greed
Always someone willing to stick it to the buyer. But artificially induced high prices can't last forever. Notice the price of gas is back down to a reasonable $2.009 a gallon (at Sam's).
When people stop paying the high prices, and supply catches up with demand then there will be a glut on the market and the price will start falling.
Patience will get us through this.
Gary

LittleCooner gave a good explanation. I'll go one step further. Before I moved to PA, (semi's are illegal for hunting) I used to use my scope sighted High Standard Victor for hunting tree rats.

That Victor will shoot several brands of mid-priced .22 ammo well, but it absolutely loves Ely Tenex, and will shoot it 1/4 to 1/2 inch better from the bench at 25 yards than any other ammo I have tried in it, which is a lot.

Is that kind of accuracy needed for plinking, or informal target shooting? No. But, when taking head shots on squirrels at over 25 yards, every little bit of accuracy helps. Expensive? Yep. But for hunting use where one shot is all you usually get, a 50 round box lasts quite a while, and pays for itself with the extra couple of hits it provides.

As far as prices in general for .22's go, I believe it is simple supply and demand, combined with sellers wanting to get top dollar. Plenty of .22's available on line for 12 - 14 cents a round. But Walmart, for example, can sell bricks at $25 - $27, and still make a profit, so a lot of sellers are taking advantage of the supply situation. I don't believe in the GOVT. conspiracy theory. I worked long enough for the fed govt. to know something so far reaching, involving so many people could not be kept secret.

Larry

Fishinfool said:

[...] I don't believe in the GOVT. conspiracy theory. I worked long enough for the fed govt. to know something so far reaching, involving so many people could not be kept secret.

Larry

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Ahh, come on now. How gullible do you think we are? You admit to working for the gov'mint AND try to debunk conspiracy theories? You could only be the suction cup on the end of the long tenticle that grabbed the brick off Wal Mart's shelf ahead of me!

k22fan said:

Ahh, come on now. How gullible do you think we are? You admit to working for the gov'mint AND try to debunk conspiracy theories? You could only be the suction cup on the end of the long tenticle that grabbed the brick off Wal Mart's shelf ahead of me!

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Well, you didn't hear it from me, but I heard that all govt. employees are being given a cash bonus for every receipt / box of .22 ammo they turn in. Some say it is all being stored in a secret bunker in NJ......

Larry

Just pulled the old Anschutz of my father's out just a couple of days ago to have some fun. I've spent some time with that, the High Standard I inherited from my grandfather, and an old beat to hell Glenfield rifle from my other grandfather, and cut my teeth on a 100 year old pump action Winchester 22lr that my great great uncles used to shoot pigs for slaughter. I've shot quite a different 22lr, from the good to the cheaper grades, and the weapons to go along with them.

I've never been a competitive shooter, rather a hunter/plinker, but I can tell you that I've never had issues killing squirrels with cheap 22lr rifles with cheapo ammo, even at ranges of 30 yards with iron sights. After checking the Anschutz, I test fired it at 20 yards and found no trouble putting 5 rounds under a dime consistently from kneeling, with 36 grain copper Walmart bullets, once I got back into the feel for the gun. I guess for my non competitive purposes, cheap ammo has always satisfied my standards.

My father shot competitively many years ago, with his own High Standard pistol and with his Anschutz, and I found an unopened box of Eley match ammunition in the stash with a $2.99 tag still attached. But from what he told me, taking CCI Standard Velocity, then weighing individual rounds, worked just as well, for less money.

In the end, I suppose if you are trying to win a world class competition, and you have the sponsorship to back it up, you might be able to justify them. However, for the regular shooter having fun or killing pests, I cannot fathom it. There is no purpose the 22lr is made for that I wouldn't trust with my Glenfield or the old pig gun that won't get done with good old Federal red box at a fraction of the cost.

In fact, with the 22lr shortage, and outrageous prices when it is available, I've basically shelved the collection of 22's. The local small town farm store was selling 50 round boxes of Armscor for $9.99, and for about a dime cheaper I can buy a 50 round box of 9mm aluminum case at Wally World. I'm using the shotgun, the best nuisance killer there is, or my clumsy 9mm Uzi i bought as a fun carbine, into the service of game control, because I will no longer give money to high price speculators, nor do I find hunting for rounds fun. Until all of this nonsense ends, all of the fine 22's I own will put oiled up and put away, pulled for a bit of occasional fun, but no longer the cheap, fun gun it was.

There is a book: “Rifleman’s Guide to Rimfire Ammunition” by Steven Boelter. Mr. Boelter has rigorously tested most of the high end .22LR Target and Match Ammunition as well as a lot of mid and low end. He also explains why ammunition like Tenex is so expensive.

I have shot a fair amount of all varieties of .22LR in high end and average cost rifles and pistols and my more informal results agree with his.

It comes down to what my Grandfather told me long ago; “You get what you pay for, quality costs money”.

All of that said; I usually use CCI-SV when shooting my M41 offhand. However, when you shoot a .22 at 50 yards you can see better groups with better ammunition. My chronograph says that CCI-SV has an extreme spread of about 100fps out of my 7” barrel and that will result in vertical stringing.

Fishinfool said:

Well, you didn't hear it from me, but I heard that all govt. employees are being given a cash bonus for every receipt / box of .22 ammo they turn in. Some say it is all being stored in a secret bunker in NJ......

Larry

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And 22's will become the next "money" no more dollars ....everything will be bought and sold for 22's. You will be paid in 22's and you will put 22's into your savings account. It will draw a .00000001% interest rate annually.

I guess it really comes down to your personal standards of accuracy. Each of us has their own and what is good for me may not appeal to others. I'm the type some might call "anal". My best 22 rifle is my CZ455 Varmint with a Vortex 4-12 AO scope.: $550 rifle + $450 scope. Here's how she performs at 115 yds shooting RWS R50 ($.32+/round).
Anything less and I'm not happy....

Eley is supposed to be the best - but YMMV! I have 4 different types of Eley .22 ammo and when shot out of my very accurate CZ 453 American with a Leupold scope is it terrible!

The best load for my CZ (to date) is Federal 40 grain RNL Hi Velocity #510. It will consistently print one hole 1/4" groups at 25 yards and 3/8" groups at 35 yards. this is bench-resting on sand bags of course.

The Eley will not reliably operate the slide on my M41 and seems less accurate than the CCI standard velocity ammo I normally use. My personal findings are that the Eley is very reliable but not the most accurate ammo for me. YMMV

k22fan said:

The 10 ring in the 50 foot four position target is about 0.2”. To get out of the entry level Marksman classification you have to hit it virtually every shot fired prone. The better your rifle and cartridge accuracy the more room there is for human error sitting, kneeling and offhand.

Just like with foot ball and other school sports the best competitors on high school teams get free college tuition even at Ivy League colleges. There are also the Olympic games. If you were struggling to get one point ahead of the best in the world you’d jump at the chance to pay $19 for 50 slightly more accurate cartridges. Closer to home the ranges have .22 LR bench rest matches and you know how competitive grown boys are with their toys.



If you want to plink at pop cans in the gravel pit with your pistol most likely super accurate cartridges won’t make a noticeable difference and thus would be a waste of money.

Click to expand...

Actually part of the Ivy league's requirement is that sports scholarships are not awarded. As a former Ivy League athlete I can assure you this policy has existed since inception and has not changed.

Gold dot @ $1.15 a round? Where? That's the only ammo I carry and the prices around here are $30 for a 50 round box of 124gr +P

As far as consistency between rounds goes, I have noticed that some of the 10 year old stuff I have is more reliable and accurate, than some of the "new" .22lr stuff that all the manufacturers are kicking out as fast as they can. Pretty sure quality control has slipped in favor of volume, as the last couple of Federal Eagle I opened I had several ftf's and short cycles, in my first 100 rds, from my Ruger 22/45 and it was a similar story with my wifes SR22.

Perhaps when some folks stop storing their ammo on boats, to the point that the weight causes them to sink, prices will come down and quality will come back....