22 Mag or 17 HMR

[Glockfan.45]

I like my Marlin in 22mag. 17HMR is to pricey for a rimfire round IMO. My 22mag will kill any small critter I aim at out to 170 yards or so.

 

[MCgunner]

Ruger makes both. The 10/22 Mag and the 10/17. Remington makes a 597 semi auto .17, but avoid it (Jam-O-Matic).

Not mine. I traded a guy out of a 597 .22 magnum last month. So far, I've gone through 250 rounds of CCI maxi mag without a hitch except for one fail to fire (it is a rimfire, after all), but no jams with CCI at all. I had one fail to feed a Winchester Dynapoint out of 50 rounds. The stuff is loaded light and I'm thinking didn't fully cycle the bolt. It don't eject those cases very far, kinda fall at your feet. The Dynapoint is very accurate and if I used that rifle on squirrel, I'd be tempted to use it. It's so light, though. that it suffers in trajectory at 100 yards. Not much pop over a 22 LR, but then, squirrels don't need any more pop.

That rifle is a 1.5MOA shooter, consistently. It will put 7 of those Dynapoints into a ragged hole at 50 yards. I'm very impressed with it. I do need to order that aftermarket hammer for it to lighten the trigger. That's my one complaint about the gun, a heavy trigger. It is crisp, though.

I wonder about that Ruger. I have a 10-22 and while it is very reliable and a lot of fun to shoot, it's not exactly target accurate. It ain't even close to that Remington 597. I like it a lot, though. I don't shoot .22 match and I really bought the 10-22 to plink with. I have other small game guns. I wanted to keep it with iron sites since all my other rimfires are scoped.

I don't know what the street price is on a Remington 597. Remington's site lists it at $440 msrp. It ain't that much more gun than the $160 list .22 LR version! I wouldn't have BOUGHT one of these little rifles at this price, I can tell ya that! The trade was a fair one, though.