"Life Expectancy" of 22 Handguns

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I bought a S&W 22A when my kids were getting into their teens and we shot over 110,000 rounds through the gun but it had many parts replaced over the years, including the frame. Firing pins broke regularly every 20,000 rounds but the gun maintained its accuracy through all that. We just have about 10K through a Ruger MkII but I have about 30 to 40k through a Hämmerli International over the years and I got it pre-owned. My favorite Korth .22 should also be in the 30 to 40K range.
The Colt OMM of my old gun club had timing problems after around 50 to 60K rounds.

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sparkyv

Really like the wood grips on your S&W 22A! Definite improvement over the factory originals.
 
Obturation said:
I didn't mention a gsg 1911 -22 my buddy has, under 20,000 rds it started to disintegrate . I say disintegrate because it was very loose and worn but still functioning most of the time but the hammer had struck the slide and knocked a piece off , I assume from the excessive looseness. That gun does still fire but isn't shot much. I'd call it mostly worn out.
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I guess that doesn't surprise me too much. I have 5 Beretta 70/71s, a Beretta 101, a S&W 317, a Buckmark, a KT P17, and an HD Military, and I expect all to be running strong for my great-grand-kids......if my kids ever get off their duffs and do their part. I wonder what a round of .22 LR will be worth then.
 
If you ever wore out a .22 pistol; actually wore it out, you would be a very highly skilled shooter when it was over. Which is a good reason to TRY to wear out a .22 pistol. I am not going to even guess at round counts but I have always been a very avid .22 pistol shooter. Not into the hundreds of thousands like some have posted, but WAY more than the normal shooter. For many years, every paycheck I would buy four of those 550 round containers of .22LR from Walmart. I would shoot two of them and keep two of them. So, that is around 1100 .22 rounds every two weeks. It has been very common for me to shoot 500 .22LR rounds in a day. In fact, I did it a week or so ago out of a Ruger LCPII. Point being, you are basically never going to wear out a .22LR pistol unless you shoot more than 99.9999% of people.
 
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I've a Hammerli Trailside with a lot of rounds, but a stainless Kit Gun has really seen a bunch. It taught me to shoot double action, and it was cheap to feed.
Been thinking about a new .22, but probably wouldn't like anything less than a Smith 41. I've owned one, off and on, over the years. When a buddy gets broke, he sells me his, and when he gets his (redacted) together, he buys it back.
I told him the last time; the next time, and I'm keeping it!
Moon
 
My Buckmark was the first pistol I ever bought, back in ‘87 while living in VT as a hiking / kit gun. Fast forward with three kids, that pistol has seen countless rounds and it still looks and is accurate as new. I replaced the recoil spring maybe 10-12 years ago, clean it once in a while. Lives in the range bag and still sees plenty of range time.
 
Obviously, high wear items like springs will need replacing at a certain interval, probably the firing pin too, but as long as the recoil spring gets replaced as needed, I see no reason a .22 can't go for 75k rounds in its lifetime. By then it may be time to have the bore checked and the barrel replaced if needed.
 
A friend of mine has an old S&W revolver that his great grandfather bought a long long time ago, it's got 10s of thousands of rounds through it and other than the nickel flaking, it looks great and neither his dad or him can remember doing anything to it, except cleaning it. The nickel was factory and not done all that well, to be honest about it.
 
Im surprised i haven't seen the browning buckmark mentioned yet. I have a browning buckmark camper i bought new 20 years ago and its still running good as ever. Its not picky about ammo and feels good in the hand. Ive made a few dumb gun decisions over the years but that buckmark is one of the best firearm purchases i have ever made.
 
TTv2 said:
Obviously, high wear items like springs will need replacing at a certain interval, probably the firing pin too, but as long as the recoil spring gets replaced as needed, I see no reason a .22 can't go for 75k rounds in its lifetime. By then it may be time to have the bore checked and the barrel replaced if needed.
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That's my question, has anyone ever had a .22 barrel worn out?
 
Interestingly enough the also ran's seem pretty durable. My MKII Ruger seems nigh on to indestructable but so does a Model 23 BERSA that I bought at the same time. I bought a second BERSA Thunder .22 probably ten years ago and it too shoots like brand new. A Taurus old model 94 I bought used has been knocked around a bit and still shoots fine after I don't know how many rounds. The polymers are fairly new but I know they stand up to a lot of use and keep on going. If you do basic maintenance you can probably shoot a .22 all your life and them give it to your Grandson.
 
My 1976 Ruger Single Six Convertible, was fired so much over the years it became out of time. Unless you cocked the hammer smartly the cylinder wouldn't always lock up but would still fire spiting lead out of the cylinder gap.. Called RUGER CS and they wanted the gun back for a safety ck. In about 3 weeks I got the gun back, in perfect time, cleaned up forcing cone, a new front sight, they even touched up the bluing. NO CHARGE !!! hdbiker
 
John Joseph said:
I think a poor cleaning regimen will be more damaging to longevity than anything else.
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Or no maintenance at all. I think that ruins more guns than anything.

My Standard was a rusty mess when I got it off GB for $80 bucks about seven years ago. I cleaned it of rust and a buddy did a home-baked gunmetal gray Brownells finish, I bought two older mags from Ruger and when I explained I was resurrecting and old gun they sent me all new internal springs for free, new grips off eBay for 20 bucks... and it shoots about as well as a new one :thumbup:.

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Stay safe.
 
I expect lots of mine to still be working after ai am dead and gone. They have already out lived lots of the folks that owned them before me, and I never set out to intentionally destroy them.
 
Terry G said:
Interestingly enough the also ran's seem pretty durable. My MKII Ruger seems nigh on to indestructable but so does a Model 23 BERSA that I bought at the same time. I bought a second BERSA Thunder .22 probably ten years ago and it too shoots like brand new. A Taurus old model 94 I bought used has been knocked around a bit and still shoots fine after I don't know how many rounds. The polymers are fairly new but I know they stand up to a lot of use and keep on going. If you do basic maintenance you can probably shoot a .22 all your life and them give it to your Grandson.
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Who will then shoot it all his life and when passing will give it to his...

Stay safe.
 
Paul7 said:
That's my question, has anyone ever had a .22 barrel worn out?
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An acquaintance once bought a used S&W K22 for a song and complained to me about horrible accuracy. I assumed he was simply a crummy shooter, but offered to look over the gun for him. He dropped it off, and upon looking through the bore I had utterly no idea what I was seeing. It was lumpy yet smooth, with nearly no rifling showing, and an odd color. The usual cleaning methods accomplished nothing, so I attacked it with a long soak in a foaming bore cleaner and was astonished when a brush first got stuck and then came out with a tube of nasty brown metal attached to it.

It turned out to be jacketing material which had built up to the point where it almost completely obscured the rifling. I have only the faintest idea how it could have happened, and unfortunately the bore underneath was badly pitted and essentially useless. Regardless, I guess that is the closest I have seen to a .22 bore worn out from too much shooting.
 
Paul7 said:
That's my question, has anyone ever had a .22 barrel worn out?
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Worn out, or cleaned out?;)
Or like @.38 Special tells, abused out.:(

Strange how leading and fouling is deposited so tightly, yet it is not moisture proof.

Older match shooters tell of worn bottom rifling when a barrel is actually shot out. There is a small bit of silica glass in the primer mixture to facilitate the shearing necessary to ignite the priming compound. This gets blown down the barrel with the rest of the ejecta and projectile. Consequently it comes to rest at the bottom of the bore. The next round rides over it and polishes the rifling as it is taken into the soft lead. Silica is brittle and loses its edge quickly, that is why it’s terrible for sand blasting, and the reason it only scrubs the bottom rifling, as the particles only polish a small bit before they are broken, or turned and pushed farther into the lead bullet.
This will wash the bottom rifling out of a match rifle.
Though I’ve never personally seen it. They were too nice for me to touch.
(I’m either ridiculously strong or unlucky, things break around me.:( I broke a bowl gouge the other day. My Dad seemed unsurprised...)
 
I have a buckmark that is over 10,000 rounds and I never replaced anything but buffers and recoil springs until the day it got dropped and broke the plastic off either the safety or slide stop lever (honestly can't remember which). It still worked but the end of the lever was sharp. I replaced that part and its back running but I don't shoot it much anymore for some reason. I don't think you'd ever wear a frame out on one of these and most of the other parts can be easily replaced either with OEM or aftermarket parts. I think some of the ruger and browning guns have reached a point where you can just about build one without using any factory parts.
 
Demi-human said:
Worn out, or cleaned out?;)
Or like @.38 Special tells, abused out.:(

Strange how leading and fouling is deposited so tightly, yet it is not moisture proof.

Older match shooters tell of worn bottom rifling when a barrel is actually shot out. There is a small bit of silica glass in the primer mixture to facilitate the shearing necessary to ignite the priming compound. This gets blown down the barrel with the rest of the ejecta and projectile. Consequently it comes to rest at the bottom of the bore. The next round rides over it and polishes the rifling as it is taken into the soft lead. Silica is brittle and loses its edge quickly, that is why it’s terrible for sand blasting, and the reason it only scrubs the bottom rifling, as the particles only polish a small bit before they are broken, or turned and pushed farther into the lead bullet.
This will wash the bottom rifling out of a match rifle.
Though I’ve never personally seen it. They were too nice for me to touch.
(I’m either ridiculously strong or unlucky, things break around me.:( I broke a bowl gouge the other day. My Dad seemed unsurprised...)
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Any consensus here on how often you need to clean a .22 barrel? I've heard from never to often.

Speaking of .22s, that's a Sako M78 in my avatar I'm pretty fond of. ;)
 
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