VERY light powder charges for .223REM

[Brass Fetcher]

I did something that was pretty fun today - I shot a .22" airgun pellet in a .223REM case with a fresh primer. So it was basically a primer-powered pellet, if you will. Now, I am interested in making it go faster with a very small quantity of powder. Any suggestions? Thank you. JE223

 

[Walkalong]

Very interesting. Primer and a pellet. I never thought of that one. It would have been cool in the Hornet.

I used to shoot 3.5 Grs. of 700X with 45/46 Gr. bullets in the .22 Hornet & 6.0 Grs. of 700X with 45/46 Gr. bullets in the .222 & .223 for light loads. 700X burns well at low pressure and did not seem to be position sensitive. Do NOT try Blue Dot. It is SEVERLY position sensitive in these cases.

Wish I still had my Hornet.

These loads were safe in my rifles with my load procedure. Use at your own risk.

 

[Dave R]

I loaded some .223 down close to .22LR velocities, once. IIRC it was 4.0 to 4.5 gr. of Unique under a 45gr. bullet. Point of impact was far enough from POI for my hunting loads, even at 25 yards, that I lost interest.

 

[Walkalong]

I was shootin' squirrels with my "Light" Hornet and .222/.223 loads. Kind of like shooting a 22 Mag, only cheaper.

 

[P95Carry]

Idle thought - NOT recommendation but ...... strikes me a small amount of fast powder such as Bullseye could add a smidgeon to primer only. Maybe a mere 1 grain or so.

How did you hold the .22 pellet in case mouth? I am thinking a small touch of CA adhesive might work. Even super light powder charges need done carefully as seemingly less than predictable things can happen.

 

[Brass Fetcher]

Thank you for the good info - here's what I'm thinking about... Why not take a .223REM (or possibly smaller '.22') and download it so far, using the primer-airgun pellet idea, that your pellet velocity is equal to or slightly greater than an 'adult airgun'? I think that this could save a lot of people, a lot of money...

 

[P95Carry]

Not so sure in the end it'd really save, over using an actual air weapon. Might be fun, obviously but even a primer costs a bit.

True, 223 cases, 222 cases - all could work and if .22 then a velocity of 700 -800 would be close to an air weapon I guess.

Seems tho for me this is fun experimentation and not much else - bit like when I experimented with Dieseling in an air weapon - to up the velocity. Fun but not ever so practical.

 

[Brass Fetcher]

Yeah Bullseye sounds good and I have it here with me. The pellet was held in place with superglue... Yeah, the cost is something that I'm not happy with, but not too concerned with - basically, I am looking to do a 'survey' of airgun pellet performance in ballistic gelatin and won't have to shoot more than 50 or so times.

I contacted one airgun retailer, who said basically : "We'll send you the pellets, but you have to get an airgun". This is generous, but I can't afford/justify a high-power airgun just to do a gelatin test. I'm still waiting to hear back from their competitor, to see if someone can 'spare' me a decent airgun for a week or so...

(For the record, if the going gets rough with pests in the backyard, I will shoot them with my .223, not any pellet gun! )

Thank you.

 

[P95Carry]

Somewhere on THR is a thread from way back, showing some pics I took from long, long ago - testing air weapon pellets in clay. This might be of interest.

I have pics on a server but thus far have not found the write-up. If you wish I will try to see what I can find as the pics (tho only B/W) are quite revealing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well - would you believe!!!! A search found it so go take a peek This was back in late 2003!!!

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=43643

 

[Tbu61]

I remember reading somewhere many years back, where someone did a piece on Pellets in a .222...

If memory serves, the Author used Small loads of pistol powder with a tuft of fiber wadding to hold the charge near the primer.

Maybe you can hold the pellets in place with a dab of Beeswax.

The only problems I can see are Driving the Pellet too fast or possibly fouling your barrel with Wadding... No biggie if you bring a Cleaning rod along.

 

[db_tanker]

P95 hit the magic formula I think...


use about a grain of bullseye and you should get something impressive without smearing it all over your barrel.


D

 

[DogBonz]

what about

reaming the primer pocket and using a magnum primer?

 

[grendelbane]

Fill the hollow base of the pellet with grease. This will ensure that some grease gets smeared on the pellet.

Then, load the pellet backwards. The grease should be tacky enough to hold the pellet in the cartridge neck.

I believe I worked my way up to a very light charge of VVN310. Its been a while. The hollow base pellet loaded backwards will act like a super hollow point, mine would not penetrate water filled beer cans.

 

[db_tanker]

dogbonz,

instead of doing that, you could just use small rifle mag primers...

little bit hotter, but still just right, I think.


seem to remember someone telling me once that he didn't even measure out the powder...just took a pinch, measured it out in his palm...guess he counted the flakes. Must have been like blue dot or something similar.


D

 

[Brass Fetcher]

Thank you for the great info!

@P95Carry: Those are some nice pictures and it seems like a repeatable enough test format... What would you say would be a 'typical' velocity for an adult pellet gun? I was read the riot act by that retailer that I mentioned, because my (not fancy enough for them) Crosman will only do about 575 ft/sec with 'typical' ,22" pellet weights. Barring the usage of pure lead hollowpoints, whose expansion begins at about 700 ft/sec, I don't see much difference between the 600 ft/sec gun and perhaps a 1000 ft/sec gun, if they even make those...

@DogBonz: I like the Magnum primer idea. I wonder about the 'oomph' of that primer, as compared to the CCI Small Rifle primer that I used previously, IE are they that much more powerful than non-magnum?

You all are 'supporting my habit' - shame shame I do have N310 on hand as well, would you mind trying to remember the load that you worked up with this powder?

Can anyone guess as to the 'typical' twist rate of the rifling in an adult airgun? My AR15 is the host weapon for this test, and twist rate is 1rev/9".

Thank you!

 

[DogBonz]

Well

I wonder about the 'oomph' of that primer, as compared to the CCI Small Rifle primer that I used previously, IE are they that much more powerful than non-magnum?

They definitely do burn hotter. This is because they have to ignite a larger amount of powder in what is usually a larger case. I know that if you use one in a non-magnum case with a normal powder charge you WILL have pressure issues. I believe that most of that is because it will ignite the powder too fast.

I would imagine that a magnum primer's hotter "throw" that was designed for a large case, would generate a pretty big difference in such a small case as a .223.

 

[taliv]

if you're trying to get the pellet to stick in the case neck, just neck it down a bit.

use bushing-type neck-dies when you reload, and get abushing that's a couple-thousandths smaller

 

[Davo]

Ive thought of the same thing, but never tried it. I guess you could lighly bell the case, seat the pellet, and lightly crimp to make it more consistant.

 

[Tbu61]

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I just thought of something.....

There used to be .22LR adapters on the market... Looks like a .222 or similar round but it's a solid tubular piece with a .22 LR chamber bored inside.... uses a base plate to transfer firing pin strike to the Rimfire round.

Now if a fella were to use one of those and a .22 crimped blank (think Powder actuated nail gun)....... You could also pull the bullet out of a .22LR and provide your own powder and a tuft of wadding.

Hmmmmm that might be an effective alternative.

 

[critter]

I have one of those .223 -> .22 adaptors. They are a little slow to use, but are VERY accurate (out of my 14" bbl). Of course, the POA is vastly different from the .223 rounds.

Never shot it much, just tried it out and got tired of fooling with it. Very interesting though.

 

[Brass Fetcher]

@Tbu61... great idea - thank you. Where might a person get one of these adapters for a .223REM chamber...?

At this point, I'm thinking about making another one of those 'open call' posts, for people with good adult airguns that will lend me one for the gelatin test. I've done this before in the past successfully with .50BMG and 7.62x25mm Tokarev guns, so this might be an option.

 

[P95Carry]

JE223 - sorry late responding .......

What would you say would be a 'typical' velocity for an adult pellet gun?

Well - I forget some figures right now but back when I did my tests all my air weapons were in UK and there was a (supposed!) 12 ft lb limit.

I think my Webley .22 probably achieved about 600 or so and the HW35 in .177 about 850 with its new moly-lubed spring. My ''Eurolux'' that I have since added (made in China I fear) ... quotes .177 at 1,000 but on chrono it is actually 950 fps - but that is still useful out to 20 to 25 yards.

This is a pic of the Eurolux BTW -

 

[Davo]

p95 what kind of groups do you get with that air rifle at say 15 and 25 yards?

 

[P95Carry]

Davo - nothing that stunning really. Probably no better than 1" - but using a steel swinger which has paddles about that size - can usually connect every time.

Trigger is not overly smooth and that affects things a bit too. Good enough tho for occasional rodent control