how short is too short 10/22

andyone

Sparks wrote: »

Well, sometimes tangents become as interesting as the main line (and actually, as tangents go, that's one of the better ones we've had in a while - it's nice to have threads about actual shooting stuff every so often :pac: )

as you said it made for interesting reading and i for one learned plenty from it.....

ie not to shorten my barrel for two reasons.....
1. because i don't want to loose accuracy(i have a better chance at beating clivej in gallery, cause i'll be bringing the full package..lol)
2.not wanting to loose my licence, end up in court... and possibly jail...( and i'm allergic to KY)

clivej

andyone wrote: »

as you said it made for interesting reading and i for one learned plenty from it.....

ie not to shorten my barrel for two reasons.....
1. because i don't want to loose accuracy(i have a better chance at beating clivej in gallery, cause i'll be bringing the full package..lol)
2.not wanting to loose my licence, end up in court... and possibly jail...( and i'm allergic to KY)

so glad i'm a "rocker";);)

Andy

Bring it on.

Plenty of lads shooting gallery rifle with 'out of the box' standard Ruger 10/22's. And getting high scores with them. :eek:

andyone

clivej wrote: »

Andy

Bring it on.

give me a little while to get aquainted with the rifle and the disipline.....:cool::cool:

looking forward to a bit of crack....

Grizzly 45

andyone wrote: »

if it was shortened more would the subsonic rounds leave the barrel supersonic... as the remainder of the barrel which would normally slow the bullet down, would be gone...????

To give you a straight answer on this point...NO!
Subsonic ammo stays subsonic no matter what your barrel length is.Its to do with the powder load ,which is loaded to keep the bullet below the speed of sound.All a shorter barrel will do is give you is a more spectacular muzzle flash,a loud[er] gun ,proably reduced bullet velocity,and a lot more gunk to clean up in unburnt powder.[Have a look at any of the AR15 pistol conversions on youtube for this].
Shortned beyond a certain point it also might cause the gun to start hiccuping especially if you use subs,as the Ruger requires blowback pressure to cycle the action.Subsonic in .22lr is already finicky with certain guns,and unless it develops optimum pressure to cycle from burning the powder in a certain barrel length ,it might just give you stove pipes all the time.Then you have to get lighter springs made to make sure it cycles 100% with a certain brand of ammo...Alot of work if you want to tinker around and not shoot much.:( Thats all academic of course if you are using a bolt action or other manual loader.

Your job shoud be to find the optimum "short legal" length barrel that gives you optimum accruacy and reliability. Even if it were under the legal length,you "COULD"[and I'll qualify this advice here with CEVAT EMPTOR] still do it.But you[in this case a gunsmith might be a wise choice] must then attach permantly a muzzle break,a flash hider or somthing of the like to bring it back to legal length!! [By permantly that means brazed or welded.]
TBH the muzzle break is just a tube and doesnt affect the accruacy,just the looks of the gun,as all it does is catch flash and recoil,but might keep you out of bother.This was done with a couple of shotguns that were 20 in barrel affairs and had long choke tubes welded onto them to bring them to 24ins for sale here and in the UK a few years back.

has any one shortened theirs to 12.5".... how did this effect performance????"

Only ever seen ONE here and it was a gunsmiths toy with a lovely old wood /metal Ramline folding stock, high cap mags and a 12 in silencer.
Which all fitted nicely into a laptop bag!Only reason he made it was as a toy,[just because he could:D]and a test bed for the homemade can.
It shot quiet and very well.But then it was set up for a specific job, to be quiet not a match target rifle,but good enough for bunnies and quiet plinking.:cool: