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Hi guys. I am curious to know what firearms people are using to shoot .22 short. First let me say I am a gun guy, but do not have all the knowledge that more experienced shooters like a lot of the folks here have.

That being said, when I was a kid I remember a friends dad shooting his .22 rifle with .22 short. They were very quite and fun to shoot.

I have a ruger 22/45 that loves CCI 22 but I want to try out some shorts for my daughter (shes 13 and new to shooting) to use when she shoots the pistol.

My concern is how well does a ruger Mark series pistol handle the short as well as a 10/22? I am not sure if it will cycle, feed or shoot correctly...

Might seem like a stupid question, thought I'd ask anyhow as there is a wealth of firearms knowledge here!

Thanks guys!
 
I'm no expert either, but I assume that something that is made to shoot .22LR won't be able to properly shoot .22 short. But I have no experience with this myself, just seems like it won't work properly.
 
Never tried to shoot 22 short from a mk II or a 10/22 - don't think they would feed correctly from either magazine as they would not stack correctly. I do know that some of the tube fed guns can feed either short or long - though CB rounds were iffy even when they did fine with regular short
 
I keep a box or 2 for my Henry lever gun. Could shoot them from a 22LR revolver. The 22/45 will not feed them. Don't think the 10/22 will either.

Most lever & pump action rifles will shoot 22 shorts. Can't remember on auto loaders but I believe some will feed shorts.
 
Most semi-auto guns will not cycle 22 short unless they are specifically chambered for the round. On the other hand most bolt action single shot and tube fed rifles and lever action rifles will cycle and shoot the 22 short even if they are chambered for the 22 LR round. The problem starts with the magazine designed for 22 LR when you try to feed 22 Short through it. You can shoot 22 short through your 22/45 but it will probably be a single shot type approach as they will probably not feed through the magazine properly and jam up with a failure to feed. They might eject though. Just remember to give your chamber a good cleaning before switching back to 22LR as the shorts will leave a crusty ring of burnt powder residue in your chamber that will inhibit the feeding and cycling of the 22LR.
 
Hi guys. I am curious to know what firearms people are using to shoot .22 short. First let me say I am a gun guy, but do not have all the knowledge that more experienced shooters like a lot of the folks here have.

That being said, when I was a kid I remember a friends dad shooting his .22 rifle with .22 short. They were very quite and fun to shoot.

I have a ruger 22/45 that loves CCI 22 but I want to try out some shorts for my daughter (shes 13 and new to shooting) to use when she shoots the pistol.

My concern is how well does a ruger Mark series pistol handle the short as well as a 10/22? I am not sure if it will cycle, feed or shoot correctly...

Might seem like a stupid question, thought I'd ask anyhow as there is a wealth of firearms knowledge here!

Thanks guys!

semi-autos will generally NOT cycle properly with 22 short if they are set up for 22lr. the spring is too stiff, and or the action is to heavy. if you reconfiger the action to reliably fire .22 short, you will beat it to death with 22lr (assuming the chamber was built to accept 22lr.

As for pistols: I have a High Standard Olympic that was design specifically for .22 short. (only)

I also have a "kit" (optional barrel, slide and magazine) for .22 short for my wife's High Standard Trophy. She also has several barrels and another slide for 22lr for the same frame. Yes, we shoot a lot of 22 short when the pistols are set up for shorts.

For a bolt rifle, I would expect the only change needed would be the magazine (if it uses one), and then only "maybe". My Model 80 Marlin handles shorts OK in it's .22 lr mag, but you can tell, a specific built mag would make loading the rounds easier.
 
semi-autos will generally NOT cycle properly with 22 short if they are set up for 22lr. the spring is too stiff, and or the action is to heavy. if you reconfiger the action to reliably fire .22 short, you will beat it to death with 22lr (assuming the chamber was built to accept 22lr.

As for pistols: I have a High Standard Olympic that was design specifically for .22 short. (only)

I also have a "kit" (optional barrel, slide and magazine) for .22 short for my wife's High Standard Trophy. She also has several barrels and another slide for 22lr for the same frame. Yes, we shoot a lot of 22 short when the pistols are set up for shorts.

For a bolt rifle, I would expect the only change needed would be the magazine (if it uses one), and then only "maybe". My Model 80 Marlin handles shorts OK in it's .22 lr mag, but you can tell, a specific built mag would make loading the rounds easier.

My I add a bit to this. For a younger person, starting them on .22 shorts (low vel) would be a good idea for several reasons. The subsonic >22 short is much quieter than a Hi Vel .22lr. In this case, you have to seek out the low velocity shorts. They are 860 fps and are general competition ammo (very accurate and reliable...but a bit more expensive than normal .22 ammo) You can also purchase sub-sonic .22lr for compition.


With low vel ammo, you would absolutely have to have your pistol set up to fire shorts. IMHO: the best would be a High Standard Trophy with a "short" kit (available through Bronwells new, or probably on gun broaker too, as a used item) The Trophy is a superb pistol, lots of optional barrels, weights, compensator, adjustable trigger, adjustable trigger overthrow...just really nice...no, you can't purchase new, you need to find a used one. Guestimate for a really nice example about $700. Also, the slide for the short kit is alloy, the slide for the .22lr is steel. The barrels are very easily interchangeable, and are cartridge specific.

BTW: My wife's Trophy is going to our (now) 13 year old granddaughter when we pass on. Our Granddaughter just loves that pistol. She's been shooting it for several years now when they come visit.
 
I love to put cb shorts in my single six and pop them off at cans in the backyard with my stack of wood as a backstop. Very fun, and I will never get any complaints about the noise.
 
Thanks everyone! This is what makes this a great forum, nice folks who don't have any trouble sharing their knowledge!

As it sounds like it would be ok, I think for now we will go ahead and do single shot firing with the 22/45 to introduce her to pistol shooting until we get a some extra cash for something set up for the short.

She does not mind the loud noise from the 10/22 with 22LR but it seems to bother her with the pistol, and when new shooters are shooting comfort and not flinching to the bang is better for them. She shot the 22/45 with cci mini mag once and did not like it due to the noise, we do have some subsonic but I haven't tried it yet.

I am very eager to get my daughter more involved with shooting and to build a knowledge and understanding about firearms for recreation as well as hunting!
 
We tried them last week in a tube fed Winchester Model 90 (pump) and they did not work. :( Hubby says they will work in his other .22 rifle he got as a kid, though, so they weren't a total waste. I only bought them because I was desperate as everywhere I went was out of LR. Finally found some LR, though, and the day of shooting with the kids was saved :)
 
Thanks everyone! This is what makes this a great forum, nice folks who don't have any trouble sharing their knowledge!

As it sounds like it would be ok, I think for now we will go ahead and do single shot firing with the 22/45 to introduce her to pistol shooting until we get a some extra cash for something set up for the short.

She does not mind the loud noise from the 10/22 with 22LR but it seems to bother her with the pistol, and when new shooters are shooting comfort and not flinching to the bang is better for them. She shot the 22/45 with cci mini mag once and did not like it due to the noise, we do have some subsonic but I haven't tried it yet.

I am very eager to get my daughter more involved with shooting and to build a knowledge and understanding about firearms for recreation as well as hunting!

Use ear plugs and electronic muffs, then the noise will not be a problem. If you use a pistol you can put a suppressor on, and have one, and use subsonic ammo, there will be no problems...you don't even need ear plugs suppressed and sub sonic.
 
We tried them last week in a tube fed Winchester Model 90 (pump) and they did not work. :( Hubby says they will work in his other .22 rifle he got as a kid, though, so they weren't a total waste. I only bought them because I was desperate as everywhere I went was out of LR. Finally found some LR, though, and the day of shooting with the kids was saved :)

Thats awesome Angie. I love it when my family can all get together and shoot, nothing better!

Yeah I had the same problem trying to find 22 lr. I just kept poking my head in to Bimart and finally got stocked up. They are keeping even the 22 bulk behind counter and limiting sales.
 
Here is an interesting article on subsonic .22shorts through suppressors:

Subsonic 22 Ammunition

I have quite a bit of the Aguila short left from the old Starling busting days from when I was a kid and getting a nickle a bird in the cherry orchards belonging to a cousin, it works well. Also to the OP, take a look at .22 CB's for low noise. The little .22 chipmunk single shot bolt is a great little for the kids, it has to be loaded then have the bolt set to fire, a pretty safe little unit that fires shorts, longs and long rifle cartridges.
 
You all forgot the CCI 22LR Quiet rounds. (finding is a problem now). In a little test with my Marlin 781 bolt rifle I shot cci short, cci cb long, Aguila Colibre and cci 22 quiets. There was little to no differance in sound between the first three and the 22 quiet was just a little louder not bad though. Now for power the short and CB were near identical would go about .75-1" into 2x4 (wide side facing shooter) from 10yds away. The aguila (standard not super) would sit just flush on board and the 22 quiet went straight thru 2x4 and 5/8" plywood about 6" behind that (impressed the heck out of me). Just a few more thougths for everyone.

Side not that the CB longs will load and with manual (slow) cycling of the slide on my Smith and Wesson 22s pistol will feed and shoot fine. But must manualy cycle slide each shot. I have heard the same with a 10/22 but have not tried that yet.
 
My old man growing up had a Beretta jetfire .22 short. It held, IIRC, 5 rounds in the mag, he never kept a round chambered because there was no manual safety and it wasn't a drop-safe gun. It had tiny, rice-grain sized iron sights, it was single-action, with a tilting barrel. It was also VERY loud when fired, with a loud sharp crack. It also had recoil similar to a light weight .22lr pistol - so it did have noticeable muzzle climb. He kept it as a back up to his .38 Chief's Special. It was certainly a "jamb it into the bad guys temple and pull the trigger" type gun - because that'd be the only way it would be a fight-stopper.
 
... And to add, might pick up a couple of the crickets that are out now for the twins. One Blue and one pink. Tried them out for size today and boy are the excited to go shooting with me!
Most Bolt gun .22lr can shoot a short as well. Autos tend to be one way or the other and not both.
 

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