Need advice on best choices in a revolver that has the .22lr AND .22Mag Cylinders

[clearconscience]

I was looking at buying a Taurus 992 i think it is that comes with the cylinders for .22lr and .22mag.

 

[pinne65]

I was investigating this a while back and from what I've read the best revolver for 22 LR / 22 Mag would be one with interchangeable barells, say4-6" for 22 LR and 9-20" for 22 Magnum. I.e. it's not worth the trouble to get the mag. It can even perform worse than 22 LR from the same barell.

 

[coop44]

love the rugers, doesn't seem to be too much talk about the bore size. I just wonder with the 22 mag bullets being a slightly larger diameter. always been curious to know what the bore is sized for.

 

[BillGabby1]

They are bored for the 22 which is plus or minus a couple of thousands of an inch of .223
That is two hundred and twentythree thousandths of an inch
A 5.56mm or .223 cal. is actually a twenty two! They use soft metal in bullets so that they will extrude upon firing to tightly fit the lands and grooves of the barrel imparting the spin and keeping the expanding gasses from bypassing the projectile! The only reason for the different cylinder is to accommodate the larger CASING!
Using interchangeable barrels is totally unnecessary!
Sheesh................ buy you books and send you to school.......................................
Gabby

 

[jbett98]

From the all knowing web.

Ask Foghorn: Can you Fire .22LR Ammunition Through a .22 WMR Chamber?
By Nick Leghorn on February 13, 2012



Brice asks:

Why does a revolver need a .22 and .22 mag cylinder? The Ruger Single Six, Taurus Tracker, etc all come with two cylinders. Why?

Short answer is because otherwise the thing might explode. Here's the long answer:




Two cartridges: .22 Long Rifle (LR) and .22 Winchester Magnum Rifle (WMR) (picture courtesy Wikipedia). On first glance these two cartridges appear almost identical in diameter, and all you would need to fire the WMR out of a LR chamber is to make it a little longer. But looks can be deceiving.

Let's check out the technical specs of each of these cartridges (in inches):

Case Length.6131.055

Metric .22LR .22WMR
Bullet Diameter ---------------- .222 ----------------- .224
Neck Diameter ----------------- .226 ----------------- .242
Case Length -------------------- .613 ----------------- 1.055
Rim Diameter ----------------- .278 ------------------ .294

You can see that there is a definite difference in size between the LR and the WMR cartridges other than just their length.

Bullet diameter doesn't really concern us much, as the lead is soft enough to be extruded to the proper diameter for the bore by the expanding gasses without damaging any parts. The concerning part about these numbers is the difference in neck and rim diameter between the two cartridges.

Let's imagine you try to fire a .22LR round out of a .22 WMR chamber. The cartridge will physically fit inside the chamber and the primer will more or less line up with the firing pin, so all seems well. But instead of the round fitting snugly into the chamber as it would if you had a WMR round in there the LR will be loose and rattle around more. That's because there is more space between the brass case and the steel chamber than the designers anticipated.

The neck diameter on these .22 caliber cartridges indicates the diameter of the case from the neck to the rim because these are both "straight walled" cartridges where the sides of the case are parallel (much like a .45ACP and much UNlike a .50 BMG). That means that in a WMR chamber there's .016 inches of extra space with a .22LR loaded versus the proper .22WMR round.



The effect of having too much space between the chamber and the brass case is pretty well understood. Too much space means the brass case can't seal the chamber, and the result from pulling the trigger can often be more explosive (and firearm destroying) than intended. This is the best illustration of that point I could find, a perfectly good shotgun ruined because someone loaded a 20 gauge round instead of a 12 gauge round.

Going back to our example improperly loaded firearm, once you pull the trigger the brass case of the .22LR round will expand to try and fill the much larger than anticipated chamber, most likely resulting in the case rupturing and splitting. Instead of all that energy being contained and directed forward, once the case ruptures the energy is free to impact the side of the chamber. More energy than normal is then directed outwards towards the wall of the chamber, and consequently the projectiles don't go quite as far as they should. Because the case has split that means all of the force of the expanding gasses are applied directly to the chamber (instead of being retained by the brass case), and since the gases have had a moment to pick up speed before they impact the chamber wall that means that they're moving faster and with more force than normal. The effect, as illustrated above, can rupture the chamber of a firearm.

In a low pressure round like the .22LR, this probably won't cause the same catastrophic failure that we see in the shotgun, but it will definitely be bad for your gun and might possibly lead to some of the gasses escaping through the case head and fouling up the mechanism of your revolver. If your revolver's chamber has been weakened (either by improper materials during manufacture or years of abuse) a kaBoom may indeed be in your future after all.

IN SHORT, you shouldn't fire .22LR through a .22WMR chamber because the cases will rupture and you could ruin your gun, possibly exploding and killing everyone on the entire planet*.
Ruger gives you a different cylinder for just this reason and I highly recommend you use it.

ALWAYS USE THE CORRECT AMMUNITION FOR YOUR FIREARM! ALWAYS!

 

[BillGabby1]

Thanks Jbett that pretty well corroborates what I was saying but much more scientifically than I did.
Gabby

 

[boogerhook]

How about a NAA? ;-)
<broken link removed>

 

[BillGabby1]

How about a NAA? ;-)
<broken link removed>

The original requirement was for SA/DA and the NAA doesn't have that capability and though they have put adjustable sights on there. I just can't imagine this little pocket pistol living up to the requirement of being accurate especially with the results I had with the spur trigger
they suck..
There has to be a reason why most of the serious guns are equipped with a real enclosed trigger, one is safety that puppy just hangs out there begging for the opportunity to go off at the wrong time. They are cute and they even make a belt buckle that you can stick the tiny one into and be carrying in plain sight and people think it's a toy.
For that kind of money you can get a much better gun if you take the time to shop around.
Gabby

 

[BillGabby1]

Go single action and get the Ruger Single Six Convertible you will have a serious quality firearm.
Gabby

 

[Certaindeaf]

Harrington & Richardson made quite a few good quality double action .22mag/22lr revolvers.
The DA triggers are pretty heavy but they are accurate and go bang every time.. that's a good thing.
Check out the model 650.. I'm sure there are more H&R DA conversion models but that's the one that comes to mind.

 

[mjbskwim]

They are bored for the 22 which is plus or minus a couple of thousands of an inch of .223
That is two hundred and twentythree thousandths of an inch
A 5.56mm or .223 cal. is actually a twenty two! They use soft metal in bullets so that they will extrude upon firing to tightly fit the lands and grooves of the barrel imparting the spin and keeping the expanding gasses from bypassing the projectile! The only reason for the different cylinder is to accommodate the larger CASING!
Using interchangeable barrels is totally unnecessary!
Sheesh................ buy you books and send you to school.......................................
Gabby

Actually the 556 and 223 is .224" in diameter.At least that's the boolitts i use for mine when reloading

 

[mjbskwim]

The original requirement was for SA/DA and the NAA doesn't have that capability and though they have put adjustable sights on there. I just can't imagine this little pocket pistol living up to the requirement of being accurate especially with the results I had with the spur trigger
they suck..
There has to be a reason why most of the serious guns are equipped with a real enclosed trigger, one is safety that puppy just hangs out there begging for the opportunity to go off at the wrong time. They are cute and they even make a belt buckle that you can stick the tiny one into and be carrying in plain sight and people think it's a toy.
For that kind of money you can get a much better gun if you take the time to shop around.
Gabby

NAA are single action so the trigger being hit won't do anything. If you leave the hammer on the rim ,well that changes thngs.
So NAA made a little notch in between the chambers to put the hammer down in,so you can load them with a full cylinder ,safely