Walther p22 qd first impressions

[ma96782]

Looking at that 22 plinkster video, it seems to me that perhaps all one has to do to make a first generation P22 cycle most any ammo is to replace the recoil spring with the gen2 spring?

I thought about that too. So then, I had called S&W about buying a magazine button for my pistol's magazine and since I had the lady on the line......I asked about the new captured recoil spring used in the 2nd Gen for my 1st Gen P22. The lady said that the new captured recoil spring wouldn't work with my 1st Gen pistol.

Anyway, the good thing was......
S&W sent me a replacement 1st Gen recoil spring for FREE!

YES, I've seen the aftermarket captured recoil spring(s) that some people sell on EBay. However, the sellers don't say that it'll work with the 1st Gen and/or 2nd Gen Walther P22s. And, some sellers have mixed reviews about it working at all, to solve the problem.

Then.....using non-factory parts will/could be bad in the event of a slide breakage. Which has been reported with the 1st and newer Gen Walther P22s.

Aloha, Mark

PS....before we go there. YES, I've also seen those videos on YouTube about making modifications to my 1st Gen Walther P22. But, I'm not interested in doing those things, at this time.

Note: Speaking only of my Walther P22. I figure that .22 LR bullets traveling at say, under 1200 fps, will not cut it. But, I'll have to try more ammo (even different brands of ammo) before I completely give up.

Meanwhile.....Remington Golden Bullets and Thunderbolt ammo works. And, it can be usually found CHEAP enough.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

...I asked about the new captured recoil spring used in the 2nd Gen for my 1st Gen P22. The lady said that the new captured recoil spring wouldn't work with my 1st Gen pistol.

Interesting about the spring. One wonders if this isn't corporate-speak where they would never recommend anything that didn't ship originally due to liability. Or possibly the representative not being knowledgeable about technical details. I'm not saying she is wrong of course, just wondering... Probably the only way to be sure is to have a gen1 and gen2 side by side and try it. Perhaps email 22 plinkster and see if he can try it if he still has access to both generations? Heck, it's possible he had the same thought and tried it already.

I hear you about reluctance to do other extensive mods to get it work right. I hate to get too far from factory myself when talking about gun "internals" (not "accessories"). Having said that, I did recently put in a lighter hammer spring in my sig p938 and it definitely lightened up the trigger some. But that was a tried and true modification done by lots of people.

On the ammo I too like the golden bullet ammo as it seems pretty consistent for bulk ammo. Haven't shot thunderbolt myself. Back in the day I bought that really cheap Remington bulk ammo and that stuff was plain foul. Sometimes I would get about 25% failure to fire in good working guns and it was extremely dirty. That put me off Remington bulk ammo for many years. But the golden bullet ammo, in contrast to that old stuff, has been great!

 

[rasputin]

I've had a P22 for several years. I never could get it to feed any brand of ammo consistently until I took it apart and took a Dremel tool to the feed ramp. Now it feeds all brands just fine. It's fun to shoot and usually gets to go when I go out shooting. It doesn't compare accuracy wise to my old Colt Huntsman, Browning Challenger, or Hi Standard Sport King, but its accurate enough to be lots of fun.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

Yea I hear u on accuracy. Same issue as all small guns I think. I noticed the longer barrel for $104 somewhere (can't remember off top of my head). It kind of funny looking in that it's 5" (I think, can't remember and has a plastic extension for the frame. I'll try to find a pic. That longer barrel would make it much easier to shoot accurately I would think.

Edit: found pics. Right now sportsman's guide has p22qd for $213 after sale discounts. So add $105ish for the target barrel and that would be a pretty cool shooter for $320ish (before shipping if any). I've been looking at the sw22 which I love the feel of but I prefer the 15 shot mag of the p22 (tandem cross modification avail at brownells) so maybe I will buy long barrel instead of an sw22. Not comparable in terms of weight, balance, etc of course though.

 

[Lazyfaire]

All interesting info put forth so far. Thank you all. Ordered a 5" PPQ SD model the other day from LuckySG and sent in my paperwork for a Bower's Bitty suppressor. The can is only 2-2.5" long. Didn't want to put a 4-6" can on the front of a lightweight .22 cal pistol, making it unbalanced. Looking forward to playing with both of them.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

All interesting info put forth so far. Thank you all. Ordered a 5" PPQ SD model the other day from LuckySG and sent in my paperwork for a Bower's Bitty suppressor. The can is only 2-2.5" long. Didn't want to put a 4-6" can on the front of a lightweight .22 cal pistol, making it unbalanced. Looking forward to playing with both of them.

That should be a very nice combo. Don't forget to get a thread converter to 1/2x28 if needed for the suppressor.

I found this video shooting the p22 with 5 different suppressors using subsonic ammo. Amazingly quiet with any of the suppressors. I'm no expert on suppressors but it seems to me the 22lr is less demanding on design differences compared to larger caliber/more powerful guns (at least when shooting subsonic ammo).

I'm thinking that cci standard velocity ammo at 1050 fps might be a good subsonic round to use. Brownells has it for $0.06 per round or $0.046 per round on sale. FYI I have a thread of a simple noise test with various cci subsonic rounds in the ammo Subforum which shows the relative noise levels (unsuppressed). CCI .22 sound levels non-scientific test results