TargetTalk

An excellent marksman gave me a few rounds from different companies. My gun has a great dislike for eley. They either will not seat totaly or they will not eject. Eley pistol felt the best but would not feed without thumb seating each round ( it felt like the lead was hitting the lands). RWS target worked marginaly first but seems to to work okay if I brush about every 150 rounds. I tried wolf and every case stuck. Remington target did well but was a little sharp poss. a higher vel. round. Federal gold match slightly better than remington. Is here a soft shooting free pistol ammo (like eley pistol) that is resonably priced for training that I need to try?

It seems you have a problem with almost every brand. The only one left is Lapua, why not give it a try.

If all of the match ammo that you tried did not seat, feed properly or eject, then I would say that it is not the ammo. I think that perhaps your pistol has a chamber problem. Do not take it to your local gunsmith. Have Don Nygord ream the chamber and tune the action so that it will work with any quality load. There is no reason that a free pistol, which is a single shot, should not function properly with that many different brands of quality ammo. It is not the ammo.

Welome to free pistol, as a rule most free pistol chambers are tighter than their semi auto counterparts, this is to increase accuracy. It is not uncommon to have to use a little thumb pressure to seat a round, some ammos require a bit more.

One thing which can increase this tightness is switching from one brand to the next without thouroughly cleaning the chamber. All 22lr ammo is not created equal. Many are of different lenghts. After shooting rounds the chamber gets a small ring of carbon and wax(lube) which forms in different spots with different ammos. If you use a long round(brand) after a short length (brand) you may find it hard to seat the new rounds.

I would NEVER EVER have anyone cut the chamber on a free pistol, this could result in a total loss of accuracy.

Greg Derr

I agree wholeheartedly with Gregg and would not, under any circumstances, ream out the chamber---instead I would spend some time wiping the excess lubricant from the rounds and scrubbing the chamber with a .22 caliber NYLON brush bent at 90 degree and no longer then the chamber length after every 10 rounds. As far as ammo is concerned I have found RWS Target Rifle to shoot the best in my Hammerli with quite contrary results with Eley Pistol Match (Blue).

I use RWS Target Rifle in my Morini. It seems to seat well, no problems with ejection, bullets go where I point (often to my distress).
I tried Winchester T22, which seemed every bit as accurate, but I did have to push some of the cases in a bit harder. I also found that they leaded up the compensator.
The nylon brush is all I clean it with (no solvents), but remember to turn it upside down when brushing so no goo falls into the action.

Paul

I specifically said NOT to take it to a local gunsmith. Don Nygord is not anyone. He would NOT ream it out indiscriminately. I would at the least have him look at it. There are manufacturing tolerances in ammunition and in pistols. Chamber reamers do wear and perhaps this chamber may not be optimal or the extractor needs some fine-tuning. Don has the knowledge and ability to fine-tune any free pistol and improve its functioning.

That being said, I contacted Zanders, the importer of Eley ammunition, thinking that perhaps my information might not be up-to date. Cathy Winstead sent this reply:
Thanks for your interest in Eley. Eley produces 3 grades of ammo for Remington...Target Rifle, Club, and Match. They do not have any tenex co-branded. As far as the lot #'s go the website is correct. For the last few years Eley has been using a third alpha, this being the crimp machine, but now they have eliminated that from the number. The second letter indicates the year it was produced in. The first number indicates the machine they are built on and there are 4 Tenex/Match machines.
You are correct that the others are built on a different machine, but the second letter is the year it was built. If you have any more questions feel free to ask and good shooting.

I spoke with Don Nygord this am. He recommends rolling the rounds in a towel to remove the excess wax and then possibly adding a light oil by towel. He thinks by doing this may solve the problem. Looks like time to retry the ammo tests again.

Greg,

I feel your pain... I just got done group testing in my Ruger 10/22's. Two rifles, eight brands of ammo. Long day at the bench!

I shoot a CM84E as well as a TOZ35 and a Hammerli 150. I use Eley Target Pistol in all three (yellow box). It loads easily on both the Toz and Hammerli, but is tight in the Morini. My pistol is fairly new - less than 2000 rounds through it. But even after this small amount of shooting I'm noticing it getting significantly easier to chamber a round. It started out being physically painful to shoot a hole match. Now it's not much more than a minor inconvenience.

You assumed that with the Eley you were driving the bullet into the rifling. In my case this is correct. I seated a round with my thumb and then drove it out with a rod, just to check. Sure enough, I could see rifling marks on the driving rings of the bullet.

Remington target ammo works OK in my gun, but leaves behind some pretty gritty priming compound. Won't try T22 because they fouled my Toz something fierce. You might want to try some of the Aguila target stuff because they've licensed the Eley priming design.


Mark.

My pistol is about 600 rounds old. Thanks for the words that it may loosen up a little. I plan to try each of the ammo that people suggested.

I would like to know from others what they find works well in there CM84e for pratice and for matches.