Small caliber reloading

[S.S.]

Most of what I read on BPCR reloading is for larger calibers.
What is the smallest caliber you folks load for?
The reason I am asking is that many years ago I came into a large amount
of primed but not loaded .22 LR. brass. I loaded them with fff
Black Powder and thumb pressed a lead roundball into the case.
I had a great deal of fun with them and would love to find more!
Right now though I just load for .45-70.

[horseman308]

I've never heard of reloading .22LR. How were your results w/ BP? I may be hallucinating, but I think I read in the NRA's rule book for silhouette shooting that .22 silhouettes had to be shot with factory loaded ammo. I know that there are a lot of folks who shoot small bore silhouettes with BPCR rifles either chambered for small bore or w/ converters. Been looking to do some of that myself.

[Nobade]

The problem loading small caliber cases with black powder seems to be bullets, or rather their lack of lubricant capacity. I have been shooting my 30-30 rolling block with black recently, but haven't found a bullet that carries enough lube. I have to wipe between shots or at least every 2 shots to keep any accuracy. Best bullet is (suprise) Ideal 31171, but the Lee 170 isn't bad either. With 777 I can shoot all day though, and it still smokes enough to be fun. I haven't tried the .22 hornet yet, but it might work pretty good in my 10 inch Contender with the RCBS 55gr.  Hafta see...

[S.S.]

I didn't actually reload them, They were never fully loaded in the first place,
Just primed..  They worked great. I have no Idea what the velocity was,
but they were a blast to use on Blue Jays in the Pecan Trees we had at the time.
I did this probably 25 years ago, and I still have the 22 rifle that I used.
No ill effects on it at all using black powder in it. They were very accurate
and would Smack those Jays pretty good too.

[sqball]

S.Sumner,

  You've got me beat shooting those .22 RF's. It's not surprising that you got reasonable accuracy with them as they were originally loaded with BP and were considered good enough for target shooting at 75 ft.

  The smallest I load for and shoot is the .22 WCF (aka .22 Hornet). For me the big problem was finding out that you really need a good crimp to get them to shoot decently. I've only been able to get around 2" accuracy, on average, at 100 yds., but at 50 they'll almost put them into 1/2". Makes for a great Squirrel caliber. I also load for the .25/20SS and .28/30. The .25 is my 200 yd. offhand gun and is very pleasant to shoot over a long series of shots.

[StrawHat]

  sqball

Care to share the 22 WCF recipe?  I've been having the devil's own time trying to get mine to work with BP.

Thanks

[sqball]

Strawhat,

  Sorry to be so long in answering. Been so long I didn't think there was anyone interested in discussing this further so didn't look in till now.

  I'd be happy to share what I've found out, but you do realise that YMMV due to differences between guns. My gun is a Win. Low Wall with a Shilen barrel with a 1-10" twist that is throated especially for breech seating and target shooting, but which I also use fixed ammo in for Squirrel hunting. So what I'll going tell you might not work well in your gun but should give you an idea as how I do it. Also as I mentioned in my last message I'm actually using a .22 Hornet, which other than bore diam. is the same thing as the WCF.

  The load is 13.6 grs. of 3F Goex in a WW case. The case is important since with this small of a capacity different brands will change the volume a couple of tenths and this will change the whole dynamics of the results. In the lot of cases I use this will fill the case almost to the top, with just enough room for a wad. That's one I make out of .025" milk cartons. This is compressed to a depth to allow for seating the bullet. Rem. 7 1/2 primer and a 60 gr. Lyman 225415 bullet. SPG lube. OAL - 1.870". After trying several different amounts of crimp I found that .010" worked the best in my gun.

  Since I don't know how you're going about loading for this small of a caliber I'll point out a few things that you might already know. Changing the powder charge .1 gr. will make a difference in performance. This can easily amount to 50 fps difference in MV. When you change lots of powder you will have to do some adjustment in powder charge and compression. What I usually tell people about working up BP loads is to start with a powder charge that will just reach the bottom of the wad/bullet when you have your bullet seated to just touch the rifling. From there you, in this small of a caliber, change the charge .1 gr. at a time till you get the smallest groups. Then, of course, you can play with the compression, primers, OAL, and in this case, the crimp to fine tune the load.

  This is not going to be an easy thing to do. It took me shooting 5 days a week for two solid Summers to come up with what I've written above. But I was looking for the best possible accuracy I could get at 200 yds. fo breech seatedr target shooting. The fixed ammo end of it was more or less incidental. So if all you want is something to plink with or hunt Squirrels you can probably stop far short of the work I put in.

[w30wcf]

SSumner,

Presently, the 2 smallest calibers that I have loaded with b.p. is the .22 LR and the .22 WCF ('43 Winchester 22 Hornet).

In the .22 LR, the old 38 gr. Lyman Gas checked bullet works very well. The gas check shank serves as the bullet heal and fits nicely in a .22 LR case.  NEI has the same bullet design in a current mold.

To load,  I pull the bullet from a .22 LR case with a pair of pliers......rotating them to the side.  I then  remove the crimp amd bell the case slightly. 

Early catalogs indicate that 5 grs. of a "special" black powder was used by the factories. I have found that amount of Swiss 3F or 4F works well.  After charging the case, I seat the bullet (SPG lubed) with a .228" H&I die.  I then run the completed cartridge into a .225" H&I die to restore the case to it's original dimensions. 

Surprisingly, I have fired up to 30 rounds in a row (most I have had in hand at one time) and the accuracy has not changed 1 to 1 1/2" @ 50 yards, depending on which .22 I'm using. Velocity with 3F runs 1,035 f.p.s and with 4F, 1,100 f.p.s.   NEAT!


sqball,
Thank you for sharing your experience with the .22 W.C.F.  I also did a lot of experimenting to try and find the most accurate load for my '43 Winchester (.22 Hornet). One of the biggest factors I found was the primer. In my tests the CCI500 small pistol primer worked the best.  It also produced the most consistant velocities. 

Most accurate in my rifle was 14.0 / Swiss 3F with either Lyman's 225438 or Nei's .45 gr. in WInchester brass, or 15.0 grs of the same powder in R-P casings. Cartridge OAL was 1.75".
Velocities run in the 1,400 f.p.s. range.

w30wcf