another .22 LR question

A 22 rifle is not a toy. Never treat it as such. This is adult stuff with legal ramifications.

You can not transport a loaded rifle/long gun for self defense away from your "home" unless you are law enforcement. If you are out shooting, sure, it's loaded. But you don't transport the rifle loaded. Yes, you can use the rifle for self defense if you are out shooting or carrying it on a hike. Be careful about hikes and carrying a long gun. In some cases, you can not carry a loaded rifle except during hunting season... but that is another story. In my state, I am not allowed to take a gun with me on a hike inside a national forest which just happens to be a wildlife management area (unless I have a carry permit) outside of hunting season. Hence, no plinking. Stupid regulation here. But it is the law. You're okay in national forests, not WMAs for the most part. Read the regulations. I believe you are okay on BLM land.

Nobody wants a gun pointed at them. Don't do it unless you have a very good reason. There are legal ramifications.

I believe the desert is mostly BLM land and you are perfectly legal in shooting out there safely as far as I know. My previous point was you can not load the gun at home and carry it in your car/truck to the desert to shoot. You load it there.

Don't worry about the percents mentioned. If you are in fear of your life you can defend yourself. But you are limited as to location. In most cities, you can't walk down the street with a loaded rifle. If you have to defend yourself, you will do fine.

I watch "The First 48 Hours," and a lot of other "reality" crime shows. I'd say, on average, at least half of the deaths are caused by a .22 caliber handgun. Most likely, the next caliber is a 380, followed by 9mm, 45, and 40.

I live in a very safe town. Both my wife and I have CCW but don't carry because there is no reason to. Yet, we're looking at getting a Bersa Thunder 22 for those extreme because 10 rounds WILL do what we need to do.

Where we live, crimes of violence are perpetrated by single individuals, occasionally a pair but never the mongrel hoard that some fear.

The wind will deflect or move your impact point depending on distance and wind velocity.

Accuracy or precision should be determined for each 22 firearm with the ammunition you use. It will change depending on the ammunition you are using. 22's are very finicky about having a preference for certain ammunition. Set up a target at 25 yds and 50 yds and do some shooting to determine how well you, your rifle, and ammunition shoot. But you can probably expect groups up to 1.5" in diameter at 50 yds but your rifle may do better. I have 22's that fairly easily shoot 1/2" groups at 50 yds. Many M60's will shoot well. The groups open up at 100 yds and are more affected by wind the further you are shooting.

I might add that rimfires are discussed at great length at RimfireCentral forum. Check it out.

Yeah, you pretty much have to do the shooting yourself or have a friend shoot your rifle at targets for you. There are free downloadable targets on line that you can print off. It's fun to shoot, but it's not as much fun when it is really hot or really cold.

Go with a friend and punch some holes!

Lot's of folks been killed with them.

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Yeah...read up on Robert Kennedy. He was shot multiple times, including one or more to the head. Took him about two days to die.

If someone is attempting to kill you, right now... do you want him to stop in two days, or right now?

That is why cops, military, serious people don't carry .22 for self-defense.

If it is all you have, it's better than nothing...but it's not very far up the scale.

I dislike talking casually about killing. There is no question that there are better calibers for self defense than a 22 out of a handgun or rifle. But, we all don't necessarily have unlimited choices and you make do with what you have. Relax and have fun shooting your rifle. You will probably live your entire life and never have to defend yourself with a firearm.

I have gone so far as suggest to people a Ruger 10/22 rifle for home defense when they are very recoil sensitive or afraid. You can get larger capacity magazines for them that are reliable and they point quite nicely.

When you are plinking, you might try to just "point your rifle" (aka hip shots) at a soda can and see how you do. It's fun and might in fact be the way you would be using a 22 rifle in a self defense situation that happens very quickly.

I used to use a 22 semi-auto rifle rabbit hunting when I was younger. We shot a lot back then and since it was a semi-auto, it was fun to pepper stuff with holes. One of the things I did then was shoot as a pull the rifle to my shoulder... generally you get a couple shots off during that second or two. Used to hit rabbits on the jump that way which I was always proud of. Actually shot a deer "from the hip" or pointing my center fire rifle once. I had already hit it once in the front shoulders and it fell; got up and was running toward me and just past me. I shot a second shot at about 5 yds distance pointing because it was running and too close to follow in my scope. It dropped like a rock. Hit it luckily in the spine on that second shot. One could also say that I almost missed too when I hit the spine depending on your perspective. Memories.

Have fun shooting your rifle. I hope you can find ammunition or you have a fair supply on hand until the store shelves get back to normal inventories.

While my EDC is either a Sig P220 or Sig P229, if I am going somewhere that I need a pocket pistol, I grab the wife's Walther P22. While I would not want to trust my life with it everyday, it sometimes fits the requirements I have. Nothing at all wrong with a .22. The only this is shot placement is vital to it's usefulness.

A few points to consider. A rifle, including .22lr rifles are going to be more accurate at any distance than a handgun. High velocity long rifle cartridges can and do penetrate well. With good bullet placement a .22 is deadly out to 100yds. at least. Not necessarily immediately but no one's going to feel good with eight or ten rounds in their carcass. With the .22 rifle you can open fire at longer ranges if necessary which gives more time to pump ammo into the target. A Ruger 10/22 like my 50 year old specimen is surprisingly reliable, and it only takes a second if you should have to clear an FTE or FTF round. Much quicker than clearing a center fire pistol.
I wouldn't call a .22 rimfire the best defense weapon but it will do the job. I have two .22s one's a rimfire the other's a 5.56mm.

A Ruger 10/22 like my 50 year old specimen is surprisingly reliable, it only takes a second if you should have to clear an FTE or FTF round. Much quicker than clearing a center fire pistol.

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Got any videos of your techniques of clearing jams in your 10/22? I'd really like to see them.

A Type 1 malfunction (Failure To Fire) clearance on a center fire pistol (tap-rack-bang) literally takes less than a second. What do you do on your 10/22 to clear a FTF "much quicker" than that?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aYPv7Blv5g

As an Appleseed instructor, I see a LOT of 10/22 jams. An Failure To Eject is the worst by far. In a FTE, a 10/22 will crumple the fired case back up inside the receiver when the bolt comes forward. This typically causes a double feed when the bolt picks up the next round in the magazine, but the fired case keeps it from sliding under the extractor. The shooter then racks the bolt trying to clear the jam, and another round gets picked up by the bolt and added to the mess. It's usually simple to clear. Drop the mag and cycle the bolt to let everything drop out of the receiver, then re-install the mag, cycle the bolt and keep shooting. Definitely NOT quick though by any stretch of the imagination.

No different than a Type 3 malfunction drill on a centerfire pistol. I have a hard time imagining anyone doing the manipulations on a 10/22 faster than they can do the same thing on a pistol.

The youtube guy isn't particularly fast with his Type 3 drill, takes him about 3 seconds. Show us what you can do with a 10/22 with the same situation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leqq0CSmEuM

just think of it like hunting deer with a .223. hit a vital organ and the fights over with.
there have been probably millions of deer size "game" taken with the .22. just aim small, miss small.

I am pretty slow with Type 3 jams (FTE) mentioned above. I know it's longer than 3 seconds for me. 45 Auto describes it very well and probably the first time I have read it in print. Anyone who shoots semi-auto 22's will occasionally have to clear these jams. When it starts happening, it's a good time to clean the action of all the accumulated junk.

Well, the 30-06 was the U.S. military's main battle rifle and machinegun caliber for two world wars.

So I'd say it would work for defense.

Too good in fact, in todays sheet rock and vinyl sided homes.

It will shoot through 2 or 3 houses and still have enough energy to kill somebody in the third house.

rc

Over penetration is the problem using a 30-06 for home defense. If you live in a traditional neighborhood, you would litterally shoot through your walls and into at least one other home and perhaps two of them. The age of the rifle doesn't matter as long as it is safe to shoot.

That has been the criticism about using a 357 mag for home defense needs if you can get past the muzzle flash and extremely loud ear shattering noise level. The -06 would have the same effect on you shooting it indoors. I shot a 222 out the back window at a crow once. It was raining and I didn't want to barrel to get wet from the rain... well, let me tell you that THAT is the first and last time I will ever pull a stunt like that unless my life was endangered.

I wouldn't be all that bothered to depend on a Marlin M60 for my safety. Sure there are better calibers and so forth, but you have a M60 and can probably hit what you point it at. Velocitors are my choice.

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Just FYI, Velocitors will destroy a Marlin 60 pretty quickly. The manual clearly says not to use hyper velocity ammo. The buffer won't stand up to the recoil. If you want to use a semi-auto .22 for SD I would suggest a 10/22. And trust me I'm not a big fan of that rifle. It's a good rifle but I have several Marlins and only one Ruger which is a pistol.

Also people are talking about shooting and killing people at 100 yards. They have a word for that in most states - murder. You would have to have some joker shooting at you to justify shooting another human at that distance and even then you would have to be away from any place you could get cover in most states. You have a duty to retreat in a large portion of states. It was a lot more before the CCW laws were passed and then came the castle doctrine laws. Still a lot of states say you have to try to retreat if possible.

If you have no other choice then by all means use a .22 for SD. If you can afford something else then you really would be far better off using something else. A shotgun is very good for SD. Even those who don't like heavy recoil can go with a smaller shotgun like a 20 ga. or even a 28 ga..

Don't let people convince you a .22 is just as good. They aren't. They are better than throwing rocks of course. But most of the reasons we would need to shoot another human is because they are trying to shoot us. That means they would almost certainly have a more powerful gun if you are using a .22.

Use your head guys. It makes more sense to use almost any firearm over a .22. Sure you can assassinate someone with a .22 (Ronald Reagen survived being shot by a .22) but that's a lot different than defending yourself especially if the bad guy has a Tec-9 or a Mac-10 or an Uzi or a Heckler & Koch MP7. If you've ever shot one of those weapons you'll know how incredibly devastating they are. Then there's the full auto AK's and AR's and various other machine guns a person can find if they look really hard. But it doesn't take such a devastating weapon to out gun a .22. The Commie bloc peasant gun known as the SKS will overwhelm any .22 made like a D-9 bulldozer going up against a VW Beetle. Even the every day Glock 21 or Glock 19 or any one of 100 high capacity pistols will make you cry for mommy. 13 rounds of .45 ACP (in the Glock 21) trumps 15 rounds of .22 (in a Marlin 60) pretty much every time. Surely most people here have shot those weapons or one like them. Using a .22 against someone armed with a SA XDm .40 (16 rounds plus one in the tube) is almost suicidal. I hear a lot about shot placement but that works both ways. For one thing a .40 caliber bullet is known to penetrate extremely well (as in through the cross beam steel in a car door) while a .22 will bounce off bone frequently (my wife's cousin is living proof of that).

I'm not here trying to act like Mr. Expert. I just know a few things and so do most of the people here. And one of the things I know is if I'm faced with having to have a gun battle with some bad gun I want to be the guy with the XDm instead of the .22. Better still I want to be the guy with a 12 ga. Remington 870 or an SKS. A person can buy a very good clone of the 870 for less than $175 at Walmart. I actually have two of those plus an 870. Yes I can only shoot one at a time but I have them set up for different uses. I have one sitting by where I sleep in case some idjit with a .22 decides to break into my house.

Just FYI, Velocitors will destroy a Marlin 60 pretty quickly. The manual clearly says not to use hyper velocity ammo. The buffer won't stand up to the recoil. If you want to use a semi-auto .22 for SD I would suggest a 10/22. And trust me I'm not a big fan of that rifle. It's a good rifle but I have several Marlins and only one Ruger which is a pistol.

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That be correct. It will slowly destroy the M60 in most cases not to mention that they cost more than standard CCI HV rounds. I'm not a big fan of the Ruger 10/22 either. But they handle nicely for non-precision shooting unless you do a lot of mods to them to make them more accurate. I suspect the 10/22 is not rated for hyper velocity ammo either. But I haven't read my manual in years. I probably haven't even shot my 10/22 in 5 years.

Cee Zee, can't argue with what you said. But he has a M60 NOW and I try to work with what ya got when I can. One could also argue that a under barrel tubular magazine 22 is not the better choice for a defensive use 22.