22 rim fire or 6.5 Creedmoor?

[Sunray]

"...a case of Eley black..." That may or may not shoot well out of a specific M52.
As mentioned, your buddy needs to decide what distance he wants to shoot at and rimfire or centre fire first. Ain't the same thing. However, the techniques are exactly the same for NRA 50 or 100 yard small bore matches as they are for 1,000 yard Palma Match shooting. Breathing, sight picture and trigger control are all the same with an M52 or a heavy barreled, centre fire, target rifle.
He will not be shooting precision bullseye matches with a .22 LR. Zeroed at 50, .22 rimfire ammo starts dropping a yard plus at 200 yards. And that 36" drop is with hypervelocity hunting ammo. Steel plates/ metallic silhouette aren't exactly precise. Benchrest is a game all to itself.
Like CraigC says, it's not going to be a grand to get into High Power shooting

 

[CB900F]

Fella's;

I too, would like to know what caliber his present Tikka is in. For that matter Tikka makes some very interesting 6.5's already. Of course they're in 6.5 Swede instead of the redundant Creedmore, but so what? The Swede will do anything the other one will & perhaps with a little more barrel life also. Just a piece of advice here, do not try to play the short-action card.

As for a .22lr, I do believe the ammo situation is getting better for everybody. It's always been possible to get the higher quality target ammo, simply because the demand is low & the price is comparatively high. These days though, I'm finding .22lr in several different shops when I get into town.
If he wants to scope the .22, I'd shop around a bit & try to find a CZ452 American, but that's just me. Any .22 though will need a fair amount of different brands, and types within a brand, of ammo run through it to determine what the gun likes best. That can be a challenge these days, but it can be done.

900F

 

[horsemen61]

The tikka is a 308 win the problem is it's very lightweight thin barrel he loves it to hunt with but he wants something to shoot all day and for him in a new caliber let me double check but I believe he got a 6.5 Creedmoor yesterday

 

[Varminterror]

You guys make valid points but let's refer back to the OP for a moment. The guy is looking at a .22LR or a 6.5CM, because he says he can get 6.5 components more easily than .22LR, with a budget of $1000. Based on that alone, I would not assume he was gearing up to shoot for the PRS top 100 next year. The long range rig I just put together would be considered entry-level in the PRS game and it cost three times that. Catch my drift?

Not sure if your focus on rifle price fits the OP's question. If he's asking about learning, I infer a lot of practice shooting. If he is concerned with supply chain management and believes he can feed one more readily than the other, I infer a lot of shooting. I also know most newbies will consider the rifle cost first, then the ammo cost, then optic cost, and most neglect the repair and replace cost of the barrels they will burn. Admittedly, most won't even notice their group sizes shift when the first barrel burns out on them, since they won't shoot well enough to tell, and a larger majority will shoot FAR LESS and at FAR SHORTER RANGES than they imagine when they buy the rifle, but if a guy really follows through, most don't realize they have a $500/yr or $500/2yr habit coming on for barrel replacements. In the OP's case, it might change his mind if he knows he'll have to pay his $1,000 purchase price again for barrels alone over 2-5yrs.

There's a lot to be said for buying a $300-500 .22lr and a $300-500 scope and $1,000 worth of 22 ammo which will mean a LOT more shots than $1,000 in 6.5creedmoor ammo.

Your post here DOES remind me of another fair point to favor the .22LR in the context of the OP's question though. The optic! A $300 scope will suit VERY well for 0-300yrd shooting with a 22LR, whereas the same can't really be said for 1,000-1,500yrd shooting with a centerfire ballistic badboy. Demand for optic quality goes up markedly at long ranges. I'm sure someone will come along to refute this and make claims of shooting 1,500yrds with a $200 3-9x Nikon Prostaff, but in reality, the weakness of low quality glass really reveals itself at long range. Not an issue, as critical of issue, when you're shooting short to mid-range with a .22LR.

 

[coloradokevin]

Ok guys so my friend is trying to get into shooting more accurately he is down to either a 22 rimefire bolt action rifle vs a savage Model 10 6.5 creedmoor he reloads and claims he can get components quite a bit easier than he can 22 LR he has 1,000 bucks to spend on rifle scope and bipod he can stretch that a hair if he had to so what would you tell him?

This is like asking "should my friend by a John Deer lawn tractor or a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer?". I mean, seriously, what kind of shooting does he want to do? As it stands now, this is kind of an apples and unicorns sort of question.

For $1000 he isn't going to get the best in either category, but he can certainly get good milage out of either. My first precision rifle was a Tikka T3 Scout CTR (.308 Win) with a $300 scope and $100 bipod. That was a $1,200 setup, but it was a really good one for the money.

 

[Big7]

I dabble in .22 benchrest. It is tough. This is my unmolested 40x.View attachment 230018

SWWWWEEEETTTT!!

 

[Bart B.]

I strongly, but politely, disagree that optic quality must increase with range. Heard a lot of reasons why, none convincing.

 

[dh1633pm]

I agree with coloradokevin. Its like eating a peanut or having a sandwich. Get both.