Contender Silhouette toy, breaking it in and finding the ammo it likes

[rickt300]

Burned around 250 rounds up today at my 100 yard range. Rifle is a Contender Carbine with a laminated Revolution stock set to add some weight. Barrel is a new TC 23" 22 LR says "Match" on the barrel. Mounted a 10x42 SWFA on it and quickly got it sighted in at 100 yards. Today was windy and the wind kept switching from my right to almost head on still a bit from the right. Ammo, well I had a bunch of different stuff to play with and chose Aquilla pistol Match, Federal Automatch, Federal standard velocity, Federal Gold Medal Match, Winchester Expert HP, some Winchester HV HP, Remington Target. I shot 15 shot groups at a 50 foot three position smallbore rifle target (ten 1 1/2" black dots), did not adjust for wind just fired away and refined my zero. Now some of this ammo is over ten years old and what I was looking for is vertical spread and what the wind was doing. Of the bunch the Federal Standard velocity and the Remington Target were the worst. The "Match" labeled ammo was OK not special. Best was the Winchester Expert HP stuff! Even the Winchester HV HP stuff outshot the Match ammo. After figuring the wind out I was waiting for the breeze to pick up just so I could test my guess work and it became easy with the Winchester "Expert" HP's to keep them in the black on the fifty foot target at 100 yards which is 1 1/2 inches across. Plenty good enough to knock the pigs over at a match. What I figure is wrong with the match ammo is the lube has dried and flaked off so I will soon "grease" them with Crisco and see if it helps.

 

[dhagerty40]

I can tell you what my Contender 22LR match barrels like.
one Barrel likes Lapua Center-X. This barrel will consistently shoot 1/2-3/4" Groups at 100 Yards.
The other Barrel likes SK Rifle Match. not as accurate as the other barrel though.
Both of them liked Eley Tenex, But I am too cheap to use that stuff.

Just for Info, The standard chamber 22LR Contender Barrels seem to like the cheapest ammo you can buy.

 

[JayHHI6818]

I started shooting 22 rimfire matches at my club last year with a Contender 14 inch Match chamber pistol barrel. I shot SK Standard Plus and my highest score was a 247. 250 is a perfect score. This spring I bought a used stainless 21 inch match chamber barrel and shot a couple matches with it. Didn’t shoot very well. Last year I shot up all of my SK ammo and new stuff DOESN’T shoot as well as the old stuff. I bought some SK Pistol Match special, SK Rifle Match, Center X and Have only shot it in the pistol and scores have gone up. All you can do is keep testing ammo. Might check and make sure your barrel locks up tight when closed. No wiggle in it.

 

[rickt300]

I think overall the ammo tested has to be considered Plinker to less than mid grade. I really don't want to pay more than ten bucks a box for 22 rimfire either.

 

[JayHHI6818]

Read Topstraps match results and most shoots are shooting SK Biathlon and it’s under the $8 limit for the match. I’m going to try it if I can find any.

Results October Topstraps Longrange (midrange) Rimfire Challenge

I know, match report is late again. Been a busy week after the shoot trying to get a lot of small excavating jobs done for folks that see Winter coming. It was absolutely beautiful for the four days of my last shoot this year. Leaves were very vivid and colorful, slight breezes had the leaves...

forum.accurateshooter.com

 

[dhagerty40]

saw something weird, I can find most Lapua ammo, but not SK even though they are both made by the same company.

also, Silhouette you do not need extreme accuracy ammo as you do with other disciplines but it helps