What's .22lr availability like in your locale?

I stopped by Gander Mountain yesterday and the only option was CCI Standard Velocity. It’s actually a low velocity solid lead bullet. The price was ok-ish (3.99 per 50) but that was all they had. I checked online today and found some better ammo for about the same price (when shipping is included) but it took some looking. Lots of ammo available but the prices seem high especially when you figure in shipping. Now that Trump is in office I would think we would be drowning in .22LR but availability still seems a little tight. Are people still hoarding it?

Cabelas, Hazelwood MO, had plenty of 22 yesterday. Eley match, Norma, CCI etc. I bought a brick of Aquila Subsonic at about 7 cent a round.

Local access is pretty decent. (Northern Delaware)
Bought a couple bricks last month for what amounts to 4 cents per round. That was notably low, and the average cost locally is closer to 8 cents a round. Premium choices like CCI Stinger and Mini-Mag rounds are harder to come by, and are quite a bit more costly. Interestingly, .22 Short and CB / BB caps are readily available. Dicks Sporting Goods was selling 40grain sub-sonic rounds for 11 cents a shot, and I grabbed a bunch.

I spoke with a Remington Sales Rep a while back, and he explained the cause of the “shortage.” There are three factors - One, .22lr is by far the number one most-popular round in the world, so demand is high - always. Two, whilst the production lines that make .22lr are running at max capacity, little or no additional capacity is being added, because the margin on .22lr is thin. It’s relatively costly to make, involving specialized machines to make the thin-rimmed cases and spin the primer into place, and it sells very low. The Sales Rep said that if he pushed for additional rimfile capacity, his bosses would like as not fire him; There’s more money to be made in making centerfire rounds. Third factos impinges on teh other two -A spate of panic buying a few years ago created an artificial scarcity, which fueld further the fear buying, which made stocks more scarce… Regenerative feedback loop.

Oh, one more factor - ammunition speculation. When stocks went thin, and prices shot up, some folks started specualting in rimfire ammunition as a commodity, including many gun shops. This ALSO fueled the rampant panic, and helpd create more scarcity and price hikes.

Breaking that loop is hard, though it appears to be easing. That said, I know one correspondant online whom is sitting on in excess of 110K rounds of .22lr. That is a most of a life supply for a family. So long as the demand is very close to production, and people are inclined to freak, it’s going to be a while… Over all, prices aren’t likely to ever go back down to the 3-4 cent average they once were.

(Disclaimer: I hold about 7000 rounds of .22Lr - But that’s about two years supply for my daughter and I (we shoot more than the average soul). I buy it whenever the price is cheap - like below 7 cents).

I checked Bass Pro online and they had good prices and availability but in-store only not available online. I’m guessing Cabelas may be the same. No stores anywhere around here.

Kind of “hit and miss”, no pun intended.

But what I’m hear to talk about is the extreme poor quality of Remington ammo. I’m experiencing a failure rate of near 10%-12%!

I put thousands of rounds of Federal ammo through my gun with scarcely a miss-fire. After only being able to get ahold of this Remington crap, I eject more unfired rounds than I can stand! Had a coyote in my sight, and 5 rounds failed in a row! Bastard got away…

Recently switched back to the little Federal I have, no more miss-fires.

I’ve had a similar experience with Remington, plus it seems “dirtier.”

I don’t get anywhere near that failure rate with Remington ammo, though I will agree that their basic bulk box stuff is dirty as hell. Worse than Aguila, which is also pretty dirty, IME. I don’t get more than one failure in a thousand, and consider that to be rather high. Of course, firearm selection might have something to do with that, too. Heavy, falls the hammer… :stuck_out_tongue:

Big Green has fallen on hard times, and is nowhere near the giant they used to be. Of course, they’re not as screwed as Colt is, but they’re headed down the same road.
Federal is good stuff. CCI is, as far as I’m concerned, the Gold Standard.

BTW: There are specialized apps for searching out ammunition sales. AmmoSeek is one I’ve used - there are probably others.

No dramas whatsoever obtaining it in Queensland if you need it - Winchester have a factory in Melbourne and make literal tonnes of the stuff so it’s readily available from pretty much every gun shop in the country.

CCI Stinger .22 ammo can be a bit hard to obtain though; it seems to be feast or famine with regards to availability.

Thanks, that took me to a company I’ve dealt with previously and was happy with but had forgotten about. Bought 1000 rounds for about .08 per, including shipping. :slight_smile:

De nada. :slight_smile:

Western PA/Eastern Ohio ---- not too bad. You don’t always have much to pick from and the price is still what I consider high (you can get 9mm cheapies for less) but you can pretty much walk in and buy.

Is still unavailable at Walmart, but our Dick’s has 500 round boxes, 333 round boxes and 100rd boxes available. The ammo is by Remington or Winchester.(Orlando, Fl)