.22 WMR AR

Hi all,

Out of curiosity, what's the US market like for .22wmr AR15's like?

Guncraft here in the UK make very high quality AR's, mainly straight pull, due to the legal restrictions, but in all flavours from retro M16A1 look alikes to AR10 and everything in between.

Rob, the owner has started making some very nice semi automatic .22wmr builds, using his own bolt design (basically a standard AR15 bolt body "type", with a fixed Rimfire bolt face.

The main advantage over .22lr is obviously hitting power for small game,but also accurate range work out to 200 yards.

They look very nice, is there any market in the US for this type of build?

The only other option is the Ray Van kits.

I think it would be difficult to sell in 22 wmr caliber because there are many conversions available in 22 rim fire. There are dedicated uppers just
for target shooters and easy kits to install just for semi or full auto shooting. But the main reason I would think is the cost of the cartridges

I would interested in one for sure on this side of the pound .

Ammunition cost is a factor to consider.

While the 22 WMF is a better cartridge the cost as compared to 22 long rife cartridges is quite a difference and you do not have the variation in types of cartridges.

Years ago there were chamber inserts for the 223/5,56mm to shoot 22 WMR and 22 long fire but so far, a semi auto in 22 WMR is not available as a drop-in assembly.

photo show the 22 rim fire and 223 adopter which has its own firing pin, you have to poke out the empty case and firing pin each timeAttachment 111309 the other adopters are for 32 ACP/32 S&W in 303 and 30-06

Thanks for the feedback guys. I did want a A4 type build, but it appears the next batch will be M4 builds, I wanted a longer barrel ideally, but I can certainly live with M4.

Of course the beauty of the AR, is the ease of swapping barrels (especially Rimfire builds) , I could just get a longer heavy barrel at some point in the future.

The rest is a movable feast of infante customisation!

Here's a pic of the bolt design, as you can see it's a piece of high quality engineering. before you ask, I pondered about the gas key too, its there to add a little more mass apparently.

The 7,62x25mm and 9mm conversions to the AR-15 also use a blow-back design. It would appear that the 22 WMR bolts would use a recoil spring in the butt stock too.

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Originally Posted by RCS

The 7,62x25mm and 9mm conversions to the AR-15 also use a blow-back design. It would appear that the 22 WMR bolts would use a recoil spring in the butt stock too.

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Absolutely, it conforms to the "keep it simple stupid" system, like my Tippmenn Arms .22 M4 and uses a reciprocating solid bolt and buffer, giving plenty of room to eject the spent brass.

These self contained .22lr bolt groups (Ciener type) are overly complicated and prone to jamming as a result.

Many years ago my friend found a CAR-15 stock in the savalge from Rock Island Arsena. I was able to get it and spent alot of time restoring it to working condition. I then attached it to a Colt AR-15 SP1 semi auto lower, to test fire with 5,56mm (it worked)

I realized that I had never fired it with the stock closed. I had an old Cobra 22 rim fire kit and put it into my SP1. Using CCI standard velocity at 20 feet from a makeshift rest and with iron sights, I got some nice groups with that 1 in 12 twist barrel and stock closed.Attachment 111328Attachment 111329Attachment 111330

Excellent stuff. How rare are the stocks, I don't think I have ever seen one.

These stocks are quite rare to find, these were covered under US Patent by Robert Roy who worked for Colt in 1964 and these CAR-15/XM607stocks saw limited use being replaced by the XM177E2. Around 2013 a small production run of some repro XM607 stocks were produced in Texas, these were a close copy but still not quite the same. The lever inside the buttstock locks or unlocks stock.

photos show original (left) and repro and buttstock leverAttachment 111351Attachment 111352Attachment 111353

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RCS

These stocks are quite rare to find, these were covered under US Patent by Robert Roy who worked for Colt in 1964 and these CAR-15/XM607stocks saw limited use being replaced by the XM177E2. Around 2013 a small production run of some repro XM607 stocks were produced in Texas, these were a close copy but still not quite the same. The lever inside the buttstock locks or unlocks stock.

photos show original (left) and repro and buttstock leverAttachment 111351Attachment 111352Attachment 111353

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Very interesting, I've never seen one before, AR lesson of the day!