Do the Math [.22 LR conversion kits for the AR-15]

Shooting Illustrated ^ | July 30, 2010 | Chance Ballew / Photos by Les Jones

[2ndDivisionVet]

Ammo prices being what they are these days, I find myself looking into .22 LR conversion kits for guns I like to shoot regularly. Currently, my preferred load for AR-15s is running just over $0.40 per round, while .22 LR is running about $0.03 per round. So I was obviously interested in Brownells’ AR-15 .22 LR Conversion Kit. I reasoned that, after one 550-round milk carton of .22 LR, the $199 kit would pay for itself. The other option would be a dedicated .22 LR upper, which costs more and I’d have to purchase additional optics and other accessories to make it comparable to my other AR-15s. The kit seemed like a no-brainer, presuming it worked.

The kit now ships from Brownells with three, 26-round magazines. It’s a drop-in unit that replaces the entire bolt-carrier assembly. Installation is easy and no gunsmithing or fitting is required. Pop out your bolt-carrier assembly and drop the kit in. It operates via direct blowback and has an insert that looks like a 5.56 NATO shell. It also came with a rubber sleeve that holds the unit. You should hang onto this for safe storage.

The ammo recommended is high-velocity, round-nosed ammo. Brownells recommends you lubricate the kit prior to shooting and says the kit requires a break-in period. So, I lubed it up with some Rem-Oil and loaded up a few magazines with Federal ammo and dropped the unit into my daughter’s pretty AR-15 to see how it would do. Her AR is a J&T Distributing Lightweight Upper with a chrome-lined, 1:9-inch-twist barrel.

Magazines fit snugly—there were no issues with wobble. And the fact the mags allow you to see your ammunition is a plus. When installed, the charging handle doesn’t move as far rearward as an AR shooter is accustomed. That took some getting used to. At 25 to 50 yards, I was hitting steel plates and clay pigeons with ease. On paper, I found it was slightly less accurate than firing 5.56 NATO through the same gun. An AR-15 barrel isn’t designed with a twist rate for .22 LR, so that was expected. I was getting about 1.5-inch groups at 25 yards standing. I consider that sufficient accuracy for the kit’s intended purpose. There was virtually no felt recoil, which was also unsurprising.

The magazine holds the bolt open on the last shot. Ejecting the magazine releases the bolt. While it’s a nice visual check to verify you’ve expended a magazine, it doesn’t lend itself to practicing speed reloads.

In nine magazines, I had zero failures to fire and zero failures to feed with the 550-round milk carton of Federal .22 LR. Though round-nosed ammo is recommended, I had no issues with the hollow-point Federal rounds. It doesn’t seem to me that the kit required a break-in period. Firing a .22 through the AR-15 sounded very quiet, and I could have easily shot this configuration all day. I see myself doing that, regularly.

If you want to inexpensively practice sight alignment, trigger squeeze and some drills with your AR-15 rifle, this is a fine product. But, bear in mind, there are a few things with which it doesn’t help, practicing magazine reloads being the most important. The light recoil doesn’t lend itself to perfect practice for follow-up shots either, but shooting ammo less than 1/10 the cost, I see getting a lot of use out of this kit.

[cornfedcowboy]

Crossbows are fantastic. Accurate and quiet.

[NavyCanDo]

You could relate well with this guy

The I Like Guns music video....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TC2xTCb_GU&feature=player_embedded

[Dayman]

My wife will only shoot a .22LR. I love to build AR-15’s so I built her an SP1 style rifle with a light barrel then put a Ciner conversion bolt in there. She loves it.

FTF/FTE’s are very rare with her rifle and usually occur due to a lack of lubrication. Every 50 shots or so I give it a blast of Remoil and it keeps humming along.

[gundog]

Great minds...

[gundog]

Remington is making a .22LR CB round that’s as quiet as a powerful air rifle out of a rifle length barrel. And they feed manually from a 10-22 magazine, which CB longs will not do.

[gundog]

OK...only question the article didn’t answer for me was whether this was blowback or gas operation. I’d think there was potential for serious crap building up in the gas tube either way.

[Eagle Eye]

Boating accident? Something like that.

One should never try to transport several firearms, ammunition, and reloading equipment in a jon boat. Dammit. I feel so foolish in retrospect.

Neptune and his minions sure are lucky.

[archy]

OK...only question the article didn’t answer for me was whether this was blowback or gas operation. I’d think there was potential for serious crap building up in the gas tube either way.

They're blowback. Note that some of the .22 pistol versions of the AR, such as S&W's MP15.22, work just fine without a buffer tube or carrier rweturn spring. the same is true of most of their full-length brothers, excepting the USAF M262 training conversion, which indeedc has provision for the miniscule amount of gas from the .22 round to be vented through the barrel's gas port into the front of the conversion.

[archy]

I only tried the .22 unit once and was pleasantly surprised how well it worked. Since the H-Bar at the time had a 1-7 twist which is way faster than the 1-16 the .22LR normally uses, the accuracy really did surprise me.

The .22 conversion units work very well in the Vietnam-era M16A1 and Colt commercial SP-1 AR-15s with a 1:12 twist barrel. I put a couple of dozen of our local Civil Air Patrol cadets through a qualification program with them, and the top four were then treated to a session at the Small Arms Firing Course at the national matches at Camp Perry, Ohio, One's gone on to become a USAF sniper and another's qualified expert while at the USAF Academy at Colorado Springs.

Not bad for a bunch of zoomies....

[archy]

Boating accident? Something like that.

One should never try to transport several firearms, ammunition, and reloading equipment in a jon boat. Dammit. I feel so foolish in retrospect.

See! If you'd only slit the end of a 2-liter plastic pop bottle with a hacksaw, then hoseclamped the bottle on tightly onto an AR15s flash suppressor, it would have kept your rifle afloat. and happily, the high sight line of an M16/AR15 keeps the sights more-or-less clear, depending on the bottle configuration and brand of liquid used.

Of course with the .22 kit, it'd also function as a sound suppressor, but then there'd be a hole in the end of the bottle and it wouldn't serve as a float so well....

[Lurker]

That trick actually works. And if you use Standard Velocity .22 lr just about all you can hear is the ‘clack’ of the action in a 10-22.

[Sir_Ed]

However you’d have just manufactured an illegal suppressor and could theoretically be sent to prison for 20 years!

Ed

[Lurker]

I never said I did it, just that I know it works.

[Eagle Eye]

Yes, those lessons are a day late and a dollar short or closing the barn after the horses are out.

That’s the way the ball bounces, the cookie crumbles, and the mercedes benz.

So now I’m left with nothing but memories. Oh well.

[yarddog]

It seems that over stabilizing a bullet works better than under stabilizing them.

My first job was managing Mitchel Hall at Lackland. There wasn’t even a landing strip there. Daddy worked at Eglin for 35 years about as different as two bases can get. He would sometimes fish .45 auto mags out of the trash. I never could tell there was anything wrong with them but several were for a 6 shot .45 auto. Never did know what that was.

[Sir_Ed]

Oh, I know that!

I was commenting on the absurdity of CIII laws.

See ya’,

Ed

[joelt]

Thanks for the tip. I’m not a gun owner; but the way things are headed, probably going to need one. Seems it would be a good own to get started on and one that the wife could be comfortable using.

[archy]

My first job was managing Mitchel Hall at Lackland. There wasn’t even a landing strip there. Daddy worked at Eglin for 35 years about as different as two bases can get. He would sometimes fish .45 auto mags out of the trash. I never could tell there was anything wrong with them but several were for a 6 shot .45 auto. Never did know what that was.

Now you know: United States Pistol, General Officers’, Caliber .45, M15