Ever see a Rimfire KB before? I hadn’t. Until today. Customer brought in a Walther with a “Problem”.
The KB cracked the P22's frame and subframe is damaged.
This isn’t just from one bad round. The customer had a second piece of brass that looked exactly like the first.
When we have a KB, there are are two Culprits we look at… The Gun or The Ammo. Most of the time, the Ammo is the cause. Remington Golden Bullet Bulk Pack. I don’t have a lot number or anything. The Customer Cleaned and Lubed the gun, fired several magazines full with no problem and then suddenly had a jam… then another jam and the slide wouldn’t go forward with the magazine in. Then he noticed the frame and the brass. Looking at the brass, the way the casing was blown out like that… I think we have some cases that were double primed. If it was fired out of battery, the brass would be blown out differently and distinctively, indicating it… in this case, the primer material in the rim blew out the rim. A normal amount of primer wouldn’t do this, and there isn’t enough case volume for a double charge… but the pressure spike from too much primer – would do exactly this.
Luckily no one was hurt, nothing else was damaged. We’ll see what Walther and Remington does.
P22 KBs are unfortunately not that uncommon. Someone wrote the “P22 Bible” that corrects many of the problems and I myself used it on no less than 10 pistols and those customers haven’t had any problems. Supposedly the newest generation corrected these issues.
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Hey, Matt – - what are the issues Walther’s having w/ the P-22?
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There were a number of small issues that grew into one-two bigger ones. Do a google search for “P22 Bible” as it explains into detail the shortcomings and the fixes. I believe that I forwarded Outbreak a copy that I had. It is a pretty good read nonetheless.
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We the public should not have to re-engineer a gun. Just sayin.
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Agreed, no arguement from me.
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Another reason I will pass on polimers
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Walther’s new .22 LR pistols are becoming infamous for fragility and problems.
They went a step too far on saving weight and material costs.
Buy a Ruger.
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I had something very similar with a marlin 795 shooting Remmy Thunderbolts. Five blown rims out of a hundred. Then it took out my trigger guard. This was about 15 years ago. I havent trusted remmy rimfire ammo since. YMMV
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I almost never shoot it.
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The sad part is that was the only box that I had ever purchased. It was only $35 damage to the gun, but it could have easily injured me. Fortunately my support hand was no where near the mag well.
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A similar thing happened to me, same type of ammo, but in my little semi auto plinking rifle. I’d not previously run across this before, thanks for posting.
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Interested in hearing the final diagnosis. About a month ago, I had a .22 blow out the back of the case almost identical to the picture. The gun was fine … an old S&W revolver. Come to think of it … it was Remington ammo. I wish we had saved the case and made note of the ammo lot number.
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Actually, ruptured case heads are a fact of life with .22 rimfire ammo.
The case head has to be thin in order for the round to reliably fire.
What is damning here is that the first generation Walther P22s aren’t surviving this.
This month’s American Rifleman has an article on the Iver Johnson Sealed 8 revolver … one that had its cylinder designed specifically to prevent gas and case shrapnel injury to shooters during a .22lr blowout.
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