Rifle Shooting

Up to what range are my .22 bullets still effective?

On the ammo box it says .22 LR subsonic are dangerous up to 1½ miles - can one of these bullets kill a long distance away?

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New CCI rimfire rounds

Q: I see that CCI now produces  a segmented .22 rimfire round that is meant to be safe because it splits into three pieces. Does it work and how good is it?

Bruce Potts comments.

A: True, one of the problems with all the rimfire .22-calibre loads is that they are made from lead and thus have  a tendency to ricochet. Hollow points help the lead to expand and deliver greater energy to the game, but CCI  has a new approach. Each round has  an overall length of 0.9790in and  the CCI has its own copper-clad or  washed finish and dry lube.

The CCI weighs 40-gr and has only 0.8 grains of silver flake powder in the case. Compared with a conventional Eley Subsonic round that has a larger hollow point, the CCI’s hollow point  is smaller, but the secret behind the  CCI is that whereas the Eley bullet is designed to mushroom on impact,  the CCI segmenting ammunition  is, as you say, designed to break into three parts.

I have tested these rounds many times and here are my results. The control Eley Subsonic bullet when shot in the ballistic medium perfectly mushroomed and weighed 40.2-gr, so no loss in weight and it penetrated 3.5in. The CCI segmenting ammunition performed very well and did indeed separate into three parts that penetrated radially out into the medium up to 4in.

Each segment weighed 14.6-gr,  11.6-gr and 13-gr for a total of 39.2-gr,  so came very close to the original  bullet weight.

Those are honest results and if  the CCI shoots accurately in your  rifle then yes, buy some.