New glass bedded stock, free floated barrel except for the first 4/10", 55 gr Nosler ballistic tip, 24.5 gr H335. Seated 0.030 off lands. Shoots 5.5" groups at 100 yd, mostly vertical stringing. Original barrel, carefully cleaned.

Does the 722 usually like forend pressure?

Have tried 2 scopes, 24.0 gr H335 and removing more wood from barrel channel down to the 4/10" remaining now.

What should I try next?

The 788 that I foolishly traded off did it's very best with 40 grain V-Max.
Are you the original owner / know the history of the rifle?

No, I bought it in ~1970. Restocked it in birdseye maple when I was 18 years old. It has never shot better than 1.5" groups for me, but I have never tried to work up a load till now. I just now have the tools to measure powder accurately and set seating depth etc. (used to use Lee dippers etc!!).

The barrel looks to be in real good shape.

It certainly sounds like you may have some bedding / forend perssure issues with the vertical stringing.
I would check the crown very closely, just to make sure it is good. Check your action screws and all scope mounting to make sure everything is tight.
You can place thicknesses of business cards between the barrel and the forend until you get good solid pressure when you tighten up the stock screws. This should tell you something without permanently changing anything.
Another trick is to tighten the front screw first then lay a finger along and touching the stock and action near the tang and tighten the rear screw. If it is bedded properly you should feel almost no movement. If you feel a bunch then you are stressing the action when you tighten the screws.

You might also try a faster burning powder like 322 or Benchmark, I have seen barrels completely defy conventional wisdom by liking something either way faster or slower than they really should.
please let me know if you need any more help with this one. I have one too. (someday I will put a scope on it and shoot it)(I got it from my cousin and I know it shoots well.)
Joe
jcunclejoe@aol.com

You might want to try another 55gr. bullet. the 14 twist barrel in your 722 may not stabilize the Nosler at 222 Mag velocities. However the vertical stringing does hint to bedding problems.

You maybe bending your receiver.
Find a factory stock and try it out.

I took another closer look at the stock and the magazine box is protruding below the stock a little bit and the floor plate pushes it up into the receiver when the middle screw is tightened. I will shorten the mag box and try again.

I have the factory stock and it shot OK (1.5" groups)with 60 gr Hornadys, so I'll stick with the 55 gr Noslers for now. I have some 50 Hornady SX I can try later. Thanks for all the replies!! I let you know how it goes.

I would recommend a try with a shorter bullet with a flat base such as the 55 Sierra.
Then seat it to touch the lands with 4895 or 3031 with a Remington 7 1/2 primer. If that is too long for your magazine shoot it as a single shot. Not fancy but it works.
Considering your history of mediocre accuracy what brand of loading dies are you using? Are you neck sizing or FL sizing. I have found that FL sizing that sets the shoulder back no more than .002 gives more consistent accuracy.

Test your loaded rounds for run out by slowly rolling across a very smooth flat surface. If you see any wobble at the tip of the bullet you are generally looking at .003 run out or more.
Compare the accuracy of loads with no run out vs those with run out.

Another question. Do you have a really good rest and bench to shoot from?.

I am using Lee Loader loading tools for this caliber. Neck sizing only of course. Win WSR primers, 24.5 gr H335/ Nosler BT 55 gr still. I do see runout in 1 of 4 loaded rounds that I have left after shooting this evening.

I am shooting off my 2X6 deck rail corner with a sandbag resting on one railing and a rabbit ear bag on the other railing. Burris FF2 3X9, shooting at a 1" white square surrounded by 3" black square. It looks real steady when it goes off. Sight alignment is pretty good with 4 little white squares in each corner around the reticle.

I put the original stock back on and checked the barrel channel. It will pass a dollar bill but is a little snug just behind the fore end. It shot a 9" high X 3" wide group at 100 yards.

I have some 50 grain Hornady SX spire points that I can try.

What brand/type of dies do you recommend? I have a Dillon 550B but don't have dies for the 222Mag yet. Oh yeah, I have a Pacific 007 single press also.

quote:

What brand/type of dies do you recommend?

I normally buy used but high quality dies. Thus I maybe looking a while before I find what I want.

I prefer in this order
Forster
Redding and RCBS Tie for second.

In the end I usually wind up with RCBS because they are more commonly available.

When I see vertical stringing, I immediately go to the rifle having a bedding problem.
I think that's where you'll find the cause of your problem.
Also, all of my rifles shoot best with bullets seated .010 off the lands, as opposed to .030, but that's not the source of your stringing.

Don

I loaded some 50 gr Hornady SX spire points with 25.0 and 25.5 gr H335. I also removed a little more wood in the barrel channel so that it cleared 2 dollar bills. Group sizes dropped from 9" vertical X 3" horizontal to 3-4" vertical X <1" horizontal.

I then put business cards under the barrel to give a little fore end pressure and vertical stringing was gone, but 2.7" group w/25.5 gr H335. I am using the original factory stock.

Next I think I'll try 25.0 and 26.0 gr H335, then maybe IMR4198 keeping all other variables constant to see if group sizes will tighten up.

Any other suggestions are welcome. Thanks for the help thus far!!

IMR 4198 should do well also. Is your scope a known good scope? I have a late 60s M700 in the std .222. I once owned a 722 in the same caliber.
They both shot tiny groups with Federal factory ammo before I started loading my ammo. They shot even better once I got in more shooting time with the lower cost handloads. I thought that $2.25 a box .222 ammo was going to kill me.

IMR 4198 works best in my 223, which is close to the 222 Mag, after trying all the other usual suspects.
One thing I'm coming to appreciate is the good accuracy I get with the Reloader series of powder. RL-7 is THE powder in my 222 Rem, much better that 4198 which is excellent in the 222 normally. You might want to try it along with RL-10 too.
On a side note, RL-15 transformed my 284 Winchester from a one inch group at 100 yards into a 1/2" group rifle.

The load looks a little light from my weak memory... perhaps uping the powder charge, or a change of seating depth could aid in accuracy. IMR 4198 was too fast for the larger capacity MAG case, and Win 748 and H335 were the top performers back when this was my Groundhog getter of choice.

I tried a starting load of 21.5 gr of IMR4198 and the results were the same....1 flyer 1st shot out of the barrel then a group of 4 -- 3.3" high X 0.2" wide. If I can get the vertical stringing taken care of, the horizontal dimension of the groups is pretty good!

Next step, get a set of dies and (hopefully) get rid of the runout in the seated bullets.

My friend said he has really good luck with the Lee collet dies...but they are not standard for the 222 Mag.

How was the reciever bedded? Might be stress on it. The front screw should be at 40 inch pounds, the rear at 25 inch pounds and the center screw just snug enough to hold it. It must be bedded even so the reciever doesn't bend when you tighten the screws.
Make sure there is no bedding compound touching in front, the bottom or on the sides of the recoil lug. You only want it in the rear. Chisel a few thousandths out of those other spots. Make sure the screw holes are not bedded so the screws touch bedding compound, there should be a little space around them.

Lately I have been using the factory stock. Earlier I was using a glass bedded stock that has bedding compound touching the front, sides and bottom and is snug around the screws.

I have the front screw tighter than the rear and the middle with not much torque, but have not measured the torque...I don't think I have a torque wrench that goes that low.

Will the bedding compound touching all those areas cause vertical stringing?

MWD
All that vertical must be coming from the stock/bedding combination. All I can say at this point is make sure you are not bending the receiver. Also make sure you are not holding the rifle down with your cheek. Some shooters will lean on the stock with their face and shoot it one handed. This allows the fore end to jump and bounce around.
If you suspect that the magazine is binding remove the mag box and assemble the rifle and shoot it as a single shot for grins.

Success!!! Vertical stringing is gone. I took bfrshooter's advise and removed bedding compound from the front, side and bottom of the lug (birdseye maple stock.) Drilled out the stock screw holes 1/64" over and opened up the stock to let the mag box slide in easy and shortened the mag box so the floor plate did not push it up into the receiver. The barrel is free floated but is tighter now that the action is not in a bind. The barrel channel will pass a 0.004" sheet of paper easily but 2 sheets are a little tight. I may need to open up the barrel channel a bit more.

Loaded up 22.0 gr IMR4198 and Horn 50 gr SX and it shot a 5 shot group of 0.190" vertical and 1.28 horizontal. I think the horizontal is my fault OR runout due to loading with the Lee hand loader tools. I plan to order some dies this this weekend.

The Lee collet dies sound interesting but 222 Mag is a special order.

Thanks for all the help. I am looking forward to working up a good load for this rifle. I think it is going to be capable of shooting some real good groups if I can improve my technique a little.

quote:

Originally posted by mwd:
Success!!! Vertical stringing is gone. I took bfrshooter's advise and removed bedding compound from the front, side and bottom of the lug (birdseye maple stock.) Drilled out the stock screw holes 1/64" over and opened up the stock to let the mag box slide in easy and shortened the mag box so the floor plate did not push it up into the receiver. The barrel is free floated but is tighter now that the action is not in a bind. The barrel channel will pass a 0.004" sheet of paper easily but 2 sheets are a little tight. I may need to open up the barrel channel a bit more.

Loaded up 22.0 gr IMR4198 and Horn 50 gr SX and it shot a 5 shot group of 0.190" vertical and 1.28 horizontal. I think the horizontal is my fault OR runout due to loading with the Lee hand loader tools. I plan to order some dies this this weekend.

The Lee collet dies sound interesting but 222 Mag is a special order.

Thanks for all the help. I am looking forward to working up a good load for this rifle. I think it is going to be capable of shooting some real good groups if I can improve my technique a little.

I suspect you could use .223 collet dies as is. Worst case would require you drop a washer over the case before sizing it. The washer would push against the bottom of the collet.
That said there are a number of dies you could try that are made for the .223 BUT if you do not allow for the differences in headspace using .223 dies will cause you a lot of grief.

The .222 Mag dies are readily available on ebay and often sell for peanuts since the round is about dead commercially. In standard die brands I would go for RCBS since they are very good and are the most common. Redding and Forster are very good also but much less likely to turn up used.
If you like the hand tools Wilson makes sizers and seaters that are used with an arbor press.
They make wonderfully accurate ammo. Kinda pricey but loved by benchrest shooters.

Update: Found the barrel ringed about 1" from the muzzle...probably been that way since I bought it in ~1971. Cut the barrel and recrowned. Shot a 5 shot 0.667 inch group today with 50 gr Hornady SX and 22.5 gr of 4198. Wow, there have been a lot of things wrong with this gun, but it looks like it can still shoot. I plan to continue working up loads for it. I have a bunch of 60 gr Hornady bullets that I will try next to see if 1 in 14" twist is OK for the longer bullets.

quote:

Originally posted by mwd:
Update: Found the barrel ringed about 1" from the muzzle...probably been that way since I bought it in ~1971. Cut the barrel and recrowned. Shot a 5 shot 0.667 inch group today with 50 gr Hornady SX and 22.5 gr of 4198. Wow, there have been a lot of things wrong with this gun, but it looks like it can still shoot. I plan to continue working up loads for it. I have a bunch of 60 gr Hornady bullets that I will try next to see if 1 in 14" twist is OK for the longer bullets.