Yeah but by knocking off that .003 you're knocking off the full metal jacket and about 2300 feet per second. I used a 16" barrel M16 and a 30 round magazine to cut a hole in a block wall big enough to walk thru. There's only 1 .22 I know of that can do that, the American 180.
Let me tell you a funny story about the American 180.
Back a few years a famous body armor company ( the one that makes Hitman's armor I believe) put on a demonstration on how good their armor was. They invited any company to try out their weapons on the armor, which was place on a dummy. Thr armor had ceramic plates in it. The only limitations were practical ones, handguns up .44 Magnum and rifles up to .30 Full Metal jacket. Now the whole idea behind body armor is to sacrifice the armor to save body parts at the worst, kind of like crumble zones on autos.
As the tests progressed the armor representative's smile got bigger and bigger. Near the end of the tests he was approached by the designer of the 180 who asked if he could try out his baby. The rep all but laughed out loud, but finally gave in because everyone was watching him and the man converse. Well, the 180 LOOKS like a scaled down Thompson except that it sports a round magazine laying flat on top the receiver which holds 177 .22 LR rounds.
As the gentleman proceeded to the firing line all the gun reps had smirks on there faces because their weapons had failed to penetrate all 27 layers of Kevlar and the ceramic plates. What did this guy with a .22 plan to do?
After he cut loose on the armor the armor rep and everyone else walked up to the armor and found a hole big enought to stick your fist through all 54 layers of Kevlar and 2 layers of ceramic plates and come out the other side.
This story is the God's truth because I was there to see it. The name of the armor company is 2nd Chance Body Armor. I bought 2 of the 180's and sold them in my gun shop.
A side note to show you how our government can fuck up.
Before the new SAW M249 became adopted by the military 12 of them were imported into the US. Because of a paperwork screw-up they weren't classified as NFA weapons. A gun dealer firend of mine on the East coast called me up one day and said he had 6 XM249's coming and asked me if I wanted any. I went to his place to check them out and bought 2 for $1200 each and 6 200 round linked-belt magazine for $100 each. As far as I know these 12 were the only NFA weapons that were mis-classified.
I eventually sold each one for $6400 with 3 mags. They could also use M16 mags or standard linked belts.
