My daughter and I went to the range on Saturday. She has a 597 I bought a couple of years ago new.

Her .22  had several failures to feed, failure to eject, double feeds, no feeds, miss feeds, one dud. I bought some Remington ammunition while I was at the range and I still had problems. Geeez…I've never seen a gun be this bad. I told the guy at the range about it and he said. I'm so sorry you bought that rifle. He said Remington is on their third magazine design and there still having problems and that he gets them brought back to him all the time for warranty work. I had to send her rifle in for warranty work immediately after buying it. At that time the guy had a whole bunch going back with it. He told me any other .22 would have been better than that one even the other .22 rifles Remington sells.

So….I'm seriously considering getting rid of the rifle for either a Ruger 10-22 (this thing has a huge after market/following) or I'm considering getting her a shotgun like a .410 or a 20ga.

What would you do?

What's the 597 worth?

How old is your daughter?  Any shotgun will kick a lot more then a .22, so that might be a concern. For her 10th birthday gun, I got my daughter a Henry,  She is a lefty, so the lever gave her more control over ejection.  No more hot brass in the arm!

Quoted: How old is your daughter?  Any shotgun will kick a lot more then a .22, so that might be a concern. For her 10th birthday gun, I got my daughter a Henry,  She is a lefty, so the lever gave her more control over ejection.  No more hot brass in the arm!

She's 12 about 5'-2" tall. She's shot most of my firearms.

We have jerry-rigged some high caps to the rifle and they worked great.

I think as soon as someone makes a correct mag for this rifle it will be great. The upper receiver is much better than a 10/22 it is the trigger assembly and mag that need some work.

Quoted: What would you do?

A. Quite listening to know-it-alls at the range.
B.  Do not buy Remington bulk pack ammo. Some people have no problems with it but many do. Strangely enough, it does seem like the Remington firearms seem to have the most problems with Remington Ammo.
C. Call Remington and have them replace your current mags for the Gen 3's. Contrary to what the guy at the range told you, the gen 3 mags work very well. (in the link below, there is information on how to fix the older ones if you don't want to mess with Remington.)

Go to the link below and read some of the tacked threads re:597. Depending on exactly how old yours is, you may want to check and make sure you have the updated ejector? Also read about how to make sure the guide rods are tightened correctly (you don't want them too tight). The last two things you may want to try is a VQ exact edge extractor (if the above steps doesn't take care of the stove pipe problem) and the VQ or Jarvis hammer if you really want to sweeten up the trigger pull.

Remington F'ed up and released this model before they had all of the bugs worked out. (Maybe they took a page out of Microsoft's play book? ) and that's a shame because it gave it a bad rep even though it really is a very good design (much better then the 10/22 IMO).

Good luck

A friend of mine had a 597.  He bought it because it came with a "heavy" barrel and was something different than my 10/22.  He put a cheap, but decent scope on it.  Neither one of us could get the damn thing to group tighter than my stock (at the time) 10/22.  As I recall, his didn't like Rem. bulk ammo either.  This was about 6 years ago, so they may have made some changes, but it's hard to build a better gun than the 10/22.  Unless you build a better 10/22.

Quoted: Quoted: What would you do? A. Quite listening to know-it-alls at the range. <---the guy at the range is the manager and remington authoized service dealer B.  Do not buy Remington bulk pack ammo. Some people have no problems with it but many do. Strangely enough, it does seem like the Remington firearms seem to have the most problems with Remington Ammo. <----funny you should say that because the guy told me to run Federal and that should help a lot. C. Call Remington and have them replace your current mags for the Gen 3's. Contrary to what the guy at the range told you, the gen 3 mags work very well. (in the link below, there is information on how to fix the older ones if you don't want to mess with Remington.) Go to the link below and read some of the tacked threads re:597. <----where is the link? Depending on exactly how old yours is, you may want to check and make sure you have the updated ejector? Also read about how to make sure the guide rods are tightened correctly (you don't want them too tight). The last two things you may want to try is a VQ exact edge extractor (if the above steps doesn't take care of the stove pipe problem) and the VQ or Jarvis hammer if you really want to sweeten up the trigger pull. Remington F'ed up and released this model before they had all of the bugs worked out. (Maybe they took a page out of Microsoft's play book? ) and that's a shame because it gave it a bad rep even though it really is a very good design (much better then the 10/22 IMO). Good luck

Remington .22 ammo is considered the bottom of the barrel by most knowledgable rimfire shooters. Switching to almost anything else often clears up a lot of problems. I've found that the Federal bulk stuff sold by Walmart runs very well in just about everything. Not especially accurate, but very functionally reliable. If it don't run on that stuff, it's the gun's fault, not the ammo's.

Quoted: <----where is the link?

Sorry about the link, here it is...

Rimfire Central.com - Remington

As far as that guy being the manager of the range, That doesn't mean much in my book. Some of the worst info I've gotten came from gun store employees and range officers. Maybe this guy is really sharp? I don't know, never met him but I can tell you he gave you some bad "info".

CCI, while not as cheap as some bulk ammo, tend to work very well in many (most?) rim fires.

My experience with my 597 sounds kinda similar.  I had the feeding and jamming problems with it when I took it out shooting probably for the second time.  The things I can tell you are check your extractor (mine flew completely off) that caused alot of the problems.  I replaced mine with a volquertson extractor.  Secondly the mags.  If you get the newest mags they work great.  Any of the others caused me problems.  Just my experieces hopefully it helps.  And I love the rifle when all the kinks are worked out.

Jason

Quoted: My experience with my 597 sounds kinda similar.  I had the feeding and jamming problems with it when I took it out shooting probably for the second time.  The things I can tell you are check your extractor (mine flew completely off) that caused alot of the problems.  I replaced mine with a volquertson extractor.  Secondly the mags.  If you get the newest mags they work great.  Any of the others caused me problems.  Just my experieces hopefully it helps.  And I love the rifle when all the kinks are worked out. Jason

Where do you buy the extractor and how much is it?

Quoted: Quoted: <----where is the link? Sorry about the link, here it is... Rimfire Central.com - Remington As far as that guy being the manager of the range, That doesn't mean much in my book. Some of the worst info I've gotten came from gun store employees and range officers. Maybe this guy is really sharp? I don't know, never met him but I can tell you he gave you some bad "info". CCI, while not as cheap as some bulk ammo, tend to work very well in many (most?) rim fires.

Great link..thanks

Mine works fine with a new mag. the old one works fine if only 5 rounds put in it. With any ammo.

Quoted: Quoted: My experience with my 597 sounds kinda similar.  I had the feeding and jamming problems with it when I took it out shooting probably for the second time.  The things I can tell you are check your extractor (mine flew completely off) that caused alot of the problems.  I replaced mine with a volquertson extractor.  Secondly the mags.  If you get the newest mags they work great.  Any of the others caused me problems.  Just my experieces hopefully it helps.  And I love the rifle when all the kinks are worked out. Jason Where do you buy the extractor and how much is it?

I bought the volquertson extractor online from www.rimfiresports.com .  It is currently $32.85 and it ships for free I believe.  Now this is kinda pricey compared to just getting a stock replacement part, but I feel it was worth it.  Also this is just the extractor, if the spring or plunger went flying too you'll have to order those also.  I just got mine from a local dealer for a buck or so.  Hope this helps you out.  

Jason

BTW  I've put at least a 1000 rounds through it since I replaced that extractor and had no problems with it coming out again.  Compared to the stock unit staying in for maybe 100.