22 Hornet or 22 K Hornet and Barrel Length

[17cal Fan]

Bought my first Hornet used in 1987 in the form of a Savage 342. Love the gun and the caliber and still have it. It shoots great and I've run 1000's of rounds through it. After I got my bore scope, I figured out why the cases have always been sticky on extraction. The bore and chamber both have some pitting. That's not on me but it is there none the less. Don't have the heart to change a thing on it. It pretty much made me the small caliber nut that I am today.

Fast forward, now my collection includes a CZ 527 which is amazing and a T/C 10" both in 22 Hornet. These days I go to Montana once a year every year. I have guns that I built for that purpose (17 FB, 17 H and 222) so the 22 Hornets don't go with me. Which brings me the the question of why not?

So the the new CZ 527 Hornet action sitting in the safe will be my "Montana Hornet" by next trip. I ordered a 27" blank 1 in 14 from Green Mountain and a Boyd's stock to carry the load. The questions I would like help with are:

1) 22 Hornet reamer or 22 K Hornet and WHY ?
2) Barrel length when finished?

My hesitation on the K reamer is I load for so many calibers/rifles that it melts my brain. The K would add insult to injury but may well be worth it. I read a lot and have seen things such as "Ackley never improved anything" and "yep all that to end up back at 222". So if I buy a K reamer I don't want to say "yep all that and I should have just gone with 22 Hornet".

Thanks for your help. I am pretty new here but have read enough to know that there's a lot of knowledge and experience here.

 

[3Ackleys]

K for longer case life. or sell the 22 cal barrel and get a 17 and make a 17 Hornet!

 

[17VLD]

I have a Ruger that got turned into a K and it is accurate and has dang near a 222’s velocity with the fine 42 grain Calhoon.A much nicer looking case to boot,with better case life.Hard to believe the performance from such a small case.Dont get me started on the 19Hornet either,just so much fun to be had with this case.
Matt

 

[rjtfroggy]

Haven't shot my Hornet in 10-12 years. It is a single shot Savage with the laminate stock, and it just sits in the back of the safe.
Come to think about it there are a few that reside back there, maybe time to clean house.

 

[Evan]

K hornet brass won't need to be trimmed hardly ever, and I'd go 26". My 20 Vartarg is 26" and gets phenomenal velocity, despite conventional wisdom saying that long of a barrel is a waste on such a small case.

 

[17cal Fan]

K for longer case life. or sell the 22 cal barrel and get a 17 and make a 17 Hornet!

I have 2 CZ 17H and a Savage 17H, think I'm covered there. They are awesome.

 

[lotech]

I've had the regular Hornet, K-Hornet, .17 Hornet, and the .22 Long Snapper (cut down Hornet). You do get a couple of hundred feet per second more velocity (that's from memory, so may not be exactly right) with the K-Hornet. Is it worth the extra trouble? Probably not. I found the .17 Hornet worthless, sort of like all .17 calibers. The .22 Long Snapper? Just get a .22 magnum and you have the same thing. I've had ten standard .22 Hornets over many years. These were on a variety of actions such as high wall, low wall, BSA Martini, bolt-actions, Thompson Contender, and who knows what else. One or two were pretty accurate. The standard .22 Hornet remains the best and most useful of the bunch. I don't miss any of the others.

 

[Outrider27]

For me, the slightly higher velocity of the K-Hornet is just a bonus; the big thing is that case life is a bunch better, as is case maintenance. I'm the opposite of lotech; if I buy another hornet, it will go straight to the 'smith, along with my reamer, before it is ever fired. Right now, I have one of each, and the regular Hornet is a pain in the butt at times.

 

[AccelR8]

I will share my experience with the 22 K-Hornet, which has been different than almost everyone else's.

I rebarelled a New England Firearms Handi-Rifle by the barrel-stub method and rented a 22 K-Hornet reamer. So this was not a Hornet to K-Hornet job, it was a K-Hornet from the start.

At first everything was fine. I shot factory Hornet ammo, which was accurate, and in this way I fire formed the brass. I lost maybe 5% during this initial fire forming.

Soon, after several reloadings, I had neck tension issues. Zero neck tension. Just handling rounds, the bullets would push down into the case. After seating bullets I could easily pull them out with my fingers. I figured the brass had hardened and tried annealing. Then, neck tension was good but with every annealed case, when seating a bullet the cases would collapse at the shoulder resulting in very obvious run out, bulges just below the shoulder and most cases not even capable of chambering.

I got a collet neck sizer and tried it with standard and a couple undersized mandrels, without annealing. No luck. Still no neck tension.

Laugh at this if you want...I super-glued bullets into the cases! This worked great for a while but then I began having cases that were hard to chamber and sticky on extraction because they were getting too fat in the web area. My resize die was not sizing them enough in that area.

There's at least a few different versions of the K-Hornet. When I rented the reamer, I was told a certain company's dies were for the same version as the reamer but I have to say they are not. I thought about re-renting the reamer and use it to chamber a blank Wilson in-line seating die and going back to annealing. This, I reasoned, would solve the neck tension and shoulder collapse issues. Buying and trying different resize dies might solve the resizing issue. It was at this point I decided it wasn't worth it and abandoned project. The gun sits in the back of the safe unused now. I won't sell it to anybody with these problems.

Your mileage may vary!

 

[FJVance]

I have a thread here that might help. search for
Shoulder on a Hornet?

 

[lotech]

For me, the slightly higher velocity of the K-Hornet is just a bonus; the big thing is that case life is a bunch better, as is case maintenance. I'm the opposite of lotech; if I buy another hornet, it will go straight to the 'smith, along with my reamer, before it is ever fired. Right now, I have one of each, and the regular Hornet is a pain in the butt at times.

I haven't had any Hornets or variations based on the Hornet case for about ten years. I don't recall any problem with Hornet brass or case longevity in any of my many Hornet rifles EXCEPT for the very thin case necks that I would occasionally damage if I didn't handle them carefully while in the press. My fault entirely. I used both Winchester and Remington without noticing any differences in the two makes other than headstamp.

I occasionally get the urge to try another rifle in the standard Hornet chambering as I still have dies, much brass, loaded ammo, and a few bullets. The only rifle I have an interest in is a pre-'64 Model 70. All I know about these is that they are expensive and don't generally shoot with great accuracy, but that's okay, I'd only use an aperture sight anyway. And, these rifle just keep appreciating in value.

By the way, I'd have to look up the load data, but the best and most accurate load I found for a standard Hornet was the ugly looking squatty 40 grain Speer and 1680 powder. I tried many bullets and several powders over many years. Some shot reasonably well, some were horrible, but all were secondary, at least a little, to the Speer bullet and 1680. I already know... no one likes Speer so they don't try them, but Speer may make as many good bullets as anyone else.

 

[PigButtons]

My hesitation on the K reamer is I load for so many calibers/rifles that it melts my brain. The K would add insult to injury but may well be worth it. I read a lot and have seen things such as "Ackley never improved anything" and "yep all that to end up back at 222". So if I buy a K reamer I don't want to say "yep all that and I should have just gone with 22 Hornet".

So from what you say here I'd just recommend the standard Hornet. You can always get it K'd later if you think the std isn't meeting your needs. It's a simple process that any competent smith can do.

 

[Pyscodog]

I have a Ruger 77/22 Hornet. After one trip to the range, I had it bumped to a K, floated the barrel, bed the action and did a trigger job. One of the above helped as it shoots consistent 1/2 inch groups at 100yds. And the little case really looks cool.

 

[Outrider27]

By the way, I'd have to look up the load data, but the best and most accurate load I found for a standard Hornet was the ugly looking squatty 40 grain Speer and 1680 powder.

I haven't tried 1680 powder, but I definitely agree with you on the 40 grain Speer bullet. Works fine in my K, one of the two that have worked best with the powders I loaded back when I was shooting the K fair amount.