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#1
03-01-2022, 05:21 PM
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Contender carbines in 17 Hornet range day
I put two new Burris e1 6.5-20 scopes on them and moved Bridget’s old Nikon Monarch 5-20 to her 243 Encore. The purpose of the trip was to break in the new barrel and zero all three without my helpers present. They will get to shoot them next weekend. I forgot the ammo for Bridget’s rifle so all I had was some factory 20 V-max ammo for it. The MGM barrel I shot mostly un fireformed PPU 22 Hornet that I had necked down and annealed and loaded with 10.9 gr of 1680 and 20 Dogtown HPs. It was colder than hell and so I think my shooting could have been improved some. All groups were shot at 100 yards. The one group below was actually shot with the un fireformed PPU 22 Hornet loads, not factory ammo. Bridget’s EABco barrel is a tack driver, but it looks like Dale and Elise’s MGM barrel might even outshoot it once I handload formed cases for it though. The kids’ contenders just slightly outshoot all of our CZ 527 Americans in 17 Hornet. We all bought CZs in 17 Hornet after shooting Bridget’s. Before she had a hunting license I put a man size stock on it and took it to central Washington with my buddies Mark and Bob. My 204 and 22 Hornet 527s will keep up with the Contenders though. All of our Contender and Encore barrels have Stratton Custom fore end hanger bars and all of our fore ends have been modified by Steve Stratton. That way they shoot the same off Harris Bipods or bags or offhand and they shoot the same hot or cold. The case on the left below has been necked down, the one beside the case has been annealed and loaded, the next is a fire formed case and the last one is a factory loaded round. The un fireformed loaded rounds probably are getting 3,400 FPS. We will shoot them at chucks instead of wasting bullets fire forming cases. I made up a couple hundred last week and only shot fifty of them today. They are only a couple hundred FPS slower than full power loads. They will work just fine. They are a pain in the butt to make, but I kind of enjoy making them. The PPU makes up into a far better case than the Hornady factory 17 Hornet brass. It is absolute garbage. I think we have north of a thousand Hornady cases and I can’t wait until we don’t have any. It only lasts five or six loading cycles before the primer pockets go from leaking (which the crap does when new) to not even tight enough to hold a primer. The reformed PPU is far superior brass. Bridget’s new Encore in 243 shot well too. It went just under an inch for five shots at a hundred yards and it is new to us and I haven’t done any serious load development for it yet. The small squares on the target are .2 inches Last edited by JDHasty; 03-01-2022 at 05:47 PM. 
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#4
03-01-2022, 06:16 PM
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She has had that EABco barrel since ~2014 and it has always been good for near .5 inch groups at 100 yards with 20 V-max, 20 Dogtown HPFB, 20 Varmageddon either tipped or HP. We use 12.2 of AA 1680 and have been preferring 7-1/2 primers, but have been using more CCI 400 lately. This load is as good or better than any others we have tried in any of our five 17 Hornets.
We have found the 20 grain tipped bullets in the 17 Hornets to be unreliable killers at ranges exceeding 200 - 225 yards. The HPs expand more reliably than the tipped bullets at longer ranges. If there is a difference in accuracy it is so slight that it would only have theoretical relevance. There is no difference in accuracy that comes into play in the field. Last edited by JDHasty; 03-01-2022 at 08:00 PM.
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#7
03-01-2022, 08:28 PM
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The top two targets are with PPU 22 Hornet cases that are not foreformed yet. The bottom is with some factory ammo. The two top targets are with the MGM barrel and the bottom with the EABco barrel. The PPU forms beautiful cases but be warned, you must anneal down into the shoulder. I dropped a piece of brass that took a bounce and ended up in my bread pan full of water full of annealed brass. I couldn't recognize it among those in the pan of water and then forgot to find it later. It was immediately apparent which one it was when I took it out to inspect it after firing. Other than that I didn't lose a piece out of 50.
Out of twenty barrel breakin shots, cleaning after each round, with unfireformed cases they all went into about an inch and a quarter at 1oo yards. The random holes in the targets outside of the groups are not part of the groups. I am known for being particularly parsimonious when it comes to using fresh targets. I have an Annealeze and here's the deal on the Hornet cases. The slot in the lower small wheel is obviously cut to deal with 357, 44 mag etc and two Hornet cases will fall into it and then be forced past the side of the hopper. I couldn’t sleep thinking about this and decided if I could find the right piece of tubing I could get it going in ten minutes and got up and went down to my shop. A piece of copper water supply line fit snugly into the slot. I cut a piece to length and then pushed it into the slot and marked it with a sharpie. Then clamped the ends between the hardened jaws of my machinist vise. Cut it with a hack saw and and filed it down to the jaws and smoothed everything up on a wire wheel. Put it in and it’s working like a champ. I tested ten cases and they went through perfectly. I don’t want to glue it in or use double faced scotch tape because I do 44 cases and it is apparent it is too small with it in to accommodate them and that tape has been almost impossibly permanent in the past to remove or separate if it gets even a little hot. Like even in the sun. I put a trajectory table on the bell of a scope once with it and had to soak it with mineral spirits for a week to finally get it cleaned up. I also replaced the flange nuts on the bottle stand with 1/4-20 knobs. Big improvement in ease of setup. I also had a couple plastic 1/4-20 acorn nuts I put on the ends to keep it from scratching my dinner table when I set it up. I think they were originally for mounting a license plate frame on a car. A zink or brass acorn nut would work just as well, but I had these. I don’t fire it up in my loading shop that is full of primers and powder and risk blowing myself to hell and back. I'll see if I can get the video of it to post. On this job the torch discolored the corner of case stop that is J shaped but did not burn the wheel at all. On my machine the torch sets up to the left and I had it angled forward. Only about ten Hornet cases can be on the feed hopper at a time. The rims make them arch too much after 10 and they will fall out so they have to be hand fed. But all in all it does a fantastic job. Last edited by JDHasty; 03-01-2022 at 09:46 PM.
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#8
03-01-2022, 08:35 PM
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It didn't like the Quick Time video, but here is a photo of the copper water supply tubing insert. It fits nice and snug and can be taken out to do short fat cases. Last edited by JDHasty; 03-01-2022 at 08:46 PM.
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#10
03-01-2022, 09:08 PM
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FWIW, The reticle in the Burris e1 6.5-20x50 will have the first sub crosshair line up at 200 yards and the second at 250 if the primary crosshair is zeroed at a buck and a half. That is with HPFB bullets. That puts it a half inch high at a hundred.
They have been going on sale recently for as low as $190. I don't know how well they track, but they certainly are clear and the crosshairs are in the right place for use on the 17 Hornet. We personally don't shoot out past ~250 with the 17 Hornet at rock chucks, so the rest of the sub-crosshairs are not usable on these rifles. I bought a third for the kid's 20 Practical and it has pretty much the same trajectory as the 22-250 so it should be great for that... if I ever get it going.
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