Building a 17 Hornet Contender Carbine barrel...

[magnumwheelman]

my retired buddy is building his "one last rifle" from scratch... it'll be a 17 Hornet repeater using an old Savage magazine he had laying around... he needed a chamber reamer, & told me he would build me a Contender barrel, giving up his last machined Contender barrel base, for letting him use a reamer if I bought one... so today, my new 17 Hornet chamber reamer is on it's way, along with a 17 caliber barrel blank... I'm thinking a 16-18" carbine barrel in 17 Hornet could replace my 17 Mach 2 bolt action repeater, as the factory 17 Mach 2 rimfire ammo still continues to be MIA... it's my most used varmint rifle / cartridge for use around the farm, & I'm down to less than 2 bricks of ammo left... thinking this centerfire is a better replacement for me... I've always planned on selling that custom Mach 2 rifle, with a brick of ammo, when I get down to my last brick... I currently have a 10" 17 K Hornet factory Contender barrel... I like the 17 Hornet, as they go in those "K" chambers, & fire form nicely...

I'm not sure if reloading components are drying up permanently, or if it's one of those things where they are only made once a year??? seems like brass availability is a little thin right now... I'll have to stay diligent keeping the 17 K Hornet & the regular 17 Hornet apart & properly labeled, as they are pretty close to the same...

anyone out there shooting 17 Hornet???

[Encore64]

I have 17 Ackley Hornets in both 14" and 24" TCs. Both built by VVCG which is now Match Grade Machine.

[magnumwheelman]

This same buddy has a 10" 17 Ackley Hornet barrel... the standardized 17 Hornet cartridges don't go into his chambers... but they do fit in my K Hornet chambers... I wasn't a big fan of the 17 K Hornet before the standardized 17 Hornet became a factory chambering... so much work forming cases, wasting a bullet powder & primer fire forming... the 17 Hornet is reasonably accurate out of my K chamber, & they fire form nicely... I like it better, now that it's not so much work

[magnumwheelman]

Hmmm... looks like they made some 17 Mach 2 ammo again... might have to buy another brick

[magnumwheelman]

been looking for some new 17 Hornet loading brass for both of our rifles, & ran across this on another forum...

A friend of a friend recently bought a CZ rifle in 17 Hornet.
He ordered 30 boxes, 750 rnds, of Hornady factory ammo from Midway USA.
Thinking that would give ammo to shoot and 750 rnds. of brass for reloading.
When the ammo arrived he noticed that the primers were staked in.
My friend had previously bought factory 17 Hornet ammo and found that the brass with staked primers had over size primer pockets. The reason for staking in the primers thus making them unusable for reloading.
My friends friend called Midway and made a complaint. Midway says that all ammo sales are final with no returns.
He then calls Hornady and they say there is nothing they can do about it. They state that only 10% of shooters are reloaders so they didn`t see it as an issue.
Hornady had a bunch of brass with out of spec (oversize) primer pockets and staked them in rather than discard them. Seems Hornadys QC is not what we hoped.
There is rumors that some of their 204 bras has the same issue.
BTW, Hornaday told him the brass is NOT safe to reload....

this was posted 11-26-2016

so... that could explain why there is no Hornady brass for sale... so... I opted for buying 50 Hornaday loaded rounds, & I see they are available from Winchester, & Federal... so a 50 round box of each... if the current Hornady loaded ammo has staked primers, I'll give those to my buddy, who can swag the case heads to get the primer pockets to spec... & I'll start collecting either the Winchester, or the Federal... if the pockets are not staked, I'll be waiting for new Hornady cases...

I find it hard to believe that on a cartridge like the 17 Hornet, that only 10% of shooters would be reloaders, & frankly, that Hornady would take that attitude in the 1st place... but I'm guessing, if they had an agreement with "some" gun manufacturers to build guns for this new standardized cartridge, & they found out their 1st large lot of brass was bad, they may be in a position to get ammo out for these guns... guessing in the big picture, it may mean a failure of the cartridge...

for me, I'd take a centerfire 17 Hornet over the new rimfire magnum 17 Winchester any day... but then I must be one of those elusive 10%

Thoughts???