Sell 17 hmr and go for hornet

Been thinking about selling my hmr and getting a 22 hornet or a 17 hornet as I reload and think this may be a better option any ideas
Good evening Tikka.
I ditched the HMR when it was difficult to find amo that didnt split necks when fired and went for a Tikka Varmint 222rem, fitted a lighter trigger spring, and dropped it in to a GRS stock. This is a tack driving range gun, and works out cheaper to reload for than buying HMR cartridges. 40 grain Vmax, and 22grains of powder gives a good flat parabolic curve and a realistic 300 yard bunny and Charlie basher. 22 hornet will use almost half the powder so even cheaper.
 
Detour!!!!!! Rifle for rabbits and hares. Not saw a hare in years or shot a rabbit this year! Plenty fox and roe about though.
 
A .17HMR works well from a 16" barrel making it a handy 100yd rabbit/fox rifle whether in a truck or walking/carrying. A 17 Hornet most likely to be CZ527 varmint with a 26" barrel plus sound moderator will give more performance but not truck friendly. Also it needs all of that barrel to achieve the superior performance over the 22 hornet which are often more compact rifles with shorter barrels. Shorten the barrel on a CZ 17 hornet and the wheels come off and the 22 hornet starts to look more attractive.
3000fps is where things get interesting. To achieve this from a 22 hornet it needs around 12gr H110 behind 35gr v max. Using blue dot reduced loads in 20 practical/tactical or .223 same weight bullets will achieve this and more. H110 or lilgun or blue dot all about same price and same charge eliminates cost saving with primers and brass much the same price. Only by finding a end of line or a weirdo bullet going cheap is there a cost saving with the hornets as far as I can see. Plus the .223 will perform from a short compact rifle and has many more load variations than a hornet running on max. Either .204 or .223 will offer same as hornets and more. 17HMR still has its place in the cabinet right alongside any of these calibres.
 
A .17HMR works well from a 16" barrel making it a handy 100yd rabbit/fox rifle whether in a truck or walking/carrying. A 17 Hornet most likely to be CZ527 varmint with a 26" barrel plus sound moderator will give more performance but not truck friendly. Also it needs all of that barrel to achieve the superior performance over the 22 hornet which are often more compact rifles with shorter barrels. Shorten the barrel on a CZ 17 hornet and the wheels come off and the 22 hornet starts to look more attractive.
3000fps is where things get interesting. To achieve this from a 22 hornet it needs around 12gr H110 behind 35gr v max. Using blue dot reduced loads in 20 practical/tactical or .223 same weight bullets will achieve this and more. H110 or lilgun or blue dot all about same price and same charge eliminates cost saving with primers and brass much the same price. Only by finding a end of line or a weirdo bullet going cheap is there a cost saving with the hornets as far as I can see. Plus the .223 will perform from a short compact rifle and has many more load variations than a hornet running on max. Either .204 or .223 will offer same as hornets and more. 17HMR still has its place in the cabinet right alongside any of these calibres.


Is blue dot not position sensitive, like H110? As I low charges laying flat in the case can detonate and cause pressure spikes. Also easy to doh le charge on a low case fill

Plus it’s hard to get hold of around here
 
Is blue dot not position sensitive, like H110? As I low charges laying flat in the case can detonate and cause pressure spikes. Also easy to doh le charge on a low case fill

Plus it’s hard to get hold of around here

I don't know if any of you fellas has ready access to French reloading powders, specifically VECTAN SP3?? I have long found it to be a great alternative to the ones you use - though I do like/rate & use H110 for my fire-forming loads under fast moving 45gr Sierra Hornet or under the 35gr Hornady V-Max bullets - and using 12.0.->12.5gr of said under the 40gr Sierra BlitzKing is what gives me my main .22KH loading @ a moderate but very accurate and useful 2,950fps. A really good (imho) accurate & DEADLY night time foxing round that gets used under an old fashioned hi-power electric lamp with red filter clamped to my scope body.

That Vectan SP3 meters like water it is so fine and round in shape, even finer and certainly more uniform in shape than the old girl we all seem to love, H110. So fine in fact that it is a bit of a pain with my (totally manual) powder trickler in that grains of the black shiny "sand" come out round the 'O' ring seal twixt Archemeaies tube and trickler body. But I can put up with this for the accuracy and performance it gives me in my loads.

Just a helpful suggestion I hope....?

As additional asides & hopefully helpful suggestion I also use a slower burning brother of said VECTAN SP3 under some pretty fast and accurate .223Rem fox and informal target rounds, specifically under 52gr Berger Varmint hollow points. That slower burning variant I use in my 26" .223 Rem 700 HBVS in is SP10... another suck it 'n see option if you have the time and inclination?
Again, that number works well under 20 & 25gr .17 V-Max bullets from my .17Rem c/f so double useful at least, and probs goes well in your .204Rs too I wouldn't doubt!!?

ATB ..... and shoot safely
 
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2 range observations on this.

Firstly I took a 3/4 size fox target to our club at Bisley. Set all club members the challenge of hitting it first shot. A lot couldn’t do it and a few did but were caught out by the wind (including me) and hit the fox a bit far back. Ok, the super fast calibres are all excluded due to range orders but goes to show what real world first shot accuracy can be at range in a strong ish wind (was over 10 mph but can’t recall exactly what).

We have also done similar with random exposures at 300 with very mixed results, although @Bomag was on the money with his .308 AI every time.

Secondly Guesty and I did a head to head on same fox target face, different day, 5-6 mph wind gusting between 5 and 7 o’clock. 40 gr out of the .22H I had 4 in a reasonable group and all kill shots but 1 opened the group to 12”, Guesty with 20 gr (I think) in the .17HH shot around a 3-4” 5 shot group all in the kill zone. So both rounds capable as the flier was more than likely me!

Now THAT sounds like a well thought out, sensible test of one's REAL WORLD shooting abilities, and even then you are not subjecting yourself to the stress taking a live target can present, one that can and does suddenly move off and one that doesn't appear at whole 100yd units distance from a prepared shooter!? Like that idea of your "test shoots" and might adopt that myself when next down at Bisley (or even out on one of my allowed farmer fields... Excellento Mr. '25 Sharps' ....

ATB and Kind Regards,
B ......
 
The .204R wins hands down within the velocity, keepy-uppey stakes, no question, but that graphic shows off the .22H to its worst cos of commercial bullet choices. The 35gr V-Max is a great little bullet for relatively close shots, not much passed 130yds or so imho cos of the fast shedding of velocity and killing energy etc. But substitute that projectile for the excellent 40gr Sierra BlitzKing and we get far better results for the diminutive ?22 Hornet .. My quite sedate loading of said in my .22Hornet/.22KH gives me 2,950fps and a drop at 300 yds of around 10.7", not a million miles off the stated .223Rem @ 7.1" but faaaaar better than the near 17" of the 35gr V-Max offering!! That velocity can be pushed to 3,100 fps quite easily in my .22KH but at the expense of case life so I keep the loads down to a sensible level for my rifle..

But then I will never zero my .22H/.22KH @ 200 yds and never probs take shots at critters at much over that in any case.... So the data is again somewhat bias in setup and comparison. And again I will ask, whete are the comparative figures for the ORIGINAL COMPETITOR of the .17HMR.?

ATB ....... and shoot safely

Now out of personal interest in getting a fair and unbiased , straight comparison - (even though it may be fairly obvious which side of the .17HMR vs .22Hornet my support falls on) - I checked Hornady's site and got these figures as representative of the ACTUAL bullet and advertised velocity figures etc. used in their .17HMR loading. I then inserted those elements into my iSterok app' (EVERYTHING ELSE was unchanged from the .22H 35gr V-Max calculations) and now can report MY findings.

The .17 HMR Hornady load for commercial use comprise the following data figures...

17grain Hornady V-Max projectile fired at an advertised 2,550 fps from a regular 24" barrel, having a B.C. of between 0.120 and 0.125. I will use the 0.125 B.C. figure here so I won't be charged with fixing the figures to suit my example.

Inputting this limited dataset into my ballistic app' and I obtained the following - slightly surprising - results...

With a comparable 200 yd zero, at 300 yds the wee 17 grain .172" diameter projectile had shed most of its useful velocity, giving:-
Remaining Velocity ...............................988 fps
Remaining Energy ................................37 fpe
Drop at 300 yds from a 200 yd zero ..... 22.3"

As a reminder, taking the figures directly off the graphic given earlier by another respondent, and so with a 200yd zero and 300yd POI gave the following :-
Remaining Velocity ................................1,119 fps
Remaining Energy .................................. 97 fpe
Drop at 300 yds from a 200 yd zero ........ 16.9" (iSterok gave me 16.2" with these inputs but what the heck eh?).

NOW which cartridge has a more "looping trajectory" between this 17gr .17HMR commercial loading and the (not a good choice but nevertheless a commercial loading) 35gr. .22Hornet cartridge with a good deal more fps & fpe than the rimfire one, and with a stated drop from a 200yd zero to a 300yd POI of 16.9"...??

BOTH are pretty awful and quite honestly would be hard to use in the stated "test comparison" from one's rifle unless one were to be an advanced ballistician AND Excellent shot and the prevailing weather played the game!!.. However, I rest my case as to which one of these two would make the best choice (???) given the test criteria, but in a pest hunting situation even though the .22H is demonstrably "better" and more powerful for nailing a fox (say), I would personally avoid such a shot with EITHER rifle/chambering...

Like I have said in this thread I would NOT use the 200yd zero with my .22H/.22KH loads, and given the above drop figures would (and do) limit my zero to 120yds and MAX quarry taking range to not much more than 150yds given this particular commercial loading with the 35gr V-Max bullet upfront.. I am shooting LIVING quarry and try my damnedest to give the chosen critters a QUICK & ETHICAL demise, as much as possible in any given situation, and trying to tag a small beastie at 300 yds distance from me when the bullet is dropping like a veritable stone is NOT following this promise to myself and to those animals I take deadly aim at!!

ATB ....... and shoot safely.
 
Of course they absolutely destroy the .22 hornet, they absolutely destroy the HMR too which is what the OP is looking to replace and which is far, far closer to the Hornets than the other 3

I would go so far as to say that, as you elude to here, the .22H and the .17HMR (in this context anyway) are fairly similar to one another, especially when the others are compared in that table. Those two are in a separate class I would say, and under practical situations not just as hypothetical comparisons as here, the cartridges would NOT generally be used thus. The ranges are just too great for the bullet/cartridge mixes.
 
What sort of ranges? That is the key

For me (and it is a personal choice here I feel, mixed in with a good slug of common sense one would hope) is Definitely NO FURTHER than 200 yds give or take a little (for lack of distance measuring equipment and/or poor distance judgement abilities)... The .22H/.22KH perhaps a little more but then again I would tend to ere on the side of respect for my quarry, and the limiting abilities of my night-time lamping equipment.

ATB ........ and shoot safely.
 
2 range observations on this.

SNIP

Secondly Guesty and I did a head to head on same fox target face, different day, 5-6 mph wind gusting between 5 and 7 o’clock. 40 gr out of the .22H I had 4 in a reasonable group and all kill shots but 1 opened the group to 12”, Guesty with 20 gr (I think) in the .17HH shot around a 3-4” 5 shot group all in the kill zone. So both rounds capable as the flier was more than likely me!

I was using 25gr Bergers and the group was just under 2.5”, which I was quite happy with in the conditions.
:thumb:
 
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