Has anyone done a .20cal wildcat on the 22 Hornet or 218 Bee case? If so, know of any data or specs?

Thanks in advance.

20-22 Hornet
http://ammoguide.com/cgi-bin/ai.cgi?sn=fLJcFZmtXM&catid=454

20-218 Bee
http://ammoguide.com/cgi-bin/ai.cgi?sn=fLJcFZmtXM&catid=425

I did a .20 Hornet Improved about five years ago on a Kimber 82 Hornet action. Greg Tannel did the work. My barrel length was 20" and I could get 3400 fps, but it was warm load. A better set up would be a CZ w/ front bolt locking lugs (thus, less case stretch) and a 22" bbl. With that set up, I believe you could safely shoot mid 3400s with 33 grain bullets and have good brass life. In my mind, the .20 Hornet Improved is superior to the 22 Hornet because you can shoot a skinnier bullet faster and still make 33-35 grains of bullet weight.


Jordan

Thanks guys, I have a takeoff Ruger stainless 204 barrel and a nice 218Bee Martini Cadet, just thinking about a couple of options...

I have one on the .218 Bee with the shoulders blown forward to 40 degrees and or course necked to .20. We call it the ".20 Killer Bee". I built mine on a Cooper Montana Varminter that had been a .22 K-Hornet. The guy who designed the case has a friend that does laser engraving, he did a logo for us, here's a pic.



Here's a picture of a few other wildcats as comparison.


They are left to right: .17 Killer Bee, .20 Killer Bee, .17 MachIV, .20 VarTarg. First two on the Bee case the second two on the Fire Ball case.
Here's another pic of all .20 Wildcats. They are left to right:.20VarTarg, .20 Killer Bee, .20 Tactical, .20 BR and the real hot-rod the .20 Dasher(.20 BR improved with the shoulders blown forward to 40 Degrees).



The first day after barrel break-in I took my Killer Bee to the range with a quickly developed but not perfected load. After a bit of sight in as I was rushing for an upcoming hunt I shot it's 1st 5 shot 100 yard group. This is it.



I didn't chrono that load as I was in a rush but since I've developed it's working load that is (no BS) more accurate than that (It's on a completely redone Cooper). It pushes a 32 grain V-Max to 3,780ish fps. using 17.1 grains of AA1680 in a formed case with a 7 1/2BR primer. Interestingly (at least to me)the popular .20 VarTarg and the smaller Killer Bee get almost exactly the same velocities. My VarTarg load is 18.7 grains of H4198 and the same bullet and primer in the bigger Fire Ball case for near Exact velocities.
Sorry for rambling, it's might be obvious but about all I shoot except for hunting season is sub.22 caliber wildcats. If I could be of further help I'd be glad to. Have a good one.

Montdoug:

Who did the reamer for the 20 KillerBee, and does the gunsmith still have it? Second question would be, can he fit a barrel to my Martini action?

dave - talk to kobe the ruger bbl will have to be turned down a bit, but a 20mashburn bee sounds like fun

Howdy Capt.
Dave Kiff at Pacific did the reamer for us. 4 of us went in on it and had it sent to Greg Tannel at Gre'Tan Rifles in Kersey Colorado. Greg has done a number of my small caliber wildcats and he is in my estimation nothing less than absolutely outstanding but I'm not sure he'd chose to work on a Martini (never had one dog-gone-it!).I know I'm having the first Killer Bee case, the .17 Killer Bee built on an original 1885 Winchester Low Wall with an octagon Pac-Nor barrel as we speak but Greg wasn't interested as he's too busy with bolt stuff. Of course on mine I wanted a Niedner bushed firing pin, harder steel falling block and some other things specific to the old low walls, color cased hardened, rust blued etc. Here's his link if your interested cause I sure don't speak for him.
Gre'Tan Rifles
Lonnie Hummel at Hornady did our dies.
It's a very easy round to form for, just partially size a .218 Bee neck with the .20Killer Bee full sizer die till you have a false shoulder for headspace and a crush fit in the chamber. With a 32 V-Max and say 14.5ish grains of AA1680 with an older action, fire it and "Bingo" formed case! I formed 400 of them for my rifle without loosing a case, took about 380 gophers in the process . With it's 40 degree shoulder it's very efficient for a single shot rifle as it wouldn't feed for squat in a repeater. My Cooper is a single shot bolt obviously.
Greg has done so much excellent work as well as many favors for us guys so we just left the reamer with him.
The Bee is a great small, rimmed case to work with as I'm sure you know, and it's a lot tougher case and primer pocket than the Hornet (not speaking ill of the Hornet, just well of the Bee). If the round interests you private message me if I can help.
Have a good one.

By the way. A writer for "Precision Shooting" magazine wanted to do a story on the .20 Caliber wildcats for the magazine. He ended up picking 5 out of I believe the article mentions around 30 something .20 cal wildcats, our Killer Bee was one he wrote about. The article is in the December issue of Precision Shooting and is titled "Stalking the Twenty Caliber Wildcats".
Good article and he's a great guy. He really couldn't go into great depth on each round due to space constraints but it's a good read for sure. Especially to us "stomp-down, hope-to-die, Small Caliber Junkies"

Tis a shame PS wasted so much space on the dead general, would have left more room for the .20 cal article, it was interesting.

Tom

It was neat talking to him as he put the article together. As with a lot of guys when actually shooting a .20 at first it is a real eyeopener and as he mentioned he ended up with two by the time he had the article done. Glenn is an open minded guy you can tell talking to him.
I think the smaller more efficient .20's such as a VarTarg, our Killer Bee etc are real impressive when ya first shoot em. Or maybe a .20K-Hornet? (I oughta build one a them). Possibly as mentioned above a .20 Mashburn Bee any of em are great fun and real cheap to shoot. No barrel heat to speak of, see all the hits. Great varmint rounds. Obviously I'm completely biased .

I'm building my second .20 Tac, Pacnor 1x10 on a Savage target action. Bought my own reamer when I had the first one done and will be using it on this one. First one is a Rem action with a 1x11 Krieger. I like the .20 Tac.

Tom

quote:

I like the .20 Tac.

Me as well Tom. Mine is on a Remington Varmint Synthetic Model 700 that started life as a .223. The .20 tactical will make a real believer out of ya at long range on p-dogs, chucks and such. My only thought is that the smaller .20's in the VarTarg class and such will accomplish about 90 to 95 percent of what a guy does varminting and do it with just over half the powder, heat etc.
My .20 tact load uses the original 33 grain V-Max that Hornady came out with and I cornered the market on when I heard it was to be dropped. It chronos 4,175ish with 24.1 grains of an old 8 pounder of H4198 I have and shoots bug-holes. My VarTarg and Killer Bee are within a few fps of each other for velocity and the KB does just under 3,800fps with 17.1 grins of AA1680 and the VarTarg gets near identical speed with 18.7 grains of a newer slower batch of H4198. (Saving the older stuff for the .20 Tactical).
I shoot a lot of colony varmints so that has a lot to do with my choices. For chucks and stuff at 400 to 500+ the big .20's win hands down but I like the 40 grainers for that kinda work.
They are all fun and all do something better than the next one does. That's why ya need one of each of em . Oh well, keeps me off the streets.
With that 1 in 10 ya oughta try the 50 Bergers with a bit slower powder and see how they do for ya, might surprise ya.

quote:

. Oh well, keeps me off the streets.

Montana now has streets???

When in the hell did that happen???

Had to have em Seafire the horse poop was to much hassle to clean up in all the mud .

quote:

Originally posted by butchloc:
dave - talk to kobe the ruger bbl will have to be turned down a bit, but a 20mashburn bee sounds like fun

I'll check with Jim. I have this neat little rifle, my original plan was for a 38/357mag barrel for it, but the 20 Killer Bee might make a great varmint gun for my youngest son.

I want it made up like a mini-Stutzen, full stock, good wood and a compact 6x or so scope.

Guys, thanks for the info, it looks like the action I have cannot handle the pressures involved without major modification. It will become a 38/357mag gun after all.

Maybe a straight Bee or Hornet for that matter? Not much pressure with either of those and both are great varmint rounds.
What ever you decide it should be fun.
I remember as a kid in the bigger gun shops they'd have an oak barrel full of old martini's by the gun rack at $14.00ish to $20.00ish each depending on condition. Wish I'd a bought 20 of em and greased em up for future use. My first hunting rifle was a model 94 6.5X55 carbine ordered out of the back of a "Sports Afield" magazine and sporterized to fit my scrawny hind end by my Uncle. New trigger, a Lyman aperture sight, he did all the work for me and we must have had near $55.00 or $60.00 bucks in it, ee-ha! Killed all kinda stuff with it, shot like crazy.
I guess we all know about that hind-sight.
At any rate I've always wanted a Martini and never had one...yet. Be sure and post us a picture when your done.

It's currently a 218Bee with a spare 30cal barrel to make the conversion with. After that, it will be a good finish and some custom wood work to make it a Stutzen for my now 3 year old(twins) son.

Hey Mountdog, that's great info on the 20KB and your Cooper.

See PM.