I'm thinking of getting a Contender barrel and equiping it with Ken Lights rail with Bo-Mar sights to use for field pistol events. Some use 22 Hornets but it seems a little light on the rams. Does anyone out there have expirience with the 25-20? I don't want to use any more gun than is required.

I understand that it was popular for at least a bit. You should get some response.

I believe that Ed's Contenders might have a barrel. I think he bought quite a few from the Custom shop a couple of years back.

He has several barrels on his site that I want. I didn't see a .25-20 but he has hundreds that aren't listed. You can contact him fairly easily and he will return calls. Great guy to do business with and his prices are fair.

I'm confused...you say that you don't want to use any more gun than is needed, but you don't give the Hornet it's proper credit. Do you realize how many 40's are shot with the Hornet? I'll bet over the past few years the ratio of 40's shot with Hornets vs. 40's shot with other cartridges is about 3 to 1 (if not more lopsided toward the Hornet).

I've been shooting the Hornet for two years now and I have lost 1 ram. Consider that I've knocked down a couple hundred rams, knockdown just isn't a problem. I'm using a pretty light load and could bump it up if I needed to...field pistol is easily within the capabilities of the Hornet. I will caution against the use of FMJ bullets that expose the core at the base. I've heard from some very accomplished field pistol shooters that the bullet will just shed that jacket as it hits the steel and not transfer all of its energy.

With all of that said, and you still want the .25-20 (which is perfectly understandable). I'd suggest that you go to IHMSA's message board and post a question in their field pistol section. I know that Gun Zorro and a couple of others have played with the round quite a bit. Here's the address...

http://www.ihmsa.org/chat.html

Good luck!

As already said, check with Ed's Contenders. I got a 25-20 10" from him last year and its the most fun I've had in a while. I don't shoot rams, but it has been pure poison on jackrabbits. With factory Winchester 86gr(I have about 400 left), I get 1389fps, same as my Marlin 94 and not too loud for hunting. Have used scope and red dot, but like the factory opens best. Haven't had a chance to try any past 60-70yds. Makes it lighter and faster to handle. Off a bench at 25 yds with opens it will stay under 3/4".

I've got one of those from Ed's batch and it is one sweet shooter. I don't do sillywet but it is right handy on woodchucks. At the range it out shot my hornet barrel and no where near as finicky as the hornet to handload. I ended up selling off the hornet barrel and will keep the .25-20 forever.

Thanks for the replies; I think I will go for the 25-20. BTW, I considered a 256 before I became interested in steel clanking but it is not legal for field pistol.