Today at a shop, I stopped briefly into, I was looking at a Ruger 77/17 in a heavy barrel and grey laminate stock....

Ruger has also made this rifle, chambered in the 22 Hornet, and also the 44 Rem Mag......

Looking at it in my hands (and I own one of my own at home)... but I was thinking on how good an action this would be for a 17 Fireball if the action can take the pressure it would generate...

James Calhoon already converts the 77 Hornet into his 19 Calhoon...

But this action would make a great varmint rifle in 17 K Hornet, or 20 K Hornet, or 17 and 20 Fireballs....

I wonder if Ruger will get as sensitive to the requests and ideas of customers like Savage does...

Too bad Savage does not have an action available like this...

With the cost of 17 HMR ammo, I was just thinking a reloadable one with a little more velocity, in that size of rifle tho.. would be a great addition to varmint shooting batteries... I am going to do a little googling on the 17 K Hornet and see what I come up with....

But a 17 Fireball on that action would be a real appealing package...especially if they can do it at a reasonable cost!

Just thought of a PS here... a 17 Ackley Bee would also be a great round for this rifle!

Remingtons the only one with a Fire ball now but if they sell well (I did my part I got one) everyone else will jump on the bandwagon but it'll be a while.
You mentioned some great .17 wildcats, might I suggest a CZ .22 Hornet which is a true mini Mauser action in .22 Hornet and have it re barreled to .17 Ackley Hornet. Mine has a 1 in 10 twist 3 groove Pac-Nor Super Match and I love it. It's working load is 12.1 grains of N120 in a formed WW case with 7 1/2BR primers and a 20 grain V-Max. That is a safe load in my rifle but ya want to work up way slow with the sub .22 calibers as they spike pressure a lot faster than anything .22 and up. I chrono that load right at 3,800fps on a 75 degree day and it shoots in the .3's and .4's (probably .2's with a better shot yank'n the trigger). I broke down the price one time and I can shoot that Ackley Hornet for the same or a tad less than buying HMR ammo.
Ruger Hornets can be converted as well but from what I hear from small caliber buddies they seem to be a lot more problematic with the accuracy and the rotary mags are a problem as well after you put shoulders on the cases added to the fact they are short. I agree with you that they are attractive however and it can be done.
I had Richard at Pac-Nor do the work for me actually and couldn't be more pleased. I did use a minimum spec reamer with a .193 base (for WW brass), a 1 1/2 degree leade and zero free bore so a guy can get the 20 V Max shoved into the lands cause that seems to be far and away the choice of most rifles shooting them. It's an absolutely fabulous round that you'll see all your hits with (no recoil at all, none!), it doesn't heat up even during long strings in dog towns and a big plus is the dies and such are available already.
Here's a picture of a load development group using the 25 V-Max at about 3,400fps (pulled one to the left).
Just a thought.





Here's a picture of a Cooper in .17 Ackley that comes ready to go shooting if ya like single shots, I do.
Dumped that badger at about 175 yards with one shot, couldn't find a mark on him. No big drama, just like someone flipped a switch, he took one big bite of dirt and just stopped.



I'm crazy about small calibers. Tiny bores = BIG fun!

Doug,

thanks for the pics...

Yeah, I just can't get fired up about the 17 HMR... and also the 17 Rem.. or even the 204 Ruger....I am too economy and efficiency minded...

However....

the 17 Ackley, 17 Fireball, 17 Bee, 17/222, the 19 Calhoon, the 19/223, 20 VarTag Turbo, the 20BR, and the 20/222 are just rounds that seem to motivate me....

That Cooper is gorgeous and I was looking at their web site...

I just need to rethink the varmint arsenal, and go for Quality instead of Quantity of equipment...just can't seem to have enought hammers in the tool box, instead of just a few good quality hammers...must be a thing...

I have to admit, I want the 17s for use on Sage Rats.... for prairie dogs and sage rats, I am heavily addicted to 'Exploding' Varmints.....something I justify to myself based on their cannibalistic nature...poetic justice...

my favorite shot on a sage rat, is to blow him up while he is busy eating the remains of his buddies that I just exploded 3 to 5 minutes before...

Some how too, I prefer to reload my brass, instead of just leaving rim fire cases all over the landscape...

Where I shoot sage rats tho, It is amazing the number of 17 HMR cases scattered all over the place on the ground out there...

for the ability to reduce recoil, that is why I pretty much shoot Blue Dot loads in my 223s... you can see your shots in the scope, without loosing sight picture...

of course if I shot those in a Cooper, I'd have to call them 'le loads de la Bleu Dot', instead of Blue Dot loads... getting into those 'Upper Crust' circles...

The Ruger 77/22 .22 Hornet is a problem waiting to happen. Rechambering to 77/17 Fireball could lead to tons of frustration. Of course Ruger will no longer stand behind it (neither would I) and you could be up a creek. The 77/22 is indeed a good looking rifle but it's reputation is poor. That's my experience.

As long as your thinking wildcats another to add to your list for consideration is the .20 VarTarg basically a .221 Fire Ball case necked to .20 cal, the .20 VarTarg Turbo as you already know I'm sure is on the Triple Duce. The straight VarTarg shoots a 32 V-Max at 3,800ish and properly whacked you can get about 5 foot of air out of a gopher and spread him around a 5 ft circle, see all the action in any rifle that weight 7ish lbs or better. (Richardson's ground squirrels are what we call gophers, I'm guessing that's what your calling a sage rat). Another plus with the .20 VarTarg is again that dies and such are already available. Real easy to form for, just size the neck on a .221 case till ya have a crush fit in your rifle, load it, fire it and "bingo", no form dies needed like on a lot of em.
Cooper makes them as well as Ackley Hornets etc and when ya look at the price of the straight Varminter which is about a $1,000.00 it ain't bad compared to buying a rifle, a barrel and having it all smithed.
Sounds like your getting yourself talked into something, good for you ! We're all counting on ya.

I currently have a Ruger with the Heavy barrel and laminate stock at Pac Nor being converted into a 17 Ackely Hornet. I did quite a bit of research and went with the Ruger over the CZ because I wanted a late season Fox calling gun that had a magazine for those doubles and triples on Grey fox. I know the arguments and believe in general the CZ is a better platform from an accuracy standpoint but I wanted that Rotary mag and the stainless gun. It shot under an inch with factory ammo as a hornet before being sent off so I have high hopes. I know it may need more to get it to shoot but it WILL shoot. I also have Cooper Classic in 17 AH that is getting ready to see it's first woodchuck season. Great caliber, to much fun. Only drawback with the Cooper, it is a single shot and I can't bring myself to take it out in nasty weather. Way to pretty. If I were you I would get a 17 AH, doesn't matter what gun, you will love it.

John if your Ruger shot under an inch from the factory I'm betting it'll shoot a lot better than that when Pac-Nor's done with it. Keep us posted hey? You are too right about the .17 Ackley Hornet, it is indeed a super varmint round IMO.
By the way, for others that are interested James Calhoon makes a magazine for the CZ's that will indeed feed the .17 Ackley. Also you can modify it yourself without too much work.

I have a friend who has a friend who is obsessed with prairie dogs. He works at Boeing in Seattle, and commutes to Montana to shoot the dogs.

That guy shoots a 17 wildcat, because he gets range and low recoil so he can see the pink mist through a high power scope without recoil blinding him.

Anyway, his gun blew up in his face from Copper fouling.
But he will not give up on the 17 wildcat, so he got a 3 groove barrel from Pac Nor and reduced the fouling.

Looking at Calhoon's web site, they say avoid the 17s as the grooves are too shallow.
http://www.jamescalhoon.com/19caliber.php

quote:

19 Calibers have rifling up to 50% thicker than the 17 and the long dormant 20 caliber (5 mm). Thicker rifling (comparable to that of the 22 and 6 mm) results in less cleaning and longer barrel life.

quote:

The 19 BADGER provides a comfortable 300 yard range and velocities of 3750 with a 27gr bullet and 3550 with the 32gr. (The 4200+ ft/sec gurus, those geniuses behind the 17 Remington and .204 Ruger, would have you think otherwise, but attempts to achieve excessive velocities cause nothing but trouble for varminters!)

I could not agree with this more.
My 17 Rem and 22-250 barrels have burned out throats after an evil life of fouling.

223 with 33 gr Vmax moly and 15 gr Blue Dot will keep shooting 3500 to 3600 fps all day with no cleaning and stay accurate.
Sighted in at 100 yards
180 yards -2" 2000 fps
275 yards -10" 1450 fps.

The 19 Bagder with 33 gr Calhoon bullet, 15.7 gr Re7, will do 3600 fps.
Sighted in at 100 yards:
205 yards -2" 2500 fps
305 yards -10" 2000 fps


19 Badger based on 30 carbine brass

What does it all mean?
There are better cartridges, but not enough better for me to switch from the .223 when shooting gophers.


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