Thread: .17 ackley hornet

I've got a 1949 BRNO 465 Hornet rebarrelled with a Green Mountain barrel. The cartridges feed and extract OK - the shoulder of the case is fairly sharp. Had a BRNO fox 17AH with a Shilen barrel, a few years ago which also fed well. It is an easy wildcat cartridge. Getting the dies is a bit of a performance, and an expensive one at that but you don't need forming dies, just polish the interior well and start the 22 Hornet case in the seater die. Getting the reamer is easy, just email a reamer company in the USA; but also expensive. I use old Dupont IMR4198 for about 3400ft/sec, using a 25gr Hornady HP and CCI match primers. There was a range of Berger bullets available as well but Berger has cut back their options. The standard powder is VV120 which is not particularly available in NZ but there are a few other powders that work OK. There are excellent hand made bullets from the USA but it is difficult to get them to NZ. So, bullets are basically Hornady 25 grain HP, 25 grain plastic tip, 20 grain plastic tip. You will need a 1:9 twist barrel for the longer 25 grain plastic tip. Brass is easy: either Winchester for slightly thicker brass, or Remington for slightly thinner brass and slightly more capacity. The Remington brass is more consistent in weight.