Guess it's time I got back to you guys. Ty Kemp sent me a note you've been talking about me. Just found this thread finally. Thanks Ty.
Wife died end of '03, I'm looking for a new mate, so have been haunting the dating site's and doing some of it. So far, still in the same boat though. Otherwise I'm doing fine, much better than last yr. Though now am having teeth pulled and trying to get uppers. Dentists sure are greedy!! Won't be a new trk/car, or more guns this yr, for sure.
Ok, on the .17x28. Ty's mistaking, I fwd'd pic's Foxhunter/Saubier sent me of the crows he killed with his in a CZ bolt gun. I've only killed 9 for 9 prairie dogs less than 100yds with it. Impressive there.
I used a NEF: HMR barrel on a .223 action, not sure which one, seems like it was a SB2, am not sure there. IT was the one I got from a fellow here from Austin Tx though. Had a dozen petty PITA hassle's with it. Reamer was too tight a neck. Was told about it ahead of time. Not knowing what that meant, I told the guy it didn't matter to me. Ended up it was a major hurdle causing blown out shoulders as the case couldn't move when fire forming. Sent the barrel to Reno to a buddy with a neck reamer that opened it up from .195" to .203", that solved the problem. Reamer also was shorter necked/longer bodied than foxhunter's. So it's a one of a kind chamber which is not good. While waiting on getting the work done on it, went ahead and loaded 330 rnds according to foxhunters specs. Had to pull them all down and fireform the case's. Oh man!!!!
Case wouldn't fit as the ejector? Wouldn't give enough to snap over the rim. Fellow on here agreed to tinker with things and got that fixed up. Will leave him nameless unless he wants to speak up. Spent a lot of hours making petty sized parts I could never afford to of paid the man what his time was worth. Did pay what he asked though, for his time, he worked mighty cheap. Among other things, he thinned the ejector down to about 1/16" so it would have room to work. Made a tiny pin w/spring to push it into place and hold the case in.
Once I got the gun back. Was trying to find max charge w/H110. 10.0gr, fired 5 x's in the same case. Worked fine. Upped it to 10.2gr and blew the primer/hole out to 1/4" dia. busted the ejector he'd thinned down, blew the plastic trigger guard up. Drew a little blood but, nothing major wrecked, just got mighty lucky is all. Once it was fixed, I milled a new ejector from tool steel & tempered it now, to the same specs he'd made the cast part to.
It's an inch shooter @ 150yds. Sure does a JOB on p.dogs, but, haven't been able to get back out since early summer last yr. Most of the p/d's around these parts died off last yr too.
10.0gr H110, or 1680 w/20gr V'max==3450fps.
Contact me by e'm if you'd like more details on this project. I've got about $330 in it total, incl the gun. This was my first wildcat. So had a lot to learn. Lots of good advice and help along the way, am very grateful for the two guys that worked on it for me. Really, they did the fixings. Without them it would never have been completed.