H&R .22 Hornet Accuracy?

[Miller]

I'm considering getting the H&R Lightweight in .22 Hornet.  My only option presently is factory ammunition.  I'm looking to find out preferably from others in a similar situation how accurate their .22 Hornet rifles are.  I'll gladly take all pertinant information.  Thanks in advance.  Miller

[ajj]

I've been trying to work up a load in a friend's H&R Hornet. He doesn't handload, or even shoot very much, and asked me to give it a try. The rifle is one of the few I've seen that has the mannlicher full-length stock, which is unlikely to help accuracy. And in fact the accuracy has been disappointing with handloads, around 2" for the best 5 shot 100 yard groups. Interestingly, it's the ONLY Hornet I've worked with which is more accurate with factory ammo than with handloads. It's shooting around 1.5" with 45gr Winchester sp. That's really not too bad for a standard gun and factory ammo and I think you can reasonably expect yours to shoot at least that well.

[cdbeaver]

My NEF Handi Riflle .22 Hornet will put five shots into right at an inch at a hundred yards, and I've done nothing yet to fine tune it.

Haven't had time to experiment a whole lot with it yet. So far I'm using Hodgdon H110 behind a Hornday 40-grain V-Max. Have some Hodgdon Lil Gun and 35-grain Hornady V-Max bullets waiting in the wings to be tried.

My Handi is equipped with a Leupold M8 4x scope at the moment, but it's about to be upgraded to a Leupold Rifleman 3-9x.

[JohnClif]

I have two single-shot Hornets, a Browning Low Wall and a Ruger 1-B.  

The Browning was acquired later (got it on sale from a distributor for around $500... couldn't pass it up!).  It has beautiful wood and shoots around a half-inch with Hornady 35gr factory loads.

The Ruger 1-B was acquired years ago ('94?).  I love the gun, but it is not as accurate as the Browning.  My best was with handloaded Nosler 40gr BTs and 11.2gr of H110, getting under 1".  This load is hot and case life isn't good, and I'm getting a crhono'd 2870 ft/sec with it.  The reason I went hot is because the load was shooting more accurately as the velocity increased... I think the rifling rate in the 1-B's barrel is slightly slow for this long bullet.

I have some 35gr bullets that I will have to try handloading in both rifles and see how they shoot.  I think they will rescue the 1-B to good accuracy.