Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles Recoil from a 17 Fireball

Seafire, when necking down to17 cal. Is neck turning nessasary? If so how would one tell how much? Myhunt pard has a 17 fireball and is crying about the lack of brass....
Allan

Allan: whether neck turning is necessary will be dependent on the individual chamber; I do not have to neck turn for the 17MIV I currently have, but did for a previous rifle. How generous Remington is on their factory chamber neck clearance is unknown to me.
Have your pard measure a fired case neck o.d., and I can tell how it compares to a necked down 221 Fireball.
Using 222 or 223 will be another story....neck almost certain to need turning.
Added: 221 necked to 17MIV/unfired ---0.198" neck

Greg

Thanks Mulerider; Italked to him and he has some fireball standard cases and will resize them and measure. He will stick me with turning them if needed, as he has no turner.
Allan

It took three more messages for me to get Remington to say that they think 17FB brass will be available in 2008. They suggested that I contact them again when the new products announcements are made in '08.

This does not help much, but it was all I could get from them.

Steve

Buddy had a 17 mk IV rimmed for his contender. It's the closest thing to a recoil less rifle that I've ever fired. It makes noise like a real gun, but you just can't feel it go off.

All this talk about 1 lb recoil gets me thinking, can anyone tell me the recoil of.....

20 Vartag
204 Ruger
223 Rem
22-250
243 Win

If you know, I'd appreciate it, just trying to "imagine" what the ones I don't have experience feel like vs. the ones I do know. Obviously bullet weight will vary recoil some.

J

Hey Jason, if you haven't played with this thing, you'll have a lot of fun. It's a real eye-opener.
http://www.huntamerica.com/recoil_calculator

Edited to add, that I can't believe a thread about "17 recoil" has lasted two months!!!

I'll have to pull out the reloading manual tonight and check out some recoil calcs.

Thanks.

...ain't that a fact--and 5 pgs. to boot.

More "17" lovers AND haters are coming "out of the closet" by the minute!! LOL!

Rumor is that Weatherby is coming out with a new 17 caliber based upon the 460 case....


sorry, just thought I would join in and cause some trouble.
Elk

Elk - THAT is funny.

They call it...." Lightning, by Weatherby"!!!

One shot, one kill.........(the barrel)

The CDL SF LTD has been holding a good share of my attention for a good share of the summer. Just picked up a SPS V as the recoil was getting to me with the lighter CDL. I am anxious to see how the longer tube fits this caliber with the SPS V.

To bad the CDL was looking to good to take into the field.

Hunterapp: I was so worried about the recoil of the 17 MachIV custom Varminter I had made back in 1995 that I had the Riflesmith order a very heavy Varmint contour barrel from the folks at Shilen and had him make the barrel 26 1/2" long! The Rifle weighs 12 pounds 10 ounces with Leupold 6.5x20 scope!
Recoil has been "subdued" to nothing (even when using the behemoth 25 gr. Berger slugs!).
Now with my brand newish Remington 700 VSF with its wimpy 26" factory Varmint barrel, I can barely stand the repeated poundings from the 20 gr. projectiles.
I even made up some handloads using the aforementioned Berger "Big Boys" (25 grainers!) on a dare.
Seriously though I have had no problems at all with my 26" barreled 17 Remington Fireball. I have not chronographed my handloads as yet but will do so when Big Game season winds down here in a few weeks.
The Fox around here are getting prime fur on them as of recent - I am in the mood to see how the 17 Fireball does on one of them!
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

I finally got to put my hands on a Rem SPS Varmint Version of the 17 Fireball...

nothing to do with the round.. just the rifles features...

I didn't care for the stock at all, on the SPS Varmint... I'd replace that thing ASAP..

The other disappointment was that the magazine has a spacer in it making it very very short...
This may be fine for a walking varminter, but as for myself, I would want the magazine length of a 223.. which I would put a benchrest follower in it, to make it a single shot anyway....

So in doing one of these, I am going to do a rebarrel... Shaw is chambering both the 17 Fireball and the 20 VarTag also, along with the 20 Tactical and 204...looks like that is the route I will go...

Hey VG, good to see you over here!!!

cheers
seafire

Seafire: Thanks for that.
YOU are my HERO!
My good friend Jack from Yelm, Washington bought a Remington 700 SPS Varmint Model about 4 months ago! He did not like the stock either so he sent to Remington a check for $232.00 and got a VLS (Varmint laminated stock) back from them!
He loves this stock. While he was waiting for the stock to come he polished the "matte finish" off of the bolt! That turned out so shiney and nice that he then polished the complete barrel! He know has a partially shiney partially matte finished Remington Varminter in 17 Remington Fireball!
He has mounted a Bausch & Lomb 8x32 variable scope on it and has 5 boxes of factory ammo for it AND he STILL has not shot the Rifle even once!
I sure hope he does not have to send that Remington back for warranty work - I can just hear the Remington worker saying "what the heck is this"!
The magazine of my 700 VSF has been long enough for my handloads with 25 grain bullets - I don't plan on trying the 30's so I may be safe with my magazine as is! I assume its the same as the SPS-V magazine well (spacer?)?
It was like pulling my Wisdom Teeth with no Novacaine when I "had" to spend the extra $340.00 or so for the 700 VSF over the 700 SPS-V!
I did not care for the stock on the SPS-V either so I went with the more expensive and VERY attractive VSF model!
I really enjoy the new trigger on the 700's though - I am very impressed with the ultra-crisp and consistent trigger on the VSF. It is a joy to shoot with.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

My brother and I built matchining 17 MachIV's. They are awesome rifles and probably our favorites. Both were built with the Zastava actions being used in the 'new' Remington 799s with Shilen barrels. We haven't tried 30s yet, but it sounds interesting. With 25 Vmaxs we consistently get sub MOA at 200 yds and I have taken numerous feral cats, raccoons, skunks and Oposums at up to 200yds.
Our favorite load is now the 20 gr over Varget giving us 4150fps. This lighter bullet seems to really like these rifles giving better than half MOA performance. It also seems to anchor the game better than either 25g VMaxs or HPFB Hornadys.
With the 25 grainers recoil is minimal and I can always see the shot. With the 20 grainers, recoil does not exist.

Vince, What twist rate did you and your brother get your Shilen barrels rifled? If you are not working with a 1 in 9 or faster you may do well to stay with the lighter bullets that are proven performers for you and your brother.

The reason I mention this is that Berger recommends 1 in 9 or faster twist rate for their 17 cal 30-grain pills. And most 17 mach IV's have been given a 1 in 10 twist. If you are UN sure you can test for your self, easy enough.
Just make two witness marks on your cleaning rod 1 foot apart. Then simply count turns while pushing a tight fitting patch through the bore, using the witness marks to reference distance of travel of course.

Years late and I apologize for that,
The twist is 1:10 which is probably why those 20gr run so well.
We continue to shoot these rifles with great results. We have backed the loads down a little as we occasionally ran into some signs of high pressure with the primers. The Rem 7 1/2 seemed to have more problems that the CCI - go figure since the Rem 7 1/2 were made for cartridges like this. Now running around 4000fps. Our cases are longer than the std MachIV or Fireball and have a slightly higher case capacity. Pacific Tool screwed up our reamers and we have case necks .100 longer than the Mach IV or Fireball. It was a heck of a disapointment because we now have a really off cartridge, but I believe the longer case necks help in bullet presentation to the throat and the case capacity is a minor plus.