Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Stevens 325 in .22 Hornet

Bought this a while back and only shot a few rounds through it to check function. Had to cobble together a scope mount for it, former owner drilled and tapped it, but the holes were high enough on the receiver that the Weaver side base put the scope way over the top and to one side. The contour worked so I used the base and some aluminum bar stock and some old rings I had and now have a mount that puts a scope down as low over the bore as can be and still have the bolt work. Threw on an old 4x Bushnell I had lying around and went to the range with some squirrel loads I had for my Savage 219 (Lyman 225438, without gas check, 2 grains of Bullseye and small pistol primer).

AT 25 yards, realistic small game range, it's a one hole rifle. When it wasn't, I could attribute it to being my fault. Easily squirrel head accurate. It is a nice handling rifle, but feels clumsy still compared to that 219. Still, it is more accurate. I think I'm going to like this rifle a lot. Doubt I'll ever buy another .22 Rimfire, these Hornets do it better and cheaper and I can reload it.

Sweet. I picked up a Savage 322 a year or two ago. It was marked @ $125. The ejector didn't work but it was filthy and needed a real cleaning. Snatched it up, took it home, cleaned it well. And low and behold it functioned perfectly and the bore was excellent!

I bought it for the same reasons you did, I can load it for less than 22 lr ammo costs.

Actually, I should have said 322 as that's what I think it is (butterknife bolt handle).

As per gnoahh's recommendation earlier, I'm going to try some of the Lee Bator bullets and a charge of 2400, hope it is as accurate in this one as initially in my 219 or more so.

Good going, Rich. Lots o' fun in your future with that rig!

I never would have thought casting and loading for a .22 Hornet would be so much fun. I'd always heard what a PITA the Hornet is to load for and I enjoyed almost instant success for what I wanted to do with it and haven't ruined a case yet, which I always heard was a problem because of the thin brass.

Nobody is gonna hold me hostage to .22 LR ammo shortages again, I can assure you of that.

Bingo! What I've been saying all along.

I wish I could find some of these for $125, I'd buy every one I could find. Good score.

You don't post something like this without pictures!

Here's a pic of mine. I'm pretty happy with it. I have a 325 in .30-30 that makes a nice companion.

My old man bought a 340 .30-30 new in 1956. I was 3 years old and remember going with him to buy it. It represented the epitome of big game hunting rifles to me in my single-digit years. It sparked a Savage collecting fever in him in his later years. As my taste in guns matured I started to look down on that homely but utilitarian rifle, and then one day it became mine, tragically. I carried it deer hunting a few times in Pop's honor but never killed anything with it except a running fox at around 50 yards, shot through its eye- but that's a story for another day. It's in one of my nephews hands now.

One of my uncle's carried a 322 .22 Hornet for Pennsylvania deer hunting for a bunch of years back in the 50's-60's. He killed a couple of freezers-full of deer with it, all purportedly one shot kills up until the last one that he had to stick a magazine-full into. At that point he hung up the Hornet as a deer rifle and went whole-hog with a scoped Amish Assault Rifle (Remington 760 .30-06).

All that is to say I have mixed feelings about the 320-340 line of Savages. If one fell in my lap I wouldn't shove it away, but I don't seek them out. (Pretty much my philosophy about heavy-set but pretty women, too!)