Had a .22 Hornet in a Savage mod 23 (pawn shop find) way back when rather young, and it shot lights out even with that side mount for the scope. Somehow or other I managed to get a small gouge in the chamber and it caused case ejection to become rough, then difficult. I tried to clean it up and the one-piece barrel/action setup defeated that. So, I figured out the way to clean it up would be to ream it out to K Hornet.
I wrote to Clymer (no e-mail in the early 60s) and asked them if they would make a K Hornet reamer with a long shank so I could go in through the action end. They wrote back - said it would be more costly than I would wish, but told me of a gunsmith customer who had one. I called him about the issue - he was nice to lend me the reamer - mailed it - went into Yuma to a small machine shop/gun guy and we make a K Hornet in about 15 minutes. Wish things would still work that way.
The K Hornet was just a bit more punchy than the original and still shot lights out. Local guys seemed enamored of that little rifle and eventually sold it for a lot more than I had in it. Went back to the same pawn shop and got a nice Win Model 54 in .22 Hornet. Haven't sold that one.
