Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Ross Seyfried on the 22 Hornet

Youse guys are comparing apples to oranges. Elmer came from an era of lead cores with light jackets, a proven performance disaster at higher velocities...what worked?.... big heavy wide diameter bullets. Ross in a much later era had the benefit of smaller lighter bullets driven fast and still holding together with good success. In other words, they were both correct...using the products of their time. BTW...they were friends. Seyfried was more than a pimple too, he put Linebaugh on the map when he used a .45 Colt Linebaugh to dump a cape buffalo without drama. As far as the Hornet goes, Ross' recipe just works in a variety of rifles...if you don't like it...don't use it, you need not trash talk the man.

yep some of Elmer Keith`s stuff is interesting but in my 69 years of life i have always notice little guys like Elmer like big things makes them feel bigger i guess ? we always called it little man syndrome , Elmer Keith`s books were kinda boring . i enjoyed and felt writers like Colonel Townsend Whelen were better reading and more accurate on his reloading for his times. and to be real honest John Barsness books are very excellent and John / Mule Deer is always been very helpful on 24 hr. Campfire with his own experiences with reloading ,his hunting and knowledge about guns too . guys he is working dang cheap for us too, so ask him questions and buy his books ,i do own all of their books including his Wife Ellen`s recipe books that i give also for presents to the ladies in my life. >> now if i can only get Ellen to send me some chocolate chip cookies ? "grin and a wink " Pete53

I always enjoyed Seyfried's articles. He was a good story teller and wrote based on experience. He also had lots of neat rifles.

I lusted after "olde yella". As I remember, it was a Mauser in a ridiculous (and sexy) maple stock, chambered for 338-378KT (I think) and believe it's prior owner was Keith.

Someone (MuleDeer ah-hem) should do an article on Seyfried's rifles.

Same here, always turned right to Seyfried's articles in G&A. The history of the old rifles and cartridges are pretty danged cool to me, the ones that were spawned to kill elk and deer at further ranges.

My favorite Ross story is the one where his lady friend went hunting on an estate with some dinky, iron-sighted single-shot. The managers told her she could have all the game she killed with that popgun for free. Soon after, they were begging her to go bird hunting or anything besides what she’d been hammering with her little cannon.

Ross could tell a good story

Link to the article?

41Rem: I have had a love hate relationship with Rifles in caliber 22 Hornet for well over half a century now.
Owned most all of them (Rifles in 22 Hornet caliber) from Anschutz to Winchester and MANY, MANY in between.
Never really had any what I would call "accurate" Rifles in 22 Hornet - try as I might.
About thirty years ago I bought a new, stunningly beautiful, Ruger #1-B in 22 Hornet and as beautiful as it was it would NOT shoot well!
I tried everything and did so for many years - then a fellow CampFirer on this forum suggested I try "nickel plated brass" and the then newish Hornady 35 grain V-Max bullets in my Hornet.
I did so and immediately that 2.000"+ grouping 22 Hornet shot a 5 shot group at 100 yards that measured .778"!
I recall that fellow CampFirer mentioning way back then that "neck tension" was/is critical in his accuracy obtaining with his 22 Hornets.
Whichever it was (the new neck tension of the nickel plated brass or the new to me Hornday 35 grain V-Max bullets) - that load is what I use today in that beautifully stocked Ruger #1-B.
I would LOVE to read Mr. Seyfried's article on the 22 Hornet - any suggestion on how to?
TIA
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy
P.S.: I have a Leupold 6x18 variable power scope on that Ruger #1-B - and its "twin" that I also bought new (a Ruger #1-B in caliber 218 Bee - also afixed with a Leupold 6x18 variable scope!) about the same time, shot quite well, from the get-go, with my beloved Sierra 50 grain Blitz (not BlitzKing!) bullets?
In other words I think the shape of the 22 Hornet case (and its neck?) has something to do with its tendency to be inaccurate?

Craigster: Thank you for that link - you must have posted it while I was typing and checking my records.
Thanks again.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Great article. I enjoyed reading that!

VARMINT GUY the K-Hornet is more accurate but not really much faster. Big Stick knows it too

That article is part of a pair, the other in RIFLE, about Hornet rifles naturally. I forget which one came first, but they were in successive issues.

I remember Seyfried wrote about Hornets back in Guns and Ammo in the 1980's. Recommended an about to be discontinued Winchester powder with small pistol primers as being the most accurate combo. Growing up in the UK, shooting my Dad's beautiful BSA mini Mauser Hunter rifle in .22 Hornet, I thought I had the holy grail of loads. I found the last 4 pounds of that powder in the UK and still have a couple pounds left. I love the Hornet and still have the BSA as well as a Ruger. Ross was a pleasure to read and he writes very well.

Ross's articles were what compelled me to buy various .22 Hornets--starting with a T/C Contender Carbine in the "standard" Hornet. His comments were very helpful, though I eventually decided another factor was perhaps more important in the "superior" accuracy of the K-Hornet.

Also, my second .22 Hornet, a Ruger No. 1B obtained directly from the factory in 2003, was FAR more accurate than his earlier 1B--probably because by that time Ruger had been hammer-forging their own barrels for around a decade, and were really good at it. With it's best load my rifle would put TEN shots into around 3/4" at 100 yards.

Have owned two K-Hornets, one a CZ 527 and the other a Brno of similar lineage to the one Ross mentions. I eventually decided, due to considerable testing, that an equally important factor in K-Hornet accuracy is the straight-sided cases can't tilt nearly as much in sizing dies as the tapered "standard" cases. Discovered this by measuring both neck and seated bullet run-out during various tests.

Eventually I decided to sell my Ruger No. 1B (which which I'd take thousands of prairie dogs out to 400+ yards) to pete53, partly because I realized I didn't use it nearly as much after buying a superbly accurate CZ 527 .17 Hornady Hornet years ago--which proved to be superior when shooting small "colony rodents."

But eventually also discovered I wasn't "over" the .22 Hornet--and a couple years ago acquired another single-shot through the Campfire Classifieds, a BSA Martini that has originally been a .22 Long Rifle target rifle, but had been rechambered and converted to centerfire. It turned out to shoot my handloads for the Ruger 1B just about as accurately!

I first met Ross in 1998 on a black bear hunt on Vancouver Island, sponsored by Federal when they brought out a 12-gauge slug load with Barnes Expanders. The outfitter was Jim Shockey, a few years before he became really famous, and the "camp" was a group of travel trailers on the shore of a bay on the north end of the island. Ross, of course, brought an old rifled-barrel side-by-side 12-gauge double made by a British company, which happened to shoot the Federal load to the point of aim. The drive into camp was about 4 hours, and he actually got his bear on the way into camp, spotting one from the logging road--which is the common way of hunting on the island, due to clearcuts being about the only place you can glass (or even see) bears.

We ended up rooming together in one of the trailers, and I got my bear a day or so later, after a long stalk on a big clearcut. So we started fishing, and collecting mussels to eat at dinner, and got to talk about a lot of things. I told him that I considered him the best gun writer in America, and he confessed that he was unhappy at GUNS & AMMO, and was thinking of writing for Wolfe--which has been my main gun-writing market for about 6-7 years. I told him about being happy with Wolfe, and he made the move within the next year.

Haven't seen or talked to Ross in quite a while now, but have always liked his articles in THE DOUBLE-GUN & SINGLE-SHOT JOURNAL. But would if he ever writes a book would be among the first customers.

Thanks JB

I'd love to have his sweet little reworked Kimber, wonder how well it feeds those 7 Hornets from the internal magazine??

Cool stuff JB..

Thanks!

I didn't start gun writing almost full-time until the late 1990s. Before then was a full-time writer, but wrote for a variety of magazines, including Gray's Sporting Journal, Sports Illustrated and National Geographic on a variety of subjects, including natural history, Western history, fishing (especially fly-fishing), etc. But eventually gun writing started taking over more and more of my time. Learned a lot from Ross, who'd been in the gun-writing business far longer, both by reading his articles and talking with him.

I think a lot of folks shape who we are by what we read until the internet became a thing. My grandpa got me a subscription to Guns and Ammo, kept getting it for me till I was a Sgt in the USMC. Seyfried’s articles on stuff that was crazy to a young man in deer country always kept my attention. 585 Nyati, 475 Linebaugh on Buffalo, the 2 shot group in a hunting rifle, the 300 and 338 G&A, Blackpowder double guns, etc.

I know I’m forgetting a ton but man it was interesting stuff for a lad that didn’t see much in his area other than 270, 30-06’s and 12 gauges…

Another good turn Ross did for me was with regard to my .54 Pedersoli Mortimer flintlock. He had the same model and did a piece on how he modified the touchhole to make it fast and reliable. Spot on!

He ended up shooting a fine old muley buck with his, but mine went down the road in support of higher education.