Anyone have experience with the .25 Hornet?

[bearmn56]

Heard about this cartridge and read an old article about a .25 Hornet in a Contender. The author found that the 1-14 twist of the Contender had its faults. I love the .25-20 and have two. This cartridge seems to be about ideal with the 257420 70gr cast bullet. Very intriguing......Want to hear what you have to say!!
Bearmn56
Montana Territory

[ddixie884]

Glen Frixell made a blackhawk in .25 hornet, and wrote it up in an article. Go to classics and stickies, and look for his articles.

[BerdanIII]

No 'sperience, but....

From Practical Dope on the Big Bores, F.C. Ness

The .25 Caliber Hornet

Al's idea dated back to Walter Oakey's .25 Hornet squirrel rifle and the nice fifty-yard groups he got with lead bullets and three grains of Hercules Unique. Although all our cartridge experimenters are extremely fond of necking brass down, Walter Oakey and Herbert Longo formed a duo of exceptions who necked the .22 Hornet case up, to take .257-inch bullets. At least on of Longo's loads is shorter than the standard Hornet; but Barr left his full length to just fit the S.A. Colt cylinder with a flat-nose 74-grain bullet properly seated. The overall of this .25 Hornet is slightly shorter than that of the round nose .25 Hornet, both lead-bullet handloads, although the case lengths match.

Al Marciante cut a cherry for a 66-grain bullet and made a mould, but this lighter bullet worked best in Carl Nix's rifle which had a .25 Stevens R.F. barrel and 17-inch pitch of rifling. Although inferior in Barr's two barrels, it was not too bad, with consecutive groups ranging from 3.62 to 4.82 inches at fifty yards in the revolver and from 1.16 to 2.96 inches in the rifle, same distance. In Nix's rifle, the five-shot groups with this bullet ranged from .84 to 2.22 inches. Since the above include all experimental loads, it is obvious that the load, and not the bullet was at fault in some instances. At that, they are all practical squirrel loads in both rifles.

In Barr's rifle the regular revolver load did fairly well, the five-shot groups running 2.85, 0.87, 1.05, 0.64, and 0.76 inches at fifty yards, and 2.48, 2.28, and 1.15 inches at 100 yards. Many combinations have been tried over the past year, in the rifle, but the most accurate were those with the 74-grain gas check No. 257616, sized .2575 inch and with the plain lead bullet, sized .2587 inch. The latter was best with 3.5 grains Unique and the former with 4.0 grains Unique or 6.5 to 7.0 grains Hercules Sharpshooter. The latter propellant has been extensively used as a high-velocity powder in the .25-20 cartridge. These best loads, respectively, gave five-shot groups of 1.08, 1.02, 1.00, and 1.00 inch at fifty yards. The squirrel load consisted of the round-nose, gas check bullet and 3.0 grains weight of either No. 5 or No. 6 Pistol Powder, both of which grouped into less than two inches at fifty yards. The poor resolving power of the 1X Weaver shotgun scope imposed body shots that did not kill well. One squirrel escaped wounded and another had to be hit twice, on body shots. These squirrel loads were zeroed at fifty yards and landed from 6.20 to 6.70 inches below aim at 100 yards. Note the relative impacts of the other loads at both ranges:

3X Wollensak, 66-Grain Lead, .2587 inch (5-Shot Groups)
7.0 grs. No. 4759 1.27 inches 0.50 inches low
7.3 grs. No. 4759 1.48 inches 0.50 inches low
7.6 grs. No. 4759 1.05 inches 0.43 inches low
7.0 grs. No. 2400 1.63 inches 0.70 inches low
7.5 grs. No. 2400 1.84 inches 0.00 inches
7.6 grs. No. 4759 0.98 inches 0.32 inches low
________________________________________
1X Weaver Shotgun, 74-Grain, 7.0 Grs. No. 2400
Plain Base -.2587 inch - 1.06 inches - 0.95 inches high
Plain base - .2587 inch - 2.28 inches - 0.00 inches …
Gas Check - .2587 inch - 1.97 inches - 0.75 inches high
Gas Check - .2575 inch - 1.03 inches - 0.22 inches low
64 gr. Lead - .2587 inch - 1.70 inches - 0.70 inches high
3.5 gr. Unique - .2575 inch - 1.35 inches - 1.00 inches high
5.0 Bulk Shotgun - 2.28 inches - 0.50 inches high
________________________________________
3X Lyman Expert 74-Grain Bullet
6.8 Grains Sharpshooter
Gas Check - .2575 inch - 1.50 inches - 0.60 inches low
Gas Check - .2575 inch - 1.06 inches - 0.30 inches high
Plain base - .2575 inch - 0.84 inches - 0.97 inches high
7.0 Grains No. 4759
Plain base - .2587 inch - 0.64 inches - 0.30 inches high
Plain base - .2587 inch - 0.73 inches - 0.60 inches high
Gas Check - .2587 inch - 0.87 inches - 0.47 inches high
Plain base - .2587 inch - 0.46 inches - 0.00 inches…
Plain base - .2587 inch - 1.14 inches - 0.50 inches high
Plain base - .2575 inch - 1.70 inches - 0.70 inches high
74-Grain Gas Check, 7.0 Grains Powder
.2587 inch - No. 2400 - 0.97 inches - 0.30 inches high
.2575 inch - Sharpshooter - 0.95 inches - 0.00 inches…
.2575 inch - Sharpshooter - 1.50 inches - 0.15 inches high
________________________________________
3X Weaver 29-S, 74-Grain, 7.0 Grains No. 4759 (5-Shot Groups)
Bullet Size Group 50-yd. Impact 100-yd. Group & Impact
Gas Check .2587 inch 0.76 inches 0.57 inches high 1.15 inches, 5.37 high
Plain base .2587 inch 2.85 inches 4.80 inches high 2.48 inches, 6.40 high
Plain base .2575 inch 1.05 inches 0.90 inches high 2.28 inches, 3.55 low

Plain Base .2587 Inch & No. 2400 Powder
7.0 grains PB, .2587 inch 2.72 inches 0.00 inches… 4.02 inches, 2.50 low
7.5 grains PB, .2587 inch 1.38 inches 4.75 inches high 3.12 inches, 5.25 high
8.0 grains PB, .2587 inch 2.26 inches 3.85 inches high 6.12 inches, 4.35 high
8.0 grains PB, .2587 inch 200 yards 12.90 inches low 6.32 inches, Spread
8.0 grains GC, .2575 inch 2.94 inches 3.05 inches high 3.98 inches, 4.00 high
9.0 grains GC, .2575 inch 2.30 inches 1.00 inches high 4.83 inches, 2.20 high
9.0 grains GC, .2575 inch 200 yards 8.05 inches low 6.18 inches, Spread
________________________________________
The 200-yard groups of less than 6½ inches with both loads is very good, as small-size .25 caliber loads go, normally, and the relative drop of the 9.0-grain load is flat shooting for such a cartridge. The drop is less than that of the .25-20 High Velocity, 86-grain, factory bullet but greater than that of the 60-grain HiSpeed bullet, which would indicate a velocity, for this particular charge, in the neighborhood of 2000 f.s.m.v. (The chronographed velocities of both revolver and rifle will be appended if they arrive in time for publication). The ten-shot groups with the 60-grain bullet at fifty yards measured 1.88 and 1.84 inches. The one fired with 7.0 grains weight of No. 4759 had seven in 1.03 inches, and that shot with the 7.3-grain charge had the same number of its bullets in .97 inch. That is good enough, but the .25 Rim Fire barrel on Carl Nix's rifle gave finer accuracy. One of its groups, fired from bench rest with the 438 Lyman scope, was made up of a dozen odd cartridges loaded by Al Barr for his own rifle and it comprised six different combinations. Yet all twelve shots made 1.18 inches with ten in .92 inch.

With the 66-grain Marciante bullet, Carl's five-shot fifty-yard groups are uniformly good. With 7.1 and 7.3 grains No. 2400 they ran 1.05, 1.15, and .80 inches. With 6.8 and 7.1 grains No. 4759; .84, 2.22, 1.40, 1.72, 1.32, and 1.00 inches, consecutively; also; .85, 1.23, .83, .68, and .54 inch. The penultimate load had pistol priming, most of the others W.R.A. 116 rifle primers. Barr's rifle and revolver maybe somewhat more versatile in handling all makes of components and all types of loads with a preference for Remington components with No. 4759 powder.

There are two versions of the .25 Longo, but there is not much difference essentially between any pair of cartridges in this .25 Hornet group. On October 21, 1945, Herbert Longo got 2900 f.s. with the 60-grain .25-20 bullet registered by the Barnes ballistic pendulum.

On my millimeter micrometer, the .25-20 60-grain bullet mikes 6.503mm or .256 inch. The latter is practically the groove diameter of all true .25-caliber barrels and is the bore diameter of the 6.5mm and .256 Newton and .256 Norwegian Krag and other foreign .25's.

Note: I modified the layout of the tables because they were a mess as published and I didn't know how they'd show up after being pasted into the reply box.

.25 Hornet case dimensions:
OAL: 1.320"
Base to bottom of shoulder: .910"
Neck length: 0.350"
Case dia. above rim: 0.298"
Case dia. at bottom of shoulder: 0.291"
Case dia. at mouth: 0.274"

From: Handbook for Shooters and Reloaders, P.O. Ackley

.25 Hornet

The .25 Hornet is simply the .22 Hornet necked up to .26 which produces sort of a .32/20 in miniature. This is probably a very old cartridge but it was publicized to some extent by H.R. Longo who developed his version of the cartridge for use in relatively weak single shot rifles such as the Ballard. It is a good cartridge to use to bring these old rifles back to life. This cartridge can be loaded with 12 grains of 2400 powder with the 67 grain bullet for a velocity of 2000 fs and this load develops very low pressure making it easy on actions which are not too strong.

60-gr bullet
8.0 - 2400 - 1525 fs
11.0 - 2400 - 2035

86-gr bullet
6.0 - 2400 - 955
10.0 - 2400 - 1675

Standard twist: 16"

Shoulda read Fryxell's article first: good, current data.

[stubshaft]

No experience with the 25 Hornet. But have shot alot of 270REN which is the Hornet blown open and slightly shortened. I currently holds the recod as THE MOST ACCURATE Contender pistol cartridge that I own (the rifle category goes to my 219 Donaldson Wasp). It has shot 50yd groups of under 1/4" with a 10" barrel. Keep us posted on the 25 Hornet as I may be interested in getting another Tender barrel.