Need old wildcat help- Vintage Varmint Sniper rifle related

[Charger442]

I myself am a 35 year .250 Savage (.250-3000) shooter and have several rifles chambered as such. Fantastic cartridge, not a long range gun at all. But i have killed deer out to 350 yards with it. anyway....

My question for this thread today is on a wildcat of that wildcat that i cannot find any information on. Apparently, there are some guns i have come across that are supposedly chambered in a ".22-250-3000" caliber. Does anyone know anything about this cartridge? is it just an old "nomenclature" for the 22-250 which was wildcatted from the 250 savage? Thats kind of what i am leaning towards.

from '37-'63 it was a purely custom barreling and cartridge, until Browning started to sell rifles in 22-250. Hoping someone has some insight for me on what that cartridge really is and if i am even close with it being another name for a 22-250.

 

[Son of Dorn]

The Norma website says this on its .22-250 Remington page:

Originally this was a wildcat cartridge made by necking down the .250-3000 savage to .22 caliber. It is not known exactly when or by whom it was made first, but most sources credits the US gunmaker J.E. Gebby as being first, calling his design .22 Varminter. This was in 1937, but since the parent case has been around since 1915 it is quite possible that some anonymous wildcatters were way ahead of the well-known gunmakers.

Possibly the ".22-250-3000" rifles were originally .25-3000 Savage ones that had been rebarrelled for the pre-Remington version of the wildcat cartridge and were marked to reflect the change? A brief Google search came up with pretty much zip, but I did find two rifles:

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Griffin & Howe - 22/250/3000 - .22-3000 caliber

Griffin & Howe - 22/250/3000 - .22-3000 caliber for sale online.

www.gunsinternational.com

One of them's been sold of course, but since it appears to have been sold by Griffin & Howe, who also made it to begin with, I'd maybe email them to see if they can tell you.

 

[Charger442]

Possibly the ".22-250-3000" rifles were originally .25-3000 Savage ones that had been rechambered for the pre-Remington version of the wildcat cartridge and were marked to reflect the change? A brief Google search came up with pretty much zip, but I did find two rifles:

well, a rechamber i cant really see since your going from .257 dia to .224 dia. it would be a complete rebarrel. i saw that one from Griffin but i bet they dont know anything about it. i think its a naming convention issue, rather than a new caliber.

 

[Son of Dorn]

well, a rechamber i cant really see since your going from .257 dia to .224 dia. it would be a complete rebarrel. i saw that one from Griffin but i bet they dont know anything about it. i think its a naming convention issue, rather than a new caliber.

I misspoke and changed it to "rebarrelled".

Naming issues is probably what it is, after giving it some more thought. If it said ".22/250-3000", then I'd say it was just a generic way of saying ".250 Savage Necked Down to .22" when there wasn't a set name for the cartridge.

 

[mmlj]

Agree with the above poster that this indicates the cartridge is the 250-3000 Savage necked down to 22 caliber. It probably was done before the cartridge, 22-250, was legitimized.

 

[sandwarrior]

The history of cartridge naming confuses things even more. The original .250-3000 had the '3000' dropped sometime in the 1920's. the twist changed three times over it's regular production life. But, some people who knew it as the .250-3000 never give up on that. Just like the model 1899 it was chambered in. The '18' got dropped in 1926. Some people still call it the 1899.

For any exact knowledge of 'when' it was transformed, there were a bunch of old names we know today that chambered that cartridge in the 1920's. Jacketed .223" and .224" bullets came out in that decade. Pretty much the reason the .22 Hi Power went away. It used .228" bullets and you couldn't find them. Other notable wildcat cartridges of the time were the .219 Zipper, 219 Donaldson Wasp and the .22 Remington Varmint (.25 Rem necked to .224") The .220 Swift came out in 1935 and the .218 Bee came out in 1938. Both based on cases Winchester originally built pre-century (6mm Lee Navy, 32-20). The .22 Wildcat, Varminter, Rockchucker, Pdogger, which was SAAMI'd by Remington as the .22-250 in 1965 was no exception. It's been getting built in one form or another since 1920.

As you can see, Griffin & Howe jumped on that bandwagon, as did A.O. Niedner (called his a rockchucker, cuz that's what he shot with it). Ned Roberts joined in. Newton who devoloped the .250-3000 and the .300 Savage. P.O. Ackley was already designing wildcats when he got his engineering degree in 1932. All kinds of names come up when dealing with a wildcat like that.

So, that brings us to what you actually have. If you can run cases through .22-250 dies and not change the case headspace (up to .006") you can load and run that as is. How do regular .22-250 factory loads fit? If the headspace is off, get it to a gunsmith and cut a new .22-250 chamber if you want to shoot it. If you hope it's collectible, then leave it as is and don't shoot it.

 

[RTH1800]

Early on the 22-250 was called 22-250/3000. Then in the mid to late 1930's J. E. Gebby trademarked it as the 22 Varminter. It was a financial move that set the cartridge back for 20 years or more. Your rifle is a 22-250.

 

[NineHotel]

A wildcat on that wildcat - don't really understand what you are trying to say here.

22-250 is a 250 Savage case necked down to 22. No shortage of info available on it. I neck up 22-250 brass to 6mm for a 6mm/250. No shortage of info out there on that as well.

My dad had, oh 50 years ago, a varmiter based on the 257 Roberts case necked down to 22.

If you have any doubt of a barrel's chambering, take a casting of the chamber and measure it.

 

[sandwarrior]

Early on the 22-250 was called 22-250/3000. Then in the mid to late 1930's J. E. Gebby trademarked it as the 22 Varminter. It was a financial move that set the cartridge back for 20 years or more. Your rifle is a 22-250.

Gebby was the one that by 'trademarking' it, owned the rights to it. Smart move on his part, but yeah, set the cartridge's development back a number of years.

 

[ZG47A]

Gebby changed the shoulder angle to 28 degrees, in order to trademark his version. If a rifle is marked 22-.250-3000, it is probable that it has the original .250 Savage shoulder angle. A chamber cast would be a good idea if you do not have any fired cases to examine.

 

[sirhrmechanic]

Gebby changed the shoulder angle to 28 degrees, in order to trademark his version. If a rifle is marked 22-.250-3000, it is probable that it has the original .250 Savage shoulder angle. A chamber cast would be a good idea if you do not have any fired cases to examine.

I may be wrong... But I think that the .250 Savage had a 28 degree shoulder as well. It was the .250 Ackley that had the 40 degrees shoulder angle.

A 'run of the mill' .250 Savage shows a shoulder angle of 26 degrees, 30 minutes. so 26.5 degrees. Though some drawings show it as 30 degrees... I don't think this is correct. So I am with @sandwarrior that the rifle is a .22-250... with old markings on it.

I am wondering if it is worth fire forming a case. If a .22-250 will chamber, fill it with a light powder load and see if you can get a case to fireform. Should be safe as long as you can get a case to chamber... and don't try for 4,000 FPS! If it won't chamber... then do a chamber cast. But I think it should.

Neat rifle... you know that the SAS (both Brit and Aus) adopted .22/250 sniper rifles in the 1980's to avoid over-penetration in urban areas. Northern Ireland was not a place to be whinging .30 cal's off in all directions. The .22-250 had so much hydrostatic shock that it was highly-effective! And like shooting a laser at urban ranges.

Sirhr

 

[Son of Dorn]

I may be wrong... But I think that the .250 Savage had a 28 degree shoulder as well. It was the .250 Ackley that had the 40 degrees shoulder angle.

A 'run of the mill' .250 Savage shows a shoulder angle of 26 degrees, 30 minutes. so 26.5 degrees. Though some drawings show it as 30 degrees... I don't think this is correct. So I am with @sandwarrior that the rifle is a .22-250... with old markings on it.

I am wondering if it is worth fire forming a case. If a .22-250 will chamber, fill it with a light powder load and see if you can get a case to fireform. Should be safe as long as you can get a case to chamber... and don't try for 4,000 FPS! If it won't chamber... then do a chamber cast. But I think it should.

Neat rifle... you know that the SAS (both Brit and Aus) adopted .22/250 sniper rifles in the 1980's to avoid over-penetration in urban areas. Northern Ireland was not a place to be whinging .30 cal's off in all directions. The .22-250 had so much hydrostatic shock that it was highly-effective! And like shooting a laser at urban ranges.

Sirhr

The Imperial War Museum has a TAG (Aussie counterterror unit) Tikka .22-250 sniper rifle in its collection, presumably on display. No pics on the IWM website that I can see, though. Seems the Aussies sold some, if not all, of them a while ago.

 

[ZG47A]

I may be wrong... But I think that the .250 Savage had a 28 degree shoulder as well.

@sirhrmechanic Yes, you are wrong, this time. Dunlap (Gunsmithing) and every rifle loading manual in my possession show the Savage shoulder angle at 26 degrees 30 minutes; and the .22-250 shoulder angle at 28 degrees.

 

[sandwarrior]

I may be wrong... But I think that the .250 Savage had a 28 degree shoulder as well. It was the .250 Ackley that had the 40 degrees shoulder angle.

A 'run of the mill' .250 Savage shows a shoulder angle of 26 degrees, 30 minutes. so 26.5 degrees. Though some drawings show it as 30 degrees... I don't think this is correct. So I am with @sandwarrior that the rifle is a .22-250... with old markings on it.

I am wondering if it is worth fire forming a case. If a .22-250 will chamber, fill it with a light powder load and see if you can get a case to fireform. Should be safe as long as you can get a case to chamber... and don't try for 4,000 FPS! If it won't chamber... then do a chamber cast. But I think it should.

Neat rifle... you know that the SAS (both Brit and Aus) adopted .22/250 sniper rifles in the 1980's to avoid over-penetration in urban areas. Northern Ireland was not a place to be whinging .30 cal's off in all directions. The .22-250 had so much hydrostatic shock that it was highly-effective! And like shooting a laser at urban ranges.

Sirhr

I did not know that. And, I'm a fan of the .22-250

Gebby may have changed the shoulder to 28 degrees, but the version Remington SAMMI'd was 26 (I was wrong, it is) 28 degrees.

Fred Huntingdon ( RCBS) also improved this case by blowing out the shoulders, but unlike Ackley he left his 'improved' shoulder angles at 28 degrees.

Added: Speaking of Fred Huntindon, he also named his first iteration of 6mm a Rockchucker, the .244 Rockchucker. The name has been given to a lot of wildcats, but the Remington .244 Rockchucker was the first to be trademarked/patented.

 

[Greg Langelius *]

22-250 history.