The Oz / Lithgowicon Hornets appear to date back to the late 1930s, with a "hole" in production during WW2. They used the Savage Hornet magazine of the period.

I had one for a while. Impressively accurate, feed with soft-points was "variable", hollow-points better. They had machined off the charger bridge so the only scope-mounting option was the Oz "Field" brand side mount; actually pretty rugged. The barrel was standard No1 Mk 3 profile; pretty substantial with a .22 cal hole through it. "Recalibrated" standard rear sight, "commercial" front-sight.

Fore-end was a "reworked original Coachwood job. Specially modified bolthead with a narrow extractor that reached further to the tiny rim. The ejector was inlet into the left wall of the action and ran in a narrow slot in the bolthead. There were also a couple of small cuts on the lower surface of the bolthead to ease it through the magazine. The one I had wore a commercial semi-cheekpiece / pistolgrip butt.

Excellent "bunny-whacker".

In 1978 it cost me fifteen Oz bucks, pre-loved, as is, where is. Impecunious University students can't afford to get too picky. The local hardware store had a sizeable stash of very affordable ammo: Sako brass loaded in Oz by "Riverbrand" with 45gn SP bullets of unknown origin.

An "unmolested" one is a piece of Lithgow history; I think I have a "spare" factory-modified triggerguard around here somewhere. I know someone with a couple of boltheads. Hmmm......