[LurpyGeek]

LDB, I'm with you in that I prefer good old .22 LR. I've never really understood the niche that any .17 flavor fills. If I want to reach out further, I'll go centerfire.

Also, I see what you're saying, but this is an issue that will occur with a bottle-necked case in any blow back operated action. The amount of force that a blow-back action can handle can be tuned with special attention to weights and spring tension, but the "timing" cannot be adjusted since by definition, the cartridge begins moving backward immediately upon firing. This is why there are so many different methods of delaying the extraction of cartridges until chamber pressures subside.

My knowledge is by no means complete, but the only successful blow-back operated bottleneck cartridge I can think of is the 7.62x25mm Tokarev in various sub-machineguns. I don't know how this was accomplished, whether pressures were kept low or extra material was included in the casing in critical areas.

Straight walled cartridges don't have these issues. This is why there are blow-back operated firearms in many pistol calibers (hi-point for example).

Most bottlenecked calibers use something to delay the extraction of the casing whether it's short recoil, gas operation or some other method. I'm not sure .17 has enough power to be compatible with any of these methods.