Dave,
 Altho I've never owned one I think a Lilja barrel would be your best bet if you can afford it. Bill Calfee, probably the best .22 bench rest gun maker in the country today, thinks they are the best.

 On the stock. If you bondo up the scrap stock you will have exactly what you want and it will fit you. Most likely any stock you buy will have to be worked to some extent, unless you get lucky.

 I can't really recommend a good gunsmith as I have all my work down by our clubs smith, but one thing you need to be sure of is that whoever does the work knows how to determine which end of the barrel is the muzzle. Not always what the maker says it is! He will also have to know how to properly lap in a barrel if you end up with a "washboard" barrel. Very few smiths know how to do this, or will do it. This is the reason for recommending Lilja. He knows what he's doing and will even allow for barrel expansion if the barrel is going to be contoured after boring and rifling it.

 Altho I'm not a real Ballard fan I will say they are good. Especially in the trigger dept. If you have a DST on your action it's about as fool proof as you can get. The only better triggers will be on the German 3 and 4 levers.

 Not sure I understand what you mean by "loose levers". If the guns are properly rebarreled the levers will be tight. Both mine are! If you have old originals more than likely the looseness is due to wear and a good gunsmith will take care of that when you have it barreled.

 If you are considering a Stevens 44 action for your .22, and have Ballard actions, I'd go with the Ballards. Especially if your Ballard .22 has the "rod" type ejector at 7 o'clock. You will have to be careful with the Stevens 44 as the ejector tends to override the rim when the action is opened past a certain point. I think there was some comment on that feature(?) in one of the topics here.

 The one big feature of the Ballards I think that puts them above most of the rest is that they have a thru bolt on the butt stock. Probably not a big deal for a .22 but they do add stiffness at a point others will work loose in over time, affecting their accuracy. If you think on it you will see that the tang area is where a gun will bend if the butt stock is loose. Of course the stocks on Walls and the 44's can be fixed by putting in a thru bolt but the Ballards are already setup and I think most will agree that the Ballard is the better action anyway.

PETE

Hi Pete ----   I just had John King reline a 44 for me to 25-20 WCF. He told me that his best results by far was from the liners made by Gateway ( ad in SSX)  FWIW,   Ken

SS Dave;
I have given this some thought since you first posted it. I must admit (keep this quiet, please that I am a real .22 fan. I have a safe full of them, both single shots and high end bolt action rifles. I go through one to two cases of GOOD .22 ammo per year.

I have both Stevens and Ballard actions. I chose a new Ballard barreled action (Badger barrel) for my "Frogmoor" and could not be happier in any way. My Ballard has double set triggers and Ron Long's "speed lock". It is a FINE combination.

Both Ballard and Stevens have the very desirable quality of having a "rocking block" which seats a match bullet in a tight match chamber. This is difficult in a straight falling block unless the top of the block is beveled like the original low-wall .22's. 

The most important thing about a "shooting" .22 will be a match chamber. Any of the top rated barrel makers can supply a barrel that should satisfy the most discriminating. My Stevens 44 has a Shilen match barrel. My new Peregrine has a Shilen match barrel (hand lapped by Shilen).

I would suggest that ANY barrel for lead bullets be lapped by the manufacturer. Shilen charged me only $20.00 for that. I bought my Shilen Barrel direct from Shilen and it cost less than $200 delivered (a couple of years ago).

44 Stevens make up fine .22's. 44½'s are even better. I would love to have a .22 made up on the "Ladies" 44½ (044½) action.

All of that said, if I had a choice and money didn't enter into it, I would choose the Ballard because of presently available parts (over the 44) and thru bolt stock. Keep in mind, that if you do not take special precautions, the Ballard's regularly split stocks at the wrist. This is solved by seriously glassing the inside of the stock at the wrist (info supplied by Ken Hurst before I had Bernie Harrell do my Frogmoor in this manner).

FWIW
Dale53

Dave,
  Forgot about the fact your .22 might have a short light barrel on it. I'd save the .44 CF for another project and just use the .22. No sense adding work that you don't have to and a CF action would come in handy for another project. Could probably sell it for enuf to do the .22 project if you wanted to. I think Ken Hurst was looking for a Ballard action a while back.
  What length of barrel and overall wgt. would you shoot for?

PETE

Dave Crossno did the wood on my last Ballard, and my Hepburn. He's great to deal with, and his wood fits right. Had another popular stockmaker build a stock for another Ballard, and it barely had enough wood to get it fitted! Should have known better as he said he hated making wood for Ballards, but loved doing it for Rollers.
The looseness in the Ballard lever is almost always the pins and screws. I've yet to replace the link, though I too read that in De Haas. Ken Moss at Cedar Creek Screw has sets of screws for Ballards, and a set will eliminate the droopy lever, and lock it up tight!
I'd use the #3 for your project also. You can convert the extractor on your centerfire to fit the .22, but it will never work as well as the #3's extractor. The barrel will be a bit of extra machining to fit the stock extractor, and that's where the liner would come in handy, as it would eliminate this machine work.
Good luck with your project Dave!

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Dave and the crowd,
just a quick update, I got a nice email from Ballard today saying that they would credit me for the extra $100 they charged on the breech block.  Makes me feel a whole lot better as I sit here on the shore of Alabama shore of Mobile Bay contemplating seagulls and mice when I'd rather be in my Iowa basement reloading...

Brent

Hey guys, thanks to all for all the ideas...as I'm getting serious about building my own .22 on a Stevens 44.  I have the action cleaned up, wood and barrel on the way...I decided to go with the Green Mountain, as I have seen what their CF barrels are capable of.  I'll be stocking this one in the Model 45 pattern, and have a XXX grade piece of curly maple coming for it.  Can't wait to get started!

Greg

I haven't checked this board for a while because I have been at the range shooting my .22 Ballard project.  I used a cast action which was converted to rimfire, Shilen barrel, and the Ballard bench rest stock from CPA.  The  work was done by Jerry Martin at Martins Custom (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links) and he did a wonderful job.  There is a photo of it on his website.(click custom)  Jerry did all the work including the case coloring and the wood.  I would like to thank everyone who gave me advise on this project including Ken, Green Frog, and Dale 53.   2520