Rifle Sporting Magazine

7/29/2019 Rifle Sporting Magazine

1/15$5.99 U.S./Canada

February 2010 No. 264Rifle Magazine Presents - HANDLOADER

Printed in USA7 2 5 2 7 4 0 1 2 4 0 4

0 2

$ 5 . 9 9

7mm TCU In a Rifle!

.38 WCF inRevolvers

NEW

45 ACPLoads!

Big BoresLive On!

.38

SpecialandP Update


2/154 Handloader 264

AMMUNMMUNITTIONN RELRELOADINGGJOOURRNALL

February 2010

Volume 45, Number 1

ISSN 0017-7393

Issue No. 264

Background Photo: 2010 Vic Schendel

24Bull Barrels

in the 1911Pistol Pointers -Charles E. Petty

28 Load DevelopmentFrom the Hip -Brian Pearce

30 Alliants PowerPro 300-MPPropellant Profiles -

R.H. VanDenburg, Jr.

32 .38 WCF inRevolversOften Overlooked,Never IgnoredMike Venturino

42King Gun

SightsColt SAAsBefore Their TimeCharles E. Petty

50 .45 ACP200-GrainPerformanceLoadsThe Middle

GroundBrian Pearce

60 7mm TCU RifleHaviland BattlesWinter in MontanaJohn Haviland

8Revolver

AccuracyReloaders Press -Dave Scovill

14 .41 MagnumLoadsBullets & Brass -Brian Pearce

18 .32 Harrington &Richardson

MagnumCartridge Board -Gil Sengel

22 MistakesMikes Shootin Shack -Mike Venturino

Page 42 . . .

Page 50 . . .

Page 60 . . .


3/15

68 CartridgesThatSmell ofGun SmokeBig BoresLive OnTerry Wieland

78.38SpecialUpdateStandardPressureand +PMike Thomas

91 MasterIndexVolume 44 -

94 No Shortageof LessonsIn Range -Terry Wieland

Publisher ofHandloader is not responsible for mishaps of any nature that might occur from use of publishedloading data or from recommendations by any member of The Staff. No part of this publication may be reproduced

without written permission from the publisher. Publisher assumes all North American Rights upon acceptance andpayment for all manuscripts. Although all possible care is exercised, the publisher cannot accept responsibility forlost or mutilated manuscripts.

Issue No. 264 February 2010

AMMUNMMUNITTIONN RELRELOADINGGJOOURRNALLPublisher/President Don Polacek

Associate Publisher Mark Harris

Editor in Chief Dave Scovill

Managing Editor Roberta Scovill

Art Director Gerald Hudson

Production Director Becky Pinkley

Contributing Editors

Associate Editor Al Miller

John Haviland Ron Spomer

Brian Pearce Stan Trzoniec

Charles E. Petty R.H. VanDenburg, Jr.

Clair Rees Mike Venturino

Gil Sengel Ken Waters

Advertising

Advertising Director- Stefanie Ramsey

[email protected]

Advertising Representative - Tom Bowman

[email protected]

Advertising Information: 1-800-899-7810

Circulation

Circulation ManagerMichele Elfenbein

[email protected]

Subscription Information: 1-800-899-7810

www.riflemagazine.com

Hand loader (ISSN 0017-7393) is published bi-monthly by Polacek Publishing Corporation, dbaWolfe Publishing Company (Don Polacek, Pres -ident), 2625 Stearman Rd., Ste. A, Prescott, Arizona86301 (also publisher of Rifl e magazine). Tele-phone: (928) 445-7810. Periodical Postage paid atPrescott, Arizona, and additional mailing offices.Subscription prices: U.S. possessions single issue,$5.99; 6 issues, $22.97; 12 issues, $39.00. Foreignand Canada single issue, $5.99; 6 issues $29.00; 12issues, $51.00. Please allow 8-10 weeks for firstissue. Advertising rates furnished on request. Allrights reserved.

Change of address: Please give six weeks notice.Send both the old and new address, plus mailinglabel if possible, to Circulation Dept., Handloader

Magazine, 2625 Stearman Rd., Ste. A, Prescott,Arizona 86301. POSTMASTER: Send addresschanges toHandloader, 2625 Stearman Rd., Ste. A,Prescott, Arizona 86301.

Canadian returns: PM #40612608. Bleuchip Interna-tional, P.O. Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2.

Wolfe Publishing Co.2625 Stearman Rd., Ste. A

Prescott, AZ 86301Tel: (928) 445-7810 Fax: (928) 778-5124 Polacek Publishing Corporation

Page60Page50Page68

Background Photo: 2010 Vic Schendel6 Handloader 264

On the cover . . .Two Colt Single Action Army .38 WCFs(top and middle) are shown with a ColtNew Service, also chambered for the .38WCF. Photos by Yvonne Venturino.

Page 68 . . .


4/1514 Handloader 264

fired a single round through the

ACP cylinder until now.

After reading your articles onthe .45 ACP and .45 Auto Rim in

revolvers, I became curious and

decided to try that cylinder. It

works fine with factory .45 ACP

loads, but I wanted to try some of

the heavyweight cast bullet loads

you list . Th e problem is tha t

since the ACP headspaces on the

case mouth, I am not sure if I can

get the necessary crimp to keep

the heavy bullets in place. I tried

chambering the .45 Auto Rim

case, but the rim is too thick. Is it

possible to alter the chamber so

the Auto Rim case can be used?

L.C., Las Vegas NV

A: The headspace is too tight

to allow the unusually thick

rim of the .45 Auto Rim to fit. It

is possible to have a qualified

gunsmith turn the back of the

cylinder down, changing the

headspace and allowing it to

chamber the Auto Rim cartridge.

were obtained using 7.5 grains

of Alliant Unique with a 223-grain Hensley & Gibbs Keith-

style cast bullet 258. That load

produced 1,035 fps from a Smith

& Wesson Model 657 Mountain

Gun with a 4-inch barrel and

1,061 fps from a Ruger Black-

hawk with a 612-inch tube.

I do have on hand a 231-grain

Keith-style cast bullet by a man-

ufacturer that does not supply to

the general public. It is a some-what different design than the

235-grain bullet you mention,

but the extra 4-grain weight will

prove inconsequential in terms

of pressure and velocities, as

long as your bullet seats to the

same depth in the case. The point

being the data presented here

should be safe with your bullet.

The above 231-grain bullet

pushed with 7.0 grains of AlliantPower Pistol produced 974 fps

from a Ruger New Model Black-

hawk Bisley with a 512-inch

barrel. Increasing the charge to

7.5 grains achieved 1,015 fps,

while 8.0 grains clocked 1,065

fps. The last load gave the best

accuracy with a 25-yard group

clustering under one inch from a

sandbag rest. Extreme spread

was 15 fps for a five-shot string.

Cases were from Starline, cap-ped with CCI 300 Large Pistol

primers. You will need to deter-

mine the accuracy of the Lead-

head bullet with that powder

charge.

RUGER .45 COLT

Q: I have a Ruger Blackhawk .45

Colt with the extra .45 ACP cylin-

der that I bought new in 1972.

During the years I have fired thou-

sands of .45 Colt loads through it,

mostly handloads, but have never

Q: I have used your reload-

ing information for the .45Colt, .44 Magnum, .44 Special and.45 Auto Rim and found it veryhelpful. I am also a big fan of the.41 Magnum and have used yourload data with the Cast Perform-ance 250-grain WFNGC and am

very pleased with it. I am tryingto find some .41 magnum loaddata for Leadhead bullets, specif-ically its 235-grain Keith style andam not having much luck. I

would like to find a load some-where between 1,000 and 1,100fps to use as a general-purposeload.

G.B., Morristown TN

A: Going back through my notes

on the .41 Magnum, good results

www.handloadermagazine.com

BULLETS & BRASS by Brian Pearce

.41 MAGNUM LOADS

The Ruger Blackhawk .45 ACPcylinder can have the headspacechanged to accept a .45 AutoRim cartridge.

Alliant Power Pistol was used in.41 Magnum to push a 231-grainKeith-style cast bullet 1,065 fps.


5/15

This alteration is easy to accom-

plish and should not be costly.

RUGER .44 SPECIAL

Q: First, I want to complimentyou on your article on the RugerBlackhawk .44 Special in the

June edition ofHandloadermag-azine. I personally feel it was way

overdue, and thank you for theinfluence you had in making it

happen. Ive had a love affairwith the .44 and Ruger single ac-tions since 1975. I started todayinquiring at our local gun shopsto put one on order. A prize suchas this will not last long.

This brings me to the secondreason for writing you. I haveasked Ruger in the past if therewas a possibility for a .44 Specialin the New Vaquero. The responsewas that there is not enough pub-

lic interest. I personally think itwould be a big hit with the cow-boy action group and would makea great all-around working gun

A: Thank you for your kind re-

marks. You may find it of inter-

est that since completing the

article on the Ruger Blackhawk

.44 Special, Lipseys managed

to convince Ruger to increase

production to 1,500 units for each

ofthe two barrel lengths (458 and

512 inch). According to Lipseys,

sales have been strong. Also I do

not take any credit for the birth

and side companion. After you

have had time to think it over

(and see that I would be correct)

maybe you, with the help of Lip-

seys, would be able to convince

Ruger to produce this little gem.

Again, I want to thank you and

Lipseys for the Blackhawk .44

Special.

E.C., Byrdstown TN

Lipseys has had many requests to chamber the New Vaquero .44 Spe-cial, the same as the medium-frame Blackhawk currently in production.


6/15Handloader 264

of the Blackhawk .44 Special,

other than agreeing the gun was

long overdue and that it would

most certainly sell!

I also agree with you that

fixed-sighted single actions are

very handy and practical every-

day working guns (as long as

they are sighted correctly), and a

New Vaquero .44 Special wouldindeed be a Special sixgun! In

checking with Jason Cloessner

at Lipseys, they have had many

requests for that gun and will

entertain the idea with Ruger.

.270 WINCHESTER

Q: I am looking for .270 Win-chester load data to be used inconjunction with the Nosler 130-grain Partition. I am not neces-sarily looking to achieve thehighest possible velocity, butrather looking for consistent ac-curacy. What powder or powderswould you suggest? I am rela-tively new to handloading butwould like to know if it is neces-sary to weigh each charge, or canthey be thrown? Any suggestions

you can provide would be appre-ciated.

L.G., Kansas City MOA:I have had good results in the

.270 Winchester using IMR-

4831 powder, with 58.0 grains

pushing the 130-grain Nosler

Partition to 3,000 fps from a

22-inch barrel, which is below

industry maximum pressure

limits. Use a large rifle non-mag-

num primer, and best results

will be seen if cases are from one

manufacturer (and preferably of

the same lot number).

Not all powder measures are

created equal, but if the vari-

ance in thrown charges exceeds

1.5 to not over 2.0 grains for the

.270 Winchester, then it would

be suggested to weigh each charge

to keep loads consistent. To

speed that process, set the meas-

ure to throw charges slightly

under the desired amount, drop

that charge onto the scale, then

trickle in the remaining grain

or two to reach the desired weight.

With some practice this method

is reasonably fast.

SUPER BLACKHAWK .44

MAGNUM

Q: As a su bscriber to Ha nd-loaderand a beginning reloader, Ienjoy your articles. I want to loadfor my customized 4-inch RugerSuper Blackhawk .44 Magnum. I

like the load in issue No. 255,wherein you suggest a 250-grainKeith plain-base bullet with 24.5grains of Hodgdon H-110 cappedwith a Federal 155 primer for1,300 fps. My question is, canI use my Winchester brass, orshould I use another brand? Idont cast bullets, so can you sug-gest a source where I can pur-chase some?

D.H., Jackson KY

A: The load in question is within

SAAMI pressure guidelines for

the .44 Magnum, although it is

considered maximum. Nonethe-

less it is safe in any case (in-

cluding your Winchester brass)

that is suitable for reloading.

Montana Bullet Works (7730

Hesper Rd., Billings MT 59106;

www.MontanaBulletWorks.

com) offers high-quality, hand-

cast Keith bullets for the .44

Magnum.

16 www.handloadermagazine.com

The 130-grain Nosler Partition inthe .270 Winchester can be pushed

to 3,000 fps using IMR-4831.

The45-120-314A Guide to Reloading and

Shooting the Mighty 45-120

Find us online at:www.getagripgunbooks.com

Address your questions tothe author Steve Carpenter

Phone: 920-833-2282

E-Mail:[email protected]

HOCH CUSTOM BULLET MOULDS

COLORADO SHOOTERS SUPPLYShop 575-627-1933 Home 575-627-6156910 N. Delaware Roswell, NM 88201

[email protected]

www.hochmoulds.com

Tool room quality, nose-pour,most standard or custom designs

made to order. Cylindrical(straight) or tapered. Rifle &

pistol designs available.


7/15

Terry Wieland

C

olchester, England, is agarrison town steeped inhistory. An hours drive

from London, Colchesterwas the site of the first Roman fortin Britain, has housed army gar-risons for 2,000 years and is stillhome to a British military prison. Acombination of ancient history andmodern military might give Col-chester a rather brooding air.

Roads leading to and from are narrow, twistingaffairs, except for the odd straight line, disappear-ing into the distance, that is descended straightfrom the Roman legions. You can almost hear the

tramping of sandaled feet.

On one winding road lies an otherwise nonde-script farmhouse with a few outbuildings, a flock ofgeese guarding the yard and a rottweiler smiling as

you get out of your car. You wouldnt think theredbe much to guard but youd be wrong.

This is the home of Arthur Smith and his companyArms Restoration Services. In the outbuildings liethe equipment to produce any kind of gun barrel,from a seven-tube, .40-caliber Nock Volley Gun tothe most modern 20mm helicopter-mounted rifled

cannon.

Arthur Smith loves rifles. Most particularly, he

Why? Why these monsters instead of somethingsmaller, more manageable, more . . . civilized?

I love the big stuff, Arthur says with a wickedsmile. It does something, and theres nothing elselike it.

Nothing else like it, indeed.

This lesson has been learned by the shooting in-dustry in the U.S., over and over. Throughout the1960s and 1970s, when any bore larger than .308was distinctly pass, there lurked beneath the sur-

lovesbig rifles.

Big bores. Afew years ago, he

built an exact replicaof Sir Samuel Bakers no-

torious Baby, a four-boreshoulder cannon that sets the stan-

dard for recoil, complete with nosebleeds and dis-located shoulders. Now Arthur is building along-range, single-shot, black-powder target riflechambered for the obscure .650 Gatling. His goal isto win Englands annual one-mile target match, shotat targets on a hillside across a windy valley.

CartridgesThat Smell

Gun68 Handloader 264www.handloadermagazine.com

C


8/15

of

SmokeBig BoresLive OnFebruary-March 2010 69www.handloadermagazine.com

Between them, Ruger andHornady have done morethan any other Americancompanies to foster interestin older cartridges, withRuger chambering its

famous No. 1 in this case,a 450/400 3-inch (Jeffery) and Hornady providing brassand factory ammunition.


9/15Handloader 264

most all the great, old big bores

were consigned to the wilder-

ness, interest was kept alive by

handloaders. If you owned a big

rifle, you had to load your own;otherwise, you didnt shoot. It

was that simple.

Even today, however, with an

ever-expanding array of factory

ammunition for many of these

cartridges and brass available

from various sources, handload-

ing is still a vital part of shooting.

Sure, you can shoot only factory,

but even if money is no object,

tridges. It took off and has sold

steadily. Then, around 1993, Bill

Ruger teamed up with Federal to

reintroduce the .416 Rigby. Withrifles and ammunition once more

readily available, the .416 had

new life and has never looked

back.

Bit by bit, it dawned on rifle-

makers that there was a market

for the old American buffalo car-

tridges, for the huge British dan-

gerous game rounds and even

antique military stuff like the

American .50-70 and the British

.577 Snider.

To Americans, anything over

.40 caliber is a big bore; to the

British, the minimum is .450. So

to head off arguments over se-

mantics, lets settle on .40 and

larger. This takes in such diverse

and wonderful cartridges as the

.40-70 Straight Sharps, as well as

the .416 Rigby and .404 Jeffery.

No one can look at one of those

beasts and argue it is not big.

From 1960 until 1990, when al-

For years, any rifle chambered in.45-70 found a market. Anything.That should have been a clue.

The world really began to takenote in 1991, when Wolfe Pub-lishing produced an anthology ofits big bore articles in a bookcalled Big Bore Rifles and Car-


Right, as a group, the .458s arethe most versatile of the big-bore

cartridges, with a wide rangeof bullets available, both cast

and jacketed. Some of the .458diameter bolt-rifle cartridgesinclude from left: .458 Winc-

hester, .458 Lott, .450 Ackley,.450 Short A-Square, .450

Dakota and .460 Weatherby.

In recent years, .416-caliber car-tridges have gained considerablepopularity with the .416 Rigby themost popular of all, even at a cen-tury old. From left, the .416 Rigby,.404 Jeffery, .416 Remington, .416Dakota and .416 Weatherby.

The Big Three of the originalnitro-express lineup are the .600NE, .577 NE and .500 NE. Dou-ble rifles for any of them areexpensive, but there is nothingquite like them.

Left, A-Squares behemoth, the

.577 Tyrannosaur, flanked by thediminutive (!) .458 Winchesterand the .460 Weatherby. LuridInternet videos to the contrary,the .577 Tyrannosaur can behandled by an experiencedshooter, but it really serves nouseful hunting purpose.

CartridgesThat Smell of

Gun Smoke

face a somewhat embarrassed fas-cination with the old, the big, thehard-smacking with cartridgesthat smelled of gun smoke.


10/15

powder (a discipline all its own)

or to cast your own bullets.THE FRUSTRATING .40S

There is a gaggle of cartridgesin this group, from the diminutive.38-40 for lever actions all theway up to the .416 Rigby and, at

you will be missing 98 percent of

the fun of owning a .50-110, a.577 Snider or a .505 Gibbs. Eventhe more common cartridges,like the .45-70, .470 Nitro Expressand .416 Rigby, offer a widerange of shooting but only if

you handload.

There are so many aspects to

shooting big-bore cartridges targets or game, lead or jacketed,black powder or smokeless that for now well concentrate

jus t on put tin g bi g game car-tridges to general use, withoutthe need either to load black

February-March 2010 71www.handloadermagazine.com

Left, when you get to the .500s,there is no debate. These arebig bores. Shown here from left,with a .375 H&H looking daintyby comparison, are the .500 Jef-fery, .505 Gibbs, .500 A-Squareand .495 A-Square. The .500

Jeffery was made short and com-pact in order to fit a standardK98 Mauser action.

Right, with the .375 H&H (left)for comparison, these big boresare the .510 Wells, .505 Gibbsand .585 GMA. The .510 Wells

is ballistically identical (andphysically very similar to)

the new .505 Empire.


11/15

The availability oftop-quality new brasshas breathed new life

into many old rifles,like this restored Doug

Turnbull RestorationWinchester Model1886 .40-65 WCF,

which still have cen-turies of life left, if

looked after properly.

Starline is just one company that

has jumped into making brassfor old rifles. Its .40-65 brass is

a staple among black powdercartridge competition shooters.

Handloader 264

dozen different bullet diametersused in these cartridges, from.403 to .425 inch. So, while theremay look to be a huge varietyavailable, there really is not forany one cartridge.

For years this was the bugaboofor the .416 Rigby. It came in onebullet weight, and your onlychoice was between softs andsolids. That even applied to bul-lets for reloading. This made it

difficult to practice very much logistically and economically.

At the other end, before cowboyaction came along, you couldrarely buy either jacketed or castbullets for the .38-40 in its requi-site .403 inch diameter. About thebest you could do was buy castbullets intended for the .40 S&W,

imprint a cannelure and take itfrom there. It was a truly labori-ous business if you shot any vol-ume. Well, let me reverse that:Because it was so laborious, noone shot it in any volume. Now.403-inch bullets are widely avail-able, in bulk.

Today cast bullets in .416 diam-eter with gas checks are readilyavailable, as are a wider varietyof bullets. There is still not agreat choice in bullet weights,but at least you can buy econom-

the high-diameter end, the .425Westley Richards. Famous .40-caliber shooters include Jim Cor-bett, W.D.M. Karamoja Bell,

John Taylo r and Ha rr y Se lb y.While any of the group offersconsiderable scope for handload-ing and fun shooting, the onecommon element is that thereseems to be no common element.

Factory bullet weights rangefrom 180 grains for the .38-40 up

to 450 grains for the .416 Rigby.By my count, there are at least a


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Gun Smoke


12/15February-March 2010

ical jacketed bullets for practice

ammunition.

Recently two famous British

rounds have come back in the

U.S., courtesy of Ruger and Hor-

nady. The 450/400 Nitro Express

(314 inch) and the 450/400 3 inch

(Jeffery), aka the .400 Jeffery, are

two of the original smokeless

adaptations of black-powder car-tridges. Interestingly, both tiger

hunter Jim Corbett and elephant

hunter Karamoja Bell used 450/

400 double rifles to back up their

preferred .275 Rigby (7x57) bolt

actions.

good hit the elephant went down;without a good hit, it didnt. Ashe described it, 800 grains oflead powered by 120 grains ofCordite made no perceivabledifference in killing power, al-though I expect it made a differ-ence in recoil.

Even the books do not agree onthe correct bullet diameters forall the .40s. With the big British

Until the advent of the .375 H&H

in 1912, the 450/ 400s were con-

sidered the best all-around car-

tridges for big and dangerous

game. The Jeffery variation is a

shorter case with a noticeably

shorter neck and sharper shoul-

der, designed to overcome al-

leged case-sticking problems

with the original.

At one point Bell carried out an

interesting experiment with his

450/400. Wanting to compare kill-

rounds, it is a good idea to slug

the bore and find out the actual

diameter before shopping for ei-

ther bullets or a bullet mould.

Many American lever actions de-

pend on the bumping effect of

black powder to expand an un-

dersized bullet to fit the bore,

and without this expansion you

get either poor accuracy or out-

right bullet tumbling.

73www.handloadermagazine.com

ing power, he shot elephantswith his .275, a .256 (6.5mm) andthe 450/400. When hit in the brain,

he saw no difference. When hitelsewhere, he saw no real differ-ence. So Bell wired the triggersof his 450/400 so both barrelswould fire at once. Again, with a

Left, although it is far from cheapat about $20 per round, Normasnew line of African PH ammuni-tion makes it practical to take bigbores, like this Granite MountainAfrican Magnum .505 Gibbs, to

Africa even if you dont handload.

Right, CZ offers its 550 Magnumin some major big bores, making

a .416 Rigby, .500 Jeffery or.505 Gibbs available to the

man of average means.

For years, any riflechambered in .45-70

found a market.


13/15Handloader 264

Bob Hayley, a bullet caster andcustom ammunition maker, hasfound that loading Unique behindsoft lead bullets will give thesame effect as black powder not as pronounced, perhaps, butsufficient to give decent accu-racy. I have tried it with a .38-55

and a .40-65 WCF, and it workedin both rifles.

Having worked with a .38-40,

hunting feral hogs and whitetailswith big-bore rifles, just for the

practice. Nothing like prowlingriver bottoms looking for hogswith a .458 Lott or .505 Gibbs atthe high port. You grow accus-tomed to the weight and feel ofthe rifle, and after awhile its as

much a part of you as your old 94.

To do this, you need either somelighter jacketed hollowpoints orsome soft lead bullets, and the.458 has plenty of both. If I had tohunt the rest of my life with justone rifle, it would very likely be a.458 Lott.

.40-70 Straight Sharps, .40-65,

.416 Rigby and 450/400 NE 3 inch

over the years, I have reached

the conclusion that there are

cheaper and easier ways to go in-

sane, but they are nowhere near

as much fun.

For sheer madness, however,

you would have to go far to beat

Arthur Smiths current project:building a Nock Volley Gun. This

is a seven-barrel, .40-caliber black-

powder rifle, originally a caplock

but in Arthurs version it uses a

standard primer inside an ig-

nition chamber. Each barrel is

loaded with black powder and

three .40-caliber lead balls. There

is a central barrel with the other

six barrels brazed around it and

flash holes from the center to the

outer barrels. When you pull the

trigger, the primer ignites the cen-

tral barrel, which in turn fires

the others, and all seven barrels

go simultaneously. You have 21

.40-caliber balls in the air at once.

Samuel Nock made these mon-

sters in both shoulder and hand-

held models. For charging leop-

ards? Perfect.

THE DIVINE .450SCompared to the .40s, the .45-

caliber cartridges are an oasis of

sanity and calm. Whether you are

shooting a .45-70, .450 Nitro Ex-

press, .458 Lott or .460 Weath-

erby, the bullet diameter is .458

inch. Its enough to make you fall

to your knees in thanks.

Of course, one mans sanity is an-

other mans boredom, which is

why mention of the .450s, Amer-ican or British, often draws yawns

from the crowd. Personally, know-

ing I can get anything from 250-

grain jacketed hollowpoints to

600-grain lead gas checks, and any

number of mono-metal expanding

and solid bullets, makes my .458

Lotts all that much more fun. In-

stead of worrying about whether I

can get them to shoot at all, I can

concentrate on getting them to

shoot exactly what I want.

The last few years, Ive started

Nothing else in the class hasquite the same versatility. The.45-70 is shy on power, while the.460 Weatherby, .450 Dakota andsimilar cartridges are restrictedto oversized actions that makefor rather awkward rifles. TheLott (and wildcats like the .450

Ackley) can fit into a standard.375 H&H-length action and makeup into a very handy and usable10-pound rifle. Install a good



Gun Smoke

The only new cartridge in thisgroup of original Kynoch nitro-express cartridges is the huge.700 H&H (extreme right).

For the big British rounds,Woodleigh provides bullets thatare first-rate performers on the

heaviest game as here in .505 inchfor the Gibbs, and duplicate theshape and ballistic performanceof the original Kynoch bullets.

To Americans,anything over .40

caliber is a big bore.


14/15February-March 2010 75www.handloadermagazine.com

scope in a genuine detachable

mount, and you have a rifle that

fills just about every need except

300-yard prairie dogs. And I, for

one, can live without that.

The original .450 Nitro Express,

the cartridge that in 1898 rede-

fined hunting, was eclipsed after

1905 because of a .450-caliber

ban in the Sudan and India. Oncecartridges like the .470 NE were

developed to take its place, the

.450 never recovered. Thats un-

fortunate, because the original

.450 NE is a great cartridge. The

parent of the 450/400s, the .450

can be built into a slimmer, hand-

ier rifle than the .470 class, which

are all based on the heftier .500

NE case.

A double rifle or single shot, ei-ther falling block or break action,

is a wonderful all-around big

game rifle and has all the advan-

tages of the .458 Lott with vir-

tually identical ballistics. The

Lott can be loaded hotter, but it

is really at its best with a 500-

grain bullet at 2,200 to 2,250

fps. At 2,150, the .450 NE is not

far behind. A nice .450 NE double

weighs 9 to 10 pounds but bal-

ances like a fine shotgun and isvery quick for hogs or whitetails.

For anyone wanting to venture

The lead bullet, whether pureor tempered with tin or mercury(quicksilver), was an outstandinggame bullet at black-powdervelocities. The fouling problem

was overcome by patchingbullets with paper or lubricatingthem with grease.

into big-bore shooting, there is nobetter choice than the .458 Lott.

THE BIGGER-THAN-.450S

This category takes in virtuallyeverything else. Between .450and .500 lies a number of car-tridges around .475 diameter,including the famous .470 Nitro

Express.Most of the rifles chambered for

these cartridges are either dou-bles, and very expensive, or oldsingle shots. Aside from the fi-nancial obstacle, there is the bul-let dilemma: There are simply notmany bullets to choose from.

Bores range from .476 to .489,and because many of these rifleswere made by small shops, di-ameters vary even among rifles

chambered for the same cartridge.

The .470 premium, which hasapplied to double rifle prices forthe last 30 years, still exists. Otherchamberings are now becomingexpensive as well, but .470s arenot becoming any cheaper.

On the positive side, except forthe .475 NE No. 2 and the rare,straight-cased .475 NE, all thesecartridges are based on either the

.500 NE 3- or 314-inch case, sobrass is readily available or caneasily be resized.

THE HALF-INCHAND BEYOND

Cartridges .50 caliber and uphave been around since muzzle-loading days, and in fact most aredescended directly from muzzle-loading standards. The .577, forexample, was originally a 28-bore

one pound of lead divided into28 parts, with each 28th/poundball measuring .577 inch and ex-actly 250 grains.

In America, .50-caliber car-

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or online:www.riflemagazine.com


15/15

tion. You can even buy an off-the-

shelf rifle, the CZ 550 Magnum.

The .500 Jeffery for many yearswas the most powerful magazinerifle cartridge, finally shaded (on

paper) by the .460 Weatherby.The Jeffery has a clouded his-tory. The cartridge is short andfat, with a very short neck and

rebated rim. It is notoriously dif-ficult to make feed from a stag-gered box magazine. This is notsurprising, since it was designedoriginally to fit into a standardmilitary Mauser 98, fed from aspecial in-line magazine thatlines up the cartridge with thechamber. August Schuler in Ger-many is believed to have de-signed the cartridge, which wasthen adopted by Jeffery and re-

named the .500. Early Schulerand Jeffery rifles have this in-linemagazine. Recent rifles use astaggered box.

A better choice, in my view, isthe .505 Gibbs, which is biggerand roomier, with no pressure

problems. The only drawback isthat it uses a .505-inch bullet in-stead of .510, like virtually everyother .500. Finding cast bulletsin .506 can be a real problem,

but once you do, it makes a riflethat is as much fun as a big borecan be.

Beyond .50 there lie the .577,.600, various wildcats in .585 di-ameter, the .700 H&H and even12-bore rifles. In England in Sep-tember, I had the opportunity toshoot a Holland & Holland four-bore double under constructionfor an American client. The rifle

weighed 24 pounds and was dif-ficult to hold, offhand, for anylength of time.

I pulled the trigger twice andlived to tell the tale, with no dis-located shoulder, nosebleeds orspinning-top performances. Ofcourse, this rifle was consider-ably heavier than Bakers Baby,so that might account for it.

The one thing I can say in itsfavor: Going back to a .505 Gibbsfelt like I was shooting a varmintrifle. Well, almost.

tridges were common in buffalorifles, and the most famous shotever made on the frontier BillyDixon knocking an Indian off hishorse at 1,538 yards was madewith a .50-caliber Sharps.

As a result, cast bullets are read-ily available from any numberof sources, and bullet moulds

abound, both old and new. Any-one with a .50 is in good shape asfar as shooting materials go.

Among British double rifles andsingle shots, there is only the.500 Nitro Express, mostly in the3-inch version. After a century ofbeing an also-ran, the .500 issuddenly in great demand. Manynew double rifles chamber it, andolder ones are suddenly sportinga .500 NE premium. It certainlydeserves it, because its a greatcartridge. But it aint cheap toget into.

If you want to try a bolt actioninstead, the two bolt rifle .50s the .500 Jeffery and .505 Gibbs have suddenly seen a renais-sance, and you can not only buybrass but also loaded ammuni-

www.getbulletsandbrass.comReloading

Supplies &Equipment

408-857-8902 408-612-7801

NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADAMoose, Woodland Caribou & Black Bear Hunts

Book now for 2009 & 2010 Tel/Fax: (709) [email protected] www.biggamecanada.com

P.O. Box 159, York Harbour, NL, Canada A0L 1L0

STATEMENT REQUIRED BY THE ACT OF AUGUST 24,1912, AS AMENDED BY THE ACTS OF MARCH 3, 1933,JULY 2, 1946 and JUNE 11, 1960 (74 STAT. 208), SHOW-ING THE OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, and CIRCULATIONOF THE HANDLOADER MAGAZINE (PUBLICATIONNO. 577540). PUBLISHED BI-MONTHLY AT PRESCOTT,ARIZONA, FOR NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2009.

1) The name of the publisher is Don Polacek and the editor

is Dave Scovill, Prescott, Arizona.2) The owner is Polacek Publishing Corporation, 2625Stearman Rd., Ste. A, Prescott AZ 86301.

3) The known bondholders, mortgagees, and other secu-rity holders owning or holding 1 percent or more of totalamount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities are: (ifthere are none, so state.) None.

4) Paragraphs 2 and 3 include, in cases where the stock-holder or security holder appears upon the books of thecompany as trustee or in any other fiduciary relation, thename of the person or corporation for whom such trusteeis acting; also, the statements in the two paragraphs showthe affiants full knowledge and belief as to the circum-stances and conditions under which stockholders and se-curity holders who do not appear upon the books of thecompany as trustees, hold stock and securities in a capac-ity other than that of a bonafide owner.

5) The average number sold or distributed, through themails or otherwise, to paid subscribers during the 12months preceding the date shown was: (This information is

required by the act of June 11, 1960, to be included in allstatements regardless of frequency of issue.) 123,900

DONALD R. POLACEK, President

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