Cast Bullet Association Blog Rss Feedhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/Rss2_.aspxRss 2.0 for the user blogs.en-usFri, 25 Sep 2026 12:09:58 GMTCast Bullet Associationchefreiss@gmail.com(Cast Bullet Association)info@morganids.com (Richard Morgan)360The .32 Winchester Centerfire Part 2http://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/101/the-.32-winchester-centerfire-part-2 Part two of Ric Bowman's article published in the Nov/Dec 2009 #202 issue of the Fouling Shot. My thoughts on reloading cast bullets for the 32/20This cartridge has been one of my favorites over....
Part two of Ric Bowman's article published in the Nov/Dec 2009 #202 issue of the Fouling Shot.

My thoughts on reloading cast bullets for the 32/20

This cartridge has been one of my favorites over thelast thirty years and I have loaded thousands of roundsfor revolver and rifle.

The basics are the same reloading tasks required forany other small rimmed cartridge. The actuality ofreloading this cartridge is another matter. It is not for thefaint of heart or those that need to crank out a thousandrounds an evening on their Dillon press.

Even though there are SAMMI specifications for thecartridge, I have never seen a gun chamberedthat way. After all, they have been making32/20’s for over 125 years! Chambers arelarger in diameter and longer. Headspace isgiven at 0.065. However case rim thicknessrun between 0.042 for WW stamped onesand 0.048 for Starline made ones. You willalways have excessive headspace with fulllength resized cases, but that is a solvableproblem.

Reloading die manufacturers make diesthat will resize cases smaller than the SAMMIspecifications and expand necks only enoughto seat 0.310 jacketed bullets with lots of necktension. If I was starting all over again, I wouldbuy RCBS Cowboy dies made for cast bullets,then send three fired cases and threebullets I wanted to reload back to the RCBSfactory. They will adjust your dies and makethem work like they should. However, youmay have to make your own expander. Theexpander needs to be only 0.001 smallerthan the bullet. If you try to seat a 0.314 bullet with acase that has been expanded with a 0.308 expander,you will get a 0.309/0.310 bullet. The expander has tobe 0.001 smaller than the bullet or you are wasting yourtime and effort.

Added to the dimensional problem is the shape ofthe cartridge. It is longer than a 38 Special case and a lotnarrower so there is lots of room for the powder to movefront to rear inside the case. Shooting loads over achronograph is very interesting, as variations of over 175feet per second are possible just by tipping the barrel upor down before the shot. Fillers are not the answer for meas they break the case in half at the shoulder (rememberthe headspace issue?) after just two or three reloadings.

Well, lets get down to cases (pun intended) with fourof my favorite 32/20’s and what ammo they shoot welland how I make it. I use a TC Contender barrel as thestandard for case resizing as it is the smallest chambered32/20 I own. The barrel is removed and used as agauge. The sizing die is lowered until a fired case will gointo the chamber a couple of thousandths below the backof the barrel, in effect headspacing off the shoulder of thecase. This amount of sizing works just fine with all theother guns and is used for all loads. The following loadswork in my guns and with my reloading techniques andpowder charges, but you are responsible for your ownreloading and safety in your guns!

First let’s talk about my oldest revolver. It is an early1905 Model S&W Hand Ejector with a 6 1/2 inch barreland round butt, made in 1906. The bore and chamberthroats are what gun traders call dark but serviceable,other wise known as pitted. But the action is very crispand lock up is tight. It also has a plain steel cylinder,unhardened and soft. It would probably be classed as ablack powder gun and nothing you would want to hot rod.

1906 6 1/2 inch and
1941 6 inch S&Ws in 32-20

I did not have high hopes for it as a shooter, but itcertainly surprised me with the loads it likes. It uses mystandard resized cases and Federal Small Rifle (#200)primers. Small rifle primers are only used for their thickercup. The hole in the standing breech that the firing pingoes through is very large and pistol primers flow backaround the firing pin. It is probably a case of void spaceand excessive headspace, but the SR primer solves thatissue.

Cases must be trimmed to a consistent length for thisgun and its loads; short is OK, but they must be thesame. It likes two bullets; the RCBS 98 grain SWC andthe Lyman #313492 full wadcutter that are cast fromWW’s and a touch of added tin. Both are sized 0.314,the same as the throat, and lubed with any soft greasylube. The Lyman is crimped very lightly in its crimpgroove and the RCBS is lightly crimped just over the frontof the first band to fit the length of the cylinder. This brassis thin, and if you feel the crimp shoulder in the dies, it istoo much. Use a micrometer, as 0.003 is just the rightamount of crimp.

The powder charge is critical: 3.1 grains of newAlliant Bullseye in Remington or Winchester cases, or 3.0grains in Starline cases. No other powder even comesclose to hitting at point of aim or making as small of groups. These loads are both 765 feet per second andgood for 2 groups at 25 yards all day long.

L-R, Lyman 313492, RCBS 98 grain SWC, Lyman311316 (modified to remove gascheck), Lyman311576, Lyman 311440

My other favorite revolver is also an S&W, with a sixinch barrel and square grips. It was made in 1940 or1941 and is less than 200 from the last one made. It hasa heat-treated cylinder, the change having been made onSeptember 2, 1919 at serial number 81,287. The chambersand bore are in beautiful condition and best of allthey are the same dimensions as the earlier one. But thesights are the later square topped front and square notchrear groove.

It doesn’t shoot the older gun’s loads to the same point of impact. The first bullet that worked well was the Ideal #311316, a 112 grain gas checked design. This was one of the first bullets ever made for gas checks and especially for the 32/20. The gas checks worked at high speeds, less than perfect bores and soft alloys. The bullet also has a crimp groove for smokeless powder and tube magazine rifles.

My old mould was made with a sharply tapered heel for use with press on type gas checks that were hard to find. Crimp on gas checks never seated flat on the base and many were cocked at an angle. A trip to the lathe solved that problem with a bullet that is now plain based and sizes smoothly at 0.314 cast from WW’s plus tin and weighing 116 grains. The lube groove is small and without the space above the gas check, a good quality lube is required. NRA formula beeswax and Alox or better commercial lubes works well.

Now that I had a bullet that works, I went through the powders normally used; Bullseye, 700X, SR7625, Unique and SR4756. Two loads, 4.5 grains of Unique and 4.5 grains of SR7625, would shoot good groups if the powders were positioned in the case. Chronograph data shows that wide velocity differences (750 to 840 feet per second) show up on the target as high and low hits. Neither small pistol magnum nor small rifle primers would reduce extreme spread to less than 90 feet per second at random powder positions. Also, all of these loads shot three to four inches high and two inches left at 25 yards.

Ken Water’s Pet Loads, from Wolfe Publications, hasa good write up on 32/20 pistols. Mr. Water’s pet load is6.0 grains of SR4756. My concern was that it was wellabove anyone else’s listed load for that powder.Cautiously, I worked up to his loading. At 5.8 grains Ifound my pet load with standard small pistol primers. Itshoots to point of aim for elevation and is at the left edgeof the front sight at 25 yards. Cases fall out of the cylinderif you tip the gun up. Bench rested groups are twoinches at 50 yards and velocity is very close to 945 feet per second regardless of powder position.

My favorite rifle is one of only two American boltactions ever made for the 32/20, the other being theWinchester Model 43. They must have made a hundredSavage Model 23C’s for every Winchester. My Model23C was made about 1930 so was probably never firedwith corrosive primers or black powder. The bore is likenew and locking lug and bolt handle tight and solid. Theoutside shows some wear and use, but all in all it’s a verynice rifle.

The Bullseye load is 1035 f.p.s. and the SR4756 loadis 1315 f.p.s. from its 25 inch barrel. The Bullseye load isexceptionally quiet and ear muffs probably aren’trequired. It is perfect for shooting around livestock or builtup areas. The SR4756 load recreates the black powderload performance and is good at least up to 100 yards.But bullet drop rears it head, as drop with a 50 yard zerois about 4-1/2 inches at 100 yards.

Savage 23C

Two new loads were created for this rifle. A duplicate of the old 32 WCF High Velocity load was pretty easy to make. A Lyman #311316 bullet, with gas check, was cast from WWs and 2% tin sized 0.312 and lubed with NRA formula lube. This very late Lyman mould has a gas check shank that works well with Hornady crimp on gas checks. Another good thing about this mould is that itcasts bullets at .312 inches, the best size for the Savagerifle. The load is 14.0 grains of Norma 200, with Federal200 primers. While I tried IMR 4198, H4227 and AA1680powders, they never gave me as good of accuracy asNorma 200.

The nice part about this load is that it maximizes thepotential of the 115 grain bullet at 1650 f.p.s. Zeroed 1-1/4 high at 50 yards; it is 1 low at 100 yards and 3 lowat 125 yards.

Paco Kelly’s #311440 heavy bullet load always fascinatedme for some reason, but I hesitated loading thelittle round that hot. My heavy bullet load also usesLyman’s #311440 bullet. This stubby bullet is made like asoda can with rings and is short enough to stabilize in the1 in 20 twist of the Savage rifle. It is made from 1/3 WWand tin alloy mixed with 2/3 scrap lead and weighs 154grains from the mould. I have a lot of IMR SR4759 powdersaved up for benchrest match loads and used this forthe heavy bullet. A load of 9.0 grains of SR4759 will pusha 154 grain bullet 1495 f.p.s. with 2 MOA accuracy.Sighted in 1 inch high at 50 yards it is 1 inch low at 100yards. Hmmm. That sounds like original 357 Magnumrevolver performance to me!

The last is probably the most versatile 32/20, a TCContender with 10 inch bull barrel and a Leopold 2Xscope. It has the tightest chamber and is the one used forsetting up the sizing die for all the brass for all the guns.This barrel is 0.308 groove diameter with a one turn inten inches twist. The worst this pistol has ever shot wasR-P factory jacketed loads, a five shot 50 yard group of4-1/4 in freezing temperatures and a 20 MPH crosswind.Other than that one group, it has shot all the other guns’loads well, very well! Even the heavy bullet load goes1200 f.p.s., with an extreme spread of 15 f.p.s., and willmake 1-1/2 50 yard groups if I can hold it.

I wish a really good Contender shot would shoot itsfavorite load to see what it could really do. That load usesLyman #311576, a 120 grain gas checked round nosewith two wide deep grease groves. The bullet is seatedlong into the throat and you have to push the case in withyour thumb. Powder charge is 6.0 grains of SR4756 andsmall rifle primers are used. It will shoot 50 yard groupsthat are covered by the intersecting crosshairs of thescope. I just wish I could shoot as well as that pistol canshoot!

Am I done? Am I tired of playing with this little cartridgeafter 30 years? Nope! Waiting for the spring thawis an original Marlin 1889 Safety with a new Marlin32/20 CL barrel I installed last summer. Except for matchshooting and big game hunting, it still seems to be agreat little cartridge to me. But perhaps Henry M.Stebbins said it best in his 1947 book Small Game &Varmint Rifles: Were it not for the fact that this nearlyobsolete cartridge continues to give satisfaction to agreat many shooters, it need not have been mentioned atall. �20

]]>Sun, 30 Jul 2017 04:29:54 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/101/the-.32-winchester-centerfire-part-2The .32 Winchester Centerfirehttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/100/the-.32-winchester-centerfire This article is written by CBA member, Ric Bowman, and was published in the Sept/Oct 2009, #201 issue of the Fouling Shot. It started in 1882. One hundred years ago, one of the mos....
This article is written by CBA member, Ric Bowman, and was published in the Sept/Oct 2009, #201 issue of the Fouling Shot.


It started in 1882. One hundred years ago, one of the most popular cartridges around was the 32/20. It was the most popular chambering in the Colt Bisley single action revolver. Winchester made over 127,000 in the Model 1892’s alone, not even counting the Model 1873 production or Low Wall single shots. Smith and Wesson made over 144,000 Hand Ejectors in “32 Winchester” and “32-20,” plus Colt, Marlin, Remington, Savage and others chambered guns for this round. The first real book on reloading was J. R. Mattern’s Handloading Ammunition pub-lished in 1926. He gives more ink and space to the 32/20 than any other cartridge except the 30/06 and 30/40 Krag. He says, “As late as 1905 Ideal was making more loading tools for it than any of the other size (es).” “...it is one of the most accurate short-range cartridges known.” Yet by 1930 it was dying. By 1945 it was dead, well liked and fondly remembered, but dead as a door nail! Why?How could a cartridge go from a best seller to nothing in 20 years? Well, it is about the money. And leisure time and what people did for fun, work and relaxation.

The cost of a new rifle or pistol was the same for any of the short centerfire cartridges. The savings came in buying ammunition. Manufactured ammo cost a quarter to a third less than most other centerfire smokeless loads. And it was adaptable to reloading with black powder. It used small amounts of powder and lead making it economical to reload and the tools were commonly available.

Before WW1, over 80% of the people lived in rural areas. Small farms, ranches and villages dotted the country, so almost everyone could walk to small game hunting and recreational shooting. Big game hunting was Rocky Mountains. This was before Game Commissions and Departments and game conservation was a new idea. Deer and bear were meat and had been hunted out by subsistence hunters and market hunters almost all over the United States. Hunting was shot gunning for birds and rifle hunting was for squirrels, groundhogs, rabbits and other small “eatables” and predators. Every farm and ranch has guns to protect the fowl and livestock from predators.

Every farm and ranch had guns to help in the slaughter of domestic animals for food. The 32/20 was accurate, quiet and very effective as the tool of choice for these people. My theory is that the 30 WCF (30/30) was created as a long range 32 WCF and not as a shrunken 30 US Army, i.e. 30/40 Krag! It came in guns similar to the 32/20 with about half again the bullet weight, penetration and range.

With handguns, the story is almost the same. They had same initial cost, but cheaper ammunition. Certainly, the flat nosed 32 bullets were as effective as the round nosed 38’s. The big bores were certainly used by cow-boys working wild stock, remote country horsemen and man killers, both inside and outside the law. But these were a small group compared to the population as a whole.

Besides baseball, what was the most popular sport in the Unitized States between 1880 and 1910?Shooting! Schuetzenfest, long range rifle, pistol and you name it and it was all done during the golden age of the shooting gallery. Every county seat had a 4th of July shooting match. Into the 1940’s and ‘50’s the Appalachian folk that I grew up among still considered a summer evening or Sunday afternoon shooting match the neighborly thing to do. Ranges were short, mostly less than 50 yards, but targets were small. A thumbtack stuck on a stump, or a quarter inch mud spot on a shaved tree trunk was a common target.

So what happened? Some of it was economic. The farm commodity price collapse of 1920 devastated the rural communities, and the Dust Bowl days and the Great Depression creating poverty unknown to rural people before that time. As bores eroded and guns lost accuracy, they were not given to younger relatives, but kept for use. City folks and government agencies were buying new guns and the 32/20 had no place.

And some changes were social. The rural folks fled to the cities and factories to escape the spreading poverty of the farm and small ranch in the 1920’s but flight didn’t help them after the crash of the stock market in 1929. Those that stayed in the country tried to find jobs in the small towns in trade and service industries, like auto repair and gas stations. Handguns were for self-protection first and recreation second. The 38 Special and pocket automatics were what people wanted. My father told the story of my grandfather, Pleasant Bowman, who carried a Colt 32 ACP in one pocket of his overalls and a Remington 380 in the other for “balance” when he drove the Model T Ford of “mountain produce” from the hills to Cincinnati at night. The long barreled 32/20’s were left on the country place and never made the transition to the cities. Flat shooting and fifty yard accuracy weren’t needed in the city.

And shooting changed. Shooting, while still fun, became “training” sponsored by the Federal Government’s Department of Civilian Marksmanship, the US Army and the NRA. The focus was on formal matches with 22LR Small Bore at ranges up to 200 yards and High Power with the Model 1903 Springfield up to 600 yards. Guns, ammunition and reloading components were cheap and readily available for this formalized shooting game as long as it was in 30/06. And the 32/20 had no place here either.

And hunting changed also. Game conservation agencies and sportsmen groups’ efforts lead to populations of deer that had not been seen for a hundred years. Elk were introduced into new areas and their populations exploded, as they became woodland and fringe area animals rather than plains game. The 32/20 is not a good deer round and everybody knew it. Many states simply outlawed the 32/20 for deer and every other “licensed” game animal. Why buy something that you can’t take deer hunting? But the biggest change was “varminting” and its guns. The 22 Hornet would kill small animals as well as the 32/20 and at twice the range. And like the 32/20, it was quiet and ammunition inexpensive to buy. But the Hornet was as poor of a predator cartridge as the 32/20 was a deer cartridge. But predators were not the problem they once were. States hired professionals to trap or shoot or poison every predator they could to protect the new deer populations and “licensed” game animals. The little 32 WCF was dead, almost.

Here we are today

What saved the 32/20 was the cowboy. Not the cowboys as in herders of livestock, but “Cowboys” as in SASS. The generation of guys that grew up with cowboy movies and TV loved the “Old West”. Speed shooting contests with Western Frontier guns while dressing up in costume. It is fun to shoot, family oriented and took the shooting sports industry by storm. Reproduction guns in traditional calibers came pouring out of the factories not only in the US but from all over the world. And a lot of those were in 32 WCF because the “Cowboys” rediscovered that they could shoot faster and with higher scores using the light recoiling 32/20.

When military surplus guns were once more allowed to be imported, a change happened in work gun areas of the West. Fewer lever action 30/30’s were seen in pick-ups and ATV’s on the ranch. More SKS’s were showing up every day. Remember, working guns are cheap and so is their ammunition. The break up of the Soviet Empire dumped hundreds of millions of rounds of 7.62X39 ammunition and a lot of it ended up in the USA, and cheaply at prices of less then ten cents a round. Today, that ammunition and most newly manufactured stock is going to the wars in Asia Minor. So the two trends have over lapped, lots of used “Cowboy” guns available and no cheap ammo for the SKS. Re-enter the 32/20.

While there are fewer 32/20’s made compared to 45 Colt, 44 Magnum and 357 Magnum, try to find a used one. They are sought after avidly by framers and ranchers. Small game hunters and plinkers wanting traditional guns in traditional calibers are actively searching out every 32/20 they can find. And the 32/20 is just as effective today as it ever was in the 1800’s.

So what are they good for? They will still kill coyote sized and smaller animals dead at 100 yards, quietly and efficiently. Shooting your 243 or 22/250 around livestock will make you unwelcome if a visitor, and unhappy if they are your own stock. Rifle accuracy is still 2 MOA even with mediocre loads, good enough for a working gun. Sports that shoot varmints for recreation are very disappointed in that there isn’t any bloom of prairie dog parts misting through the air. But if you hit them, they are just as dead and not eating alfalfa. It is a turkey and squirrel and rabbit gun supreme! It’s also a good first centerfire gun for the kids and to teach rifle and pistol skills after the 22 LR is out grown.

A flat nose 115 grain bullet at 900 f.p.s. from a revolver or 1600 f.p.s. from a rifle is very effective. Twelve inches of penetration in flesh will solve most problems you need a gun to solve.

( to be continued )

]]>Sun, 30 Jul 2017 03:51:58 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/100/the-.32-winchester-centerfireThe .50X50http://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/99/the-.50x50 This article appearing in the Sept/Oct 2004 #171 issue of the Fouling Shot, was written by Rupert Wyble of Fallon, NV. I wanted .50-90 performance without black pow­der and at a price that wouldn....
This article appearing in the Sept/Oct 2004 #171 issue of the Fouling Shot, was written by Rupert Wyble of Fallon, NV.

I wanted .50-90 performance without black pow­der and at a price that wouldn't break the bank. Even though I have a great fondness for the .50-70 and .50-90, the cases are just too spacious for smokeless powder. It's also a little hard as a retired person to call Shiloh Sharps or Lone Star and tell them to build me a new rifle with all the extras, so this is my solution.

As luck would have it, at the same time I was looking around for a cartridge to cut off to the right length, Smith & Wesson brought out their .500 S&W revolver. Now a .500 S&W is not high on my list of "must-haves," but I thought the cartridge had possibilities.

You must first accept the fact that the .500 S&W is a true .500" as opposed to around .51 O" for the origi­nal black powder cartridges. This fact cuts down on available bullet moulds a little, but RCBS, NEI, and even Lyman has a mould or two, which can be sized to work. RCBS also makes .500 S&W dies. Brass can be pur­chased from Starline. It's not too expensive and is very rugged.

Let me confess before going on, this certainly is not a new idea. The .50x50 Maynard or .50 US Carbine, a similar size cartridge was brought out in the 1870/1882 era. I'm sure someone else has already built the same or similar to what I've done and are probably invoking the old Elmer Keith saying "Hell, I was there." Well I'm glad to be in your company, even if I'm a little late.

I have a Ruger No 1 that's worn so many barrels I've lost count, and a Lyman Super Target Spot rifle scope that were just right for the project. It ain't a Sharps, but it is a decent rifle and the scope is in good working order. As much as I would like to use those won­derful iron sights available today, it would be a waste; my eyes need the scope.

The barrel for my Buffalo Medicine rifle came from Pac-Nor in Oregon. I asked them to make me a good quality barrel and they did. I consider Pac-Nor well worth the money. Let me add a personal observation on barrels. Everybody makes good ones and everybody makes not so good ones. You pay your nickel and take your chances. This time I got a very good one.

Barrel specs are as follows: straight 1.150", length 24", twist 1-25, groove .500" and a little bit. It was made from plain old chrome moly steel. Grade: Pac-Nor Supermatch.

While waiting for the barrel, I asked JGS ream­ers. also in Oregon to make a .500 S&W reamer. They did. JGS does some very nice work. The only changes made from a standard .500 S&W are in the throat. I had it made longer for heavy bullets. I also made the body a little tighter and the pilot a little larger so that I could fit it to the barrel at hand.

I purchased new brass from Starline. I'm very pleased. It will probably last forever.

My loading dies came from RCBS. Standard old pistol dies. I did turn down and reshape the expander button. This allows for gently belling the case without expanding. Neck size is controlled by chamber and siz­ing die and changes very little.

At this point everything just came together. I installed the barrel, cut the chamber and fit the scope. The fore end was already opened up for this size barrel. I won't go into detail on this work, except to mention headspace. I cut as close to zero as possible for the lot of brass I'll be using in this particular rifle. If at a later date the gun is to be used for hunting or a different lot of brass is acquired, it can be loosened up as needed.

With the gun together, loading was next. I already use a short 1 .575'' .45-70 with heavy bullets and in that cartridge AA 2015 BR is the powder of choice, so it was the first on the list for the .50x50. Like the black powder shooters, I use a case full plus a .060" cork wad between bullet and powder. SPG black powder lube is also used. At this point it was just a matter of finding out how much powder will cause the loaded round to cham­ber and engage the rifling just a little. In this case it worked out to 37.7 grains of AA 2015 BR, one .060" cork wad and an NEI .500 bullet (No. 3598) at 565 grains in number 2 metal. This bullet drops from the mould at just short of .501". so my polished out RCBS sizer die just knocks off the high points and wipes off the excess grease. I should mention that I pan lube bullets and just run them in the top and out the bottom of the sizer die.


I pay a little more for my moulds because I use iron. NEI makes a good mould in iron. This mould, besides casting an excellent shooting bullet, does the one thing I like a bullet mould to do: When you open the han­dles the bullet falls out. I guess it's so big, it can't do anything else.

When the bullet is seated there is slight com­pression, about 1/16 inches. I use Winchester LR magnum primers. Pressures seem low and the powder bums clean. The velocity, although I can't check it. seems to be around 1300, maybe 1350 f.p.s., cer­tainly enough to do in most any buffalo, steel or real.

This load shoots. I don't have other loads or bul­lets for this gun. Life is simple.

The gun places the first shot from a clean barrel high and left several inches. After that it just pounds them into point of aim. For a big bore it shoots pretty good groups. One hundred yard five-shot groups run around one inch. I've even had a 3/4 inch 5-shot group at 100 yards. It will also shoot long strings without much change. More than I can say for myself. Fifteen-shot groups under two inches at 100 yards is normal when I do my part. In fact, other than the fouling shot, no group has exceeded 2-1/2 inches at 100 yards. I've fired about 150 shots to date.

Needless to say, I'm very happy with my winter project for 2003. It worked for me. I don't know if it would for anybody else. Try it at your own nsk.

P.S. It will shoot with the best of them, but like the original .50-90 which it duplicates, it will also kick with the best of them!

]]>Mon, 24 Jul 2017 02:52:42 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/99/the-.50x50A Winchester .35-.30-30http://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/98/a-winchester-.35-.30-30 This article written by CBA member, Ed Harris, appeared in the Sept/Oct 2012 #219 issue of the Fouling Shot.A year or so ago I acquired a very much-used 1894 Winchester .30-30 with a shot out barre....
This article written by CBA member, Ed Harris, appeared in the Sept/Oct 2012 #219 issue of the Fouling Shot.

A year or so ago I acquired a very much-used 1894 Winchester .30-30 with a shot out barrel. Factory loads keyholed and I couldn’t get cast loads to shoot acceptably. Back in my NRA days I had a Remington 788 cast bullet silhouette rifle chambered for the wildcat .35/.30-30 Marquart which worked well, so I thought a lever-action in this caliber would make sense. I sent the 1894 to John Taylor for relining. My rifle does not have barrel bands because it was built pre WWI as a “short rifle,” not as a carbine. Due to its condition it had no real collector value, so I felt that relining it would be forgiven; better for getting the old girl back into the deer woods, where she belongs.

My old 1894 now uses .30-30 brass necked up to .35 caliber with no other change. John recommended relin-ing rather than reboring, because old nickel steel Winchester barrels are hard to get good interior finish on with a rebore. The cost is about the same either way. The original markings and patina are preserved. The new bore is 16 inch twist with bore and groove dimensions the same as used for the .35 Remington. I wanted a cast-bullet rifle with which I could use common jacketed .35 Remington, cast 38 Special or .357 pistol bullets I already had, and common .30-30 brass which I have in abundance. The objective was to “split the difference” between the .32-40 and .38-55 Winchester. It does that.

Thanks to Sinclair I obtained a custom Redding die set which easily necks up .30-30 brass to .35 in one pass. I can use either .32 Winchester Special or .30-30 brass as feedstock. My first firing tests used the RCBS 35-200-FN bullet, cast of wheel weights, with 16 grains of #2400, which was OK, but my focus shifted to plain based bullets, for simplicity and economy.

There being no pressure tested load data for this wildcat, I measured water capacities of the .35 Remington and .35/.30-30 because I wanted to see how close they were. Brass in both calibers was Winchester; the .35 Remington case was once-fired from a Marlin. Capacity in grains of water when filled to base of neck:.35 Remington - 39 grains; .35/.30-30 - 34 grains.

When a 200-grain bullet is seated in the .35/.30-30 case, its base is about 1/3 the way up the neck, so I took another measurement, this time filling the case neck with water and carefully squeezing out the excess pressing a bullet to the crimp groove in the fired case. That result was 37 grains. I decided that using .35 Remington load data was OK as a guide as long as I stayed a grain or two below the maximum loads.

For a plain based bullet I bought a Saeco #351 originally intended for use in the .357 Contender pistol. The mold I got from Midway did not look like the catalog picture; otherwise I probably wouldn’t have gotten it. Its original spitzer nose was too long to feed through the 94 Winchester if crimped in its crimp groove. The .12” diameter meplat was smaller than I wanted to chance using in a tubular magazine. Its bore riding nose of .350 was too small in diameter to engage the rifling. The bearing surface of the bullet was less than 1.5 times its diameter, so wasn’t sure that it would shoot well. Almost everything about this bullet was wrong, but I couldn’t return the mold because I had cast a bunch of bullets from various alloys to try. I am a sucker for frustration.

Left to right: .30-30, .35 Remington, .35/30-30

Although not obvious in this B&W rendering, the rifle still retains its old-age patina.

Firing tests confirmed the Saeco #351 didn’t shoot as well as the RCBS 35-200-FN, so I remelted the lead and was “stuck” with the mold. Mom always told me as a kid that when you have lemons, you make lemonade. So, I sent the Saeco blocks to Erik Ohlen at http://www.hol-lowpointmold.com with an upset throat slug from my .35 Winchester model 1894. Erik did his inset-bar conversion, truncating the nose to a .25 diameter meplat, shortening the nose length to .50 from crimp groove to meplat. The cup-point nose cavity is of 60 degrees included angle and 0.6 of the meplat diameter.

Erik also cut a new front driving band ahead of the crimp groove which is .175 wide and .359 diameter to fit the throat of the relined rifle. He also widened and enlarged the rear driving band while reducing the width and depth of the lube groove to strengthen the base. Having a crimp groove and one small grease groove not much larger than the crimp groove is all that’s necessary, because velocity will not exceed about 1400 f.p.s. and this plain base bullet will be slobbered all over with Lee Liquid Alox anyway. The modified bullet weighs 200 grains in soft BHN 10 alloy, vs. 208 grains for the original Saeco spitzer

Custom 35 rifle bullets for the 35/30-30.

The LBT bullet fits the neck length perfectly.

Overall cartridge length when crimped in the reformed .30-30 brass is 2.52”, which is ideal to feed well in the Winchester 94. The bullet shoots better than I can hold with 8 grains of Bullseye at about 1300 f.p.s. The bullet was modified to provide a longer bearing surface ahead of the crimp groove and its forepart now fits the throat of the relined / rechambered 94. It looks like a .38-55 slug which shrunk in the washing machine.

My first open sight groups shot at 100 yards with my hand rested on the deck rail were about 4 inches, eyeballing strikes on a freshly painted steel gong; no different from any other open-sighted 94.

My first firing trials with the 200-grain RCBS GC bullet and 16 grains of #2400 gave 1430 f.p.s. with the powder charge leveled and 1570 f.p.s. when the powder was tipped back against the primer. Increasing the charge of #2400 and moderate charges of RL-7 did not improve ballistic uniformity. Best results with the 200-grain plain base bullet were with Bullseye. For a hunting load with the 35-200-GC RCBS bullet 29.6 grains of RL-7 gave 1900 f.p.s., approaching the .35 Remington.

Subsonic loads with the 200-gr. plain based bullets were very quiet and low noise. Ballistic uniformity with Bullseye was not acceptable below 1000 f.p.s. I didn’t use any case filler and made no attempt to orient the powder charge, but just shoved ‘em past the loading gate, levered them into the chamber and banged them off, multi-tasking feed check, velocity measurements and gong music.

The mold, dies, bullets & cases.

Groups eyeballed in the spotting scope observing strikes on a freshly spray painted 12 inch gong, judging against the gong diameter for each string averaged about 4 inches, typical for an open sighted 94. Winchester LP primers showed no pressure signs and didn’t flatten.

A charge of 7.2 grains of Bullseye is a bit light, but is fairly quiet and shoots well. I don’t recommend loading less than 7 grains of Bullseye in this case.

Loads bracketing 8 grains of Bullseye shot very well and gave uniform velocities without any bore leading using 10 BHN alloy. The bore began to lead at 9 grains of Bullseye. Accuracy declined as velocity much exceeded about 1300 f.p.s. It shoots as good as I can hold.

Increasing the charge of #2400 with the RCBS GC bullet was disappointing. RL-7 didn’t give acceptable ballistic uniformity until I got close to nearly a case full of powder, when it finally began to show some utility.

I decided that for loads with anything other than Bullseye I needed a heavier bullet to provide enough resistance to build pressure for a cleaner burn.

LBT to the rescue! I participated in one of the CBA group buys and sent an upset chamber slug and fired case. I asked Veral to make as heavy a plain based bullet as would stabilize in a 16 inch twist which would not exceed 2.54 inches overall when loaded in necked-up .30-30 brass. He returned a 4-cavity mold which casts a 260-grain plain base bullet 0.99 inch long, .361 diameter, with .225 meplat, crimp groove 0.5” back from the nose, with three driving bands 0.11” wide and two grease grooves. It is absolutely beautiful, casting good bullets immediately, giving splendid shooting results just as easily. A charge of 7.8 grains of Bullseye gave 1095 f.p.s. with a standard deviation (Sd) of 18 over a 10-shot string. A charge of 16 grains of #2400 gave 1421 f.p.s. with an Sd of 30 with only slight leading on the driving edges of the lands. Reducing the charge slightly to 15.4 grains of #2400 gave 1383 f.p.s., with round, open-sight, 4-inch groups at 100 yards without leading.

Who could ask for anything more?



]]>Sat, 22 Jul 2017 10:45:39 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/98/a-winchester-.35-.30-309.3 X 57 Mauser Loadshttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/97/9.3-x-57-mauser-loads Written by CBA member Jim Scearcy, this article was published in the Sept/Oct 2010 #207 issue of the Fouling Shot. A few months ago, on a cold winter Saturday morn-ing, I was sitting at the kitchen ....
Written by CBA member Jim Scearcy, this article was published in the Sept/Oct 2010 #207 issue of the Fouling Shot.

A few months ago, on a cold winter Saturday morn-ing, I was sitting at the kitchen table planning my day. It was too cold to go to the gun club so I opted for a gun show instead. Three hours later I was on my way back home with a new “project” rifle. The rifle in question is a model 146 Husqvarna. For the uninitiated this is a 9.3x57 Mauser built on a model 98 action. It is a graceful rifle cham-bered for a cartridge which just begs to be fed cast bul-lets.After some research I learned the following:

Hornady dies are available from Midway;
Norma brass is also available from Midway;
Jacketed bullets, if not plentiful, are available from several manufacturers;
Cast bullets and molds are not common but they are available.

A quick review of available loading manuals revealed only one reference to a cast bullet load. This is men-tioned in Wolf’s Big Bore Rifles and Cartridges, and con-sists of the Lyman 366408 bullet over 15 grains of Unique.

I wanted two cast bullet loads for this rifle. One was to be a light load for recreational shooting. The other would be a hunting load at higher velocity. While the target load would be based on a plain base bullet, the hunt-ing loaded needed a gas check design.

The Target Load:

Mike Rygwalski of Northern Star Cast Bullets kindly supplied me with a box of 250 grain plain base (PB) bul-lets made with a borrowed Rapine mold. I do not have a number for this mold. These would not be a permanent solution for bullets but they allowed me to start the pro-ject while I searched for a mold of my own. Ultimately I did find a Lyman 366408 on EBay. Let’s not discuss what that mould cost me.

Some time on the internet helped me confirm that 358 Winchester data, judiciously applied, would provide a starting point for my load development. The 358 case is slightly smaller than the 9.3x57 case but beware of using this data “as is” since the 358 is loaded to much higher pressures than is the 9.3x57. I have found 375 Winchester data to provide a useful check point as well. Be very careful. Start way low and work up slowly.

A word or two about cases is in order before we get to the load development. Very usable cases can be made by running 8mm Mauser cases through the Hornady dies. The bolt closes slightly tight for the first firing and then all is smooth thereafter. This is an inexpensive alternative to the new Norma brass I mentioned above. I also found that a 357 neck expanding die is serviceable for flaring the 9.3 case mouths. A very light bump is sufficient.My load development started with the Rapine bullet and two powders, Unique and IMR 4759.

Cautious progression in one grain increments showed the following two loads to be safe and in the right velocity range: 14gr. Unique for 1489 f.p.s. and 19gr. 4759 for 1410 f.p.s.These loads were developed using rifle primers. When I substituted pistol primers unacceptable cratering of the primers ensued with the Unique loads.With a starting point established I selected 5 comparable loads from 358 Winchester data and loaded 5 rounds of each. The day I tested these loads it was below 25 degrees, which may have marginally affected the velocities I obtained. The loads and results are shown below:

Green Dot 13 gr. 1423 fps. accuracy nonexistent
Unique 14 gr. 1508 fps. poor accuracy
4759 20 gr. 1545 fps. accuracy ok
IMR 4227 21 gr. 1333 fps. accuracy fair
IMR 4198 24 gr. 1391 fps. accuracy good

Green Dot appeared pointless and I decided to save my supply of 4759 for calibers that clearly preferred it. Friends with more PB expertise than me advised me to keep velocities below 1400 fps. With the addition of one slower burning powder which has worked for me in pre-vious projects – Rx7, I proceeded. By now I had my Lyman 366408 mold in hand. I cast a supply of bullets using a 2/1 ww/lino alloy. I also mixed up a fresh batch of Darr lube. A week later I was back at the range testing these three loads:

IMR 4227 20 gr. 1300 fps. poor accuracy
IMR 4198 23 gr. 1330 fps. under 3/4" @ 50 yards
RX 7 25 gr. 1360 fps. 1 1/4" @ 50 yards

Subsequent testing has confirmed that my rifle likes IMR 4198 and the Lyman bullet. It is an accurate and mild load. Actually it performs better than any load I had hoped to find.

The Hunting Load:

The ultimate goal for this rifle has always been to be a cast bullet deer rifle. The tract of land I hunt is a mix of timber and lowland with a few small fields thrown in. Most of my shooting needs will be met with a rifle/cartridge combination that is adequate out to 125 yards. A 275 grain bullet at 1800 fps would duplicate the stout 38-55 loads listed in Wolfs Big Bore Rifles and Cartridges. I felt this should be adequate for my needs.

I wanted a gas check bullet when trying to reach this velocity. Initially I did not expect to be able to obtain a gas check .366 inch mold. While it subsequently turned out that I was quite wrong, I reasoned that the next best thing would be swaging a readily available .375 bullet down to the proper diameter. Lee Precision is willing to provide their push through lube/sizing die in custom dimensions and at a price that is most reasonable. I ordered a .368” die which arrived just short of 4 weeks later.

Sizing a .375” bullet down to .368” is not ideal as we all know but I was committed to the plan. I had three dif-ferent .376” bullets on hand. One was a 315 grain single diameter spire point which sized down beautifully but was much heavier and longer than necessary for the task at hand.

The other two were bore ride designs. The heavier, blunter 300 grain bullet simply could not be swaged down satisfactorily. The second is a 260 grain bullet which roughly resembles an oversized Lyman 31141 or a Lyman 375296 with one fewer lube groove. I am sorry that I don’t know the mold number but I purchased this box of bullets a number of years ago. The exact bullet is not important here other than to say the smaller the bullets diameter, the better. My specimens started at an actual .375 and they sized down to .368 quite well. I found that adding some lube to the top band helped.


Once I had secured a supply of gas check bullets I started carefully testing loads. Initially my primary interest was keeping all of my body parts attached in their proper positions. My starting loads produced velocities in the 1250 f.p.s. range. Eventually I did work up four hunting level loads that are safe in my rifle. They were:

IMR 4198 30 gr. 1650 fps.
RX 7 33 gr. 1750 fps.
H4895 40 gr. 1700 fps.
Varget 41 gr. 1700 fps.


(l-r) 30-30; 308; 30-06; 9.3x57 with Lyman 366408;
9.3x57 with NEI #174; 45-70

During this phase of my testing, I bought an NEI 25 caliber mold on EBay. The mold was “new in the box”. When it arrived there was an NEI mold list also in the box. NEI shows two .366” gas check molds among their offerings. I called NEI and an incredible four days later I received a brand new .366” mold in the mail. If there is better customer service than this, I have never encountered it. Thanks to the kind folks at NEI.

The mold (#174) was listed at 260 grains. Using the same 2 to 1 ww/lino alloy, my bullets weigh exactly 280 grains including gas check. By the way I am using 35 caliber gas checks (as NEI specified) and seating them with my Lee custom die. I lubed these bullets with Darr lube the same as I had done with the Lyman 366408 PB.

Even though IMR 4198 shot extremely well in my rifle with the PB bullet, I was uncomfortable pushing the charges much farther than 30 grains. I felt that moving up to a heavier 280 grain bullet indicated that the prudent course was to opt for the slower burning powders. Hence I left IMR 4198 out of the final testing.

The weather on the day I tested the remaining three loads for accuracy was far from ideal. It was quite cold and the wind was moderate to strong. I don’t know if this impacted accuracy much but I did get some unexplained fliers, particularly with Varget. All three loads grouped under four inches at 100 yards, including fliers. IMR 4895 produced the most felt recoil and the loosest group. The Varget load put four of six shots into 1-1/2 inches. The remaining two were fliers, one high and one low. If I wanted a hotter load for this rifle, I would work more with Varget. It may be the right powder in some rifles.

The Rx7 load gave the least felt recoil and a nice round 2-1/2 inch group for seven shots. Actually this rifle may not be capable of much better accuracy than this. I am not sure that I am. Recoil becomes quite noticeable at 1750 fps. In any event, I am satisfied that 33 grains of Rx7 is a serviceable hunting load in my rifle. I will prob-ably test a softer alloy next fall as I am not sure that this fairly hard (2/1) alloy will expand.

]]>Tue, 18 Jul 2017 10:08:33 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/97/9.3-x-57-mauser-loadsUndersized Moulds? Then Beaglehttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/96/undersized-moulds?-then-beagle This article, written by James S. Knowlson, was published in the May/June 2010 #205 issue of the Fouling Shot.Beagling a mould to cast bigger bullets is a great idea from John Goins, a.k.a. “Beagle”....
This article, written by James S. Knowlson, was published in the May/June 2010 #205 issue of the Fouling Shot.

Beagling a mould to cast bigger bullets is a great idea from John Goins, a.k.a. “Beagle”. You glue alu-minum foil strips to the faces of the mould block to increase the diameter of the bullet. After you squeeze out all the excess glue, and after casting about fifty bullets, you are supposed to get larger bullets. What I got is a bullet only about 0.001” larger in diameter after starting with 0.003” of foil, and vent grooves full of glue. Not exactly the right solution to my problem.

THE PROBLEM:

My 1943 vintage Mannlicher Schoenauer Model 1924 High Velocity Rifle in 7x64mm Brenneke has a groove diameter of 0.288”, not the standard 7mm 0.284”. It will shoot Sierra 160 grain Game King bullets at 2689 fps to sub-minute groups at 100 yards using the 6X Zeiss scope. Apparently these 0.284” diameter bullets obturate up to the larger groove diameter and shoot very well for an older 7-1/2 pound hunting rifle. On the other hand, a 170 grain #287308 Lyman gas checked cast bullet made from Lyman #2 alloy, sized to 0.285” using NRA lubricant and Hornady gas checks shoot three to four inch pat-terns at 100 yards with 15 grains of Alliant 2400 and same brass and primer as the jacketed load. Reduced loads of IMR 4895 do about the same. A Lyman #287442, gas checked 140-grain bullet sized to 0.287” also performs in a similar manner.

After a local precision machine shop lapped my 0.285” Lyman sizing die out to 0.2882”, Veral Smith at LBT made me a 170-grain mould, which drops a 0.2884” bullet. The base of the bullet is 0.260” for the gas check which means that a Hornady 7mm gas check with a 0.251” ID has to be enlarged with a taper punch to about 0.265” to get proper centering without shaving lead. This bullet shoots 1.3” five-shot groups at 100 yards with 15 grains of 2400. One four shot group went 7/8”. (I had tried Alliant 2400 from 13 grains up to 15 grains in 0.5-grain increments and 15 grains seemed to close the group size. Going higher in powder was not tried because the rifle has an 8.25” twist that may be too tight for a 15 BHN bullet without land-jumping and stripping the bullet.) This load has not been chronographed yet but should be in the 1600 to 1700 fps range.

MOULD MODIFICATION METHOD:

Because my Lyman #287308 mould is much easier to cast with using a ladle than the LBT mould, I decided to “Beagle” it up to at least 0.288” in diameter. The alu-minum foil and glue method was not satisfactory after three trials. After researching high-temperature adhe-sives on the Internet I called the local automotive supply shop and they had a J-B Weld high-temperature, two-part epoxy resin good for 500 degrees. I decided that three strips of brass shim with a 0.003” thickness should give me a 0.288” diameter bullet from the Lyman two-cavity mould that unmodified drops a 0.285” bullet with #2 alloy. Brass shim stock has less memory than steel that makes it easier to press flat for a uniform thickness on the mould face and will not compress like aluminum foil.

. As shown on pictures of the mould block, I cut three strips of shim with a pair of sharp surgical scissors to minimize bending of the shim stock. After cleaning the surface of the mould block with 99% isopropyl alcohol, I glued the shims to the bottom and sides of the alignment-hole side of the block with a very fine line of J-B epoxy down the center of the shim well away from the edges to prevent the epoxy from squeezing out onto the block. These shims were positioned carefully with tweezers to assure that the epoxy was not smeared.

The mould and shims have been sprayed with Drop Out, but the shims can be seen above the alignment pin holes and across the bottom of the block.

The block was positioned on a well-leveled table to minimize gravity shifting because of the lubricity of the epoxy, and a small granite surface plate lightly coated with 3-in-1 oil was lowered straight down onto the mould block. On top of the surface plate a 4.25 pound map weight was positioned carefully to minimize shifting to aid in pressing the shims flat. The care taken with these two operations are important to prevent shifting of the shims. You cannot remove the surface plate for inspection with-out shifting the shims due to the oil coating. (I did have a slight shift of about a 0.010” towards the cavity on the outboard side but the overhang was pared back careful-ly with a bench knife after the adhesive cured.) Again, the critical operation is putting the surface plate over the shims without causing a shift. A possible solution would be to use a 2-inch square, half-inch thick piece of plate glass to see if any shift occurred and then add the addi-tional weight to flatten the shims.

After a 24-hour cure the weights were removed. The surface plate was removed with a light tap from a wood-en mould sprue-plate mallet to break the small amount of adhesive stuck to the surface plate. The increase in block thickness with the shims was measured with a Starrett dial caliper and found to be 0.003” plus an esti-mated 0.0002.


BULLETS:

I doped the mould with Frankford Arsenal Drop Out and cast 20 bullets that miked at 0.2885” to 0.290”; 0.0015” out of round. After sizing they were a uniform 0.2880” diameter. The weights for the first ten averaged 166.8 grains with a standard deviation (SD) of 1.4, the second ten were 171.2 grains with a SD of 1.4. One problem I noted was that the mould had to be squeezed firmly or the bullets had whiskers and fins.

After casting 70 additional bullets the whiskering had ceased and the bullets showed only a fine mould seam line as shown on the two right bullets in the photograph.

Weights stabilized at about 165.5 grains. In the photo-graph, the bullet on the left shows some whiskering in the lubrication grooves. What I found is that if the whiskering can be removed with the thumbnail and the result is uni-form on opposite sides, the bullet will shoot well as long as the weight is +/- 0.4 grains of the other bullets in a batch. In other words, a batch of bullets with a range of 171.0 to 171.4 grains ready to load would shoot well.

So the bottom line is accuracy. I’m now getting five shot groups of slightly over one-inch at 100 yards in gusty 3 to 5 MPH winds. With further testing I should be able to get less than one-inch groups but probably not down to the 0.6” that I get with Sierra jacketed bullets. Beagling is a great idea and beats spending twenty or so tedious hours to lap 0.003” out of a mould with questionable results.

Beagling is an easy way to modify an undersized mould and save pulling your hair out try-ing to get your rifle to shoot cast bullets properly. Total time to prep the mould was less than an hour. 􀀁

]]>Sun, 16 Jul 2017 02:50:03 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/96/undersized-moulds?-then-beagleThe .45 Auto Rimhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/95/the-.45-auto-rim Appearing in the Jan/Feb 2008 #191 issue of the Fouling Shot, this article was written by CBA member Ric Bowman. There really isn’t a reason that the .45 Auto Rim gets so much ink used on it for sho....
Appearing in the Jan/Feb 2008 #191 issue of the Fouling Shot, this article was written by CBA member Ric Bowman.

There really isn’t a reason that the .45 Auto Rim gets so much ink used on it for shooting articles. Other than the US Army Model 1917’s, there were a lot less of them made than .44 Specials or .45 Colts. The other .44/.45’s have higher velocity potentials and with heavier bullets. And both are better “hunting” calibers than the AR. When and where I grew up the rich guys who worked in the steel mills owned .44 Specials. The Colt fanciers had .45’s, usually in the New Service model, unless they were cowboy fans who had SAA’s. The guys that worked in the paper mills and machine shops had 1917’s. If you want-ed a handgun with power, the GI surplus .45 ACP in the 1917 was the only thing you could afford to shoot as reloading “ca’tridges” was unknown. The only thing they reloaded were the “squirrel rifles” and “hog guns” from down home in the hills.

My father and older brother were both S&W 1917 fans, so I grew up shooting 1917’s with GI hardball. The target was usually a tin can set in front of a stump on our Ohio farm. Once in awhile, I could hit the can. Pistols came and went, as my father was a typical southerner who traded cows, pigs, chickens, knives and guns with equal enthusiasm. However, there was almost always at least one Colt or S&W Model 1917 around the farm as long as WWII surplus ammo was available.

One of the first guns I traded for after I got out of the Army was a S&W 1917 with little finish, a dark bore but a tight action. I put so many hardball rounds through it that by 1975 the only rifling in the barrel was the last inch under the front sight.

Gallery Bullseye pistol shooting was popular in my new home in Washington State. Like most shooters of the day, I shot the 22-caliber stage with a Ruger and both Centerfire Stage and .45 Stage with a Model 1911 ”Softball” gun. As I became a better pistol shot, the 1917 became an embarrassment with its 4-inch groups at 50 feet during the after practice plinking sessions. I found a new pre-WWII commercial barrel and installed it with a 0.002” barrel/cylinder gap, 11-degree forcing cone and a crown exactly square with the bore.

It would now shoot my softball loads well. These were Lyman’s 452460 bullets cast from wheel weights, a 200-grain SWC, and sized to 0.452 inches. They were loaded over 4.0 grains of Bullseye and CCI large pistol primers in GI match brass. The bullets were seated just deep enough into the case to allow the Colt 1911 to lock up. A round dropped into the chamber would exactly reach the end of the barrel hood and the headspace was controlled with the bullet just slightly engraving the lands with the head against the slide. The front shoulder of the bullet was just outside the case. They were fine plinking loads in the S&W 1917 so now all I needed was a full power field load.

After buying 50 R-P .45 Auto Rim cases and a Lyman 452423 mould, I was ready to start. However, nothing worked well. I changed alloys, powders, and primers. Four inch groups at 25 yards were the norm. The brass was starting to crack and I couldn’t find any more. I would work up a good load for the 1911, transfer it to AR brass and it would be garbage.

My “original” 1917 that I rebarreled

Must be the gun, right? I have to find a “better” one. Then came a dozen military Colt and S&W 1917’s, Brazilian Contract S&W’s, post-war commercials, Model 1955’s, etc. Most would shoot my softball loads in half-moon clips, but none with full power loads in ACP brass or AR brass. Enough! They all went down the road, except that original 1917, and I moved on to the magnums and other projects.After buying 50 R-P .45 Auto Rim cases and a Lyman 452423 mould, I was ready to start. However, nothing worked well. I changed alloys, powders, and primers. Four inch groups at 25 yards were the norm. The brass was starting to crack and I couldn’t find any more. I would work up a good load for the 1911, transfer it to AR brass and it would be garbage. Must be the gun, right?

I have to find a “better” one. Then came a dozen military Colt and S&W 1917’s, Brazilian Contract S&W’s, post-war commercials, Model 1955’s, etc. Most would shoot my softball loads in half-moon clips, but none with full power loads in ACP brass or AR brass. Enough! They all went down the road, except that original 1917, and I moved on to the magnums and other projects.

Then in 1990 I read a “grocery store gunzine” article shilling the new S&W 625 “Model of 1989” in .45 ACP. It was supposed to shoot everything great. While cruising through a local gun shop one day, I saw one of the 5-inch models. I tried to dicker on the price. “Nope! I could only get four and have sold two. That is the price.” Going back about six months later, three had been sold. The dealer told me that the last one was a hard sell. But he did have one nobody even looked at twice, a four inch model. He would sell it for $50 less than retail. It went home with me. The AR project began again. What follows are my findings for the last 15 years work.

The S&W Model 1989 and newer 625’s

The 1989’s were made on the old hand operated equipment and were of the very highest quality that S&W made since the 1950’s. The newer 625’s were made on CNC equipment and are also well made. These have cylinder throats of 0.452” and barrels of 0.451” and will shoot jacketed bullets very well. Best accuracy seems to come with long seating of the bullets. Since they don’t have to fit into a magazine, OAL is not important. This also increases powder space so that you can use top ACP loads at less pressure. One of my favorites is the Speer 200 grain HP, the “flying ashtray,” over 9.0 grains of HS-6 with the bullet seated half way between the normal crimp area and the base of the bullet. These are loaded in recent production R-P .45 AR cases without cannelure that have a solid head. However, the main purpose of the long loading is to get the parallel sides of the bullet into the throat to center the round in the chamber.

Getting lead bullets to shoot well was a problem until I did cylinder measurements and brass measurements. The crux of the problem is that all of the .45 ACP cases I could find were shorter than the minimum trim length. Without using half-moon clips the headspace was 0.065 inches with most ACP cases. This is one of the reasons there are misfires when using .45 ACP ammo and no clips. Unlike rifle cases, the whole pistol case slides back against the breech face when the cartridge fires. This leaves a space about 0.485” in diameter and 0.065” long between the end of the case and the beginning of the throat. Moreover, unlike normal revolvers that have a nice gradual taper, these have a 90-degree shelf cut into the chamber to headspace ACP cases. What I think is happening is that the lead bullet is expanding into this void, bits and pieces are being cut off and the bullet is entering the throat crooked.

Success came when I bought “.460 Rowland” marked cases from Starline. This is an ACP case that is lengthened but otherwise the same outside dimensions as the ACP. I trimmed the cases so that when placed in the cylinder I could put a 0.005” feeler gauge between the head and the standing breech, giving me just that much headspace. Now the half-moon clips just float in between the end of the cylinder and the frame, but are still used for extraction. Fired cases measure 0.454” on the inside so little sizing is required and I can shoot either soft or hard alloys. It is best to use a taper or profile crimp to insure the case is seating against the shoulder. The only issue is that as the gun gets dirty, you have to push the rounds into the cylinder so that they are fully seated. I had a custom mould made by Mountain Molds Company that casts a 230-grain bullet with a 72% flat point. With either 6.5 grains of Unique or 9.2 grains of WW571 (HS-7), it goes about 825 f.p.s. and is a good field load. My “bear killer” load is the Lyman 452454 bullet cast from half Babbitt metal and half wheel weights, 248 grains, sized 0.452 inches and has a hardness of BHN 24. This is loaded over 14.0 grains of 2400 and gives 950 f.p.s. with very good accuracy.

My use of AR brass in this revolver has been limited The problem is that AR brass is even shorter than ACP brass. So far, I have been able to use my old “soft ball” load, but seat the bullet so that the front driving band is inside the throat. If other bullets are cast from hard alloy and seated out so that a parallel section of the bullet is in the throat, most work OK. But there are flyers you will have to contend with.


(L-R) Lyman 452460 in my softball ACP load; shortened .460 Rowland case with 452460 seated long; Lyman 454424 seated into a solid head .45 AR case (a M-625 only load.

S&W Model 1950’s and 1955’s

I now measure cylinders of all of these that I can find, or that people will let me measure. Some have throats as large as 0.459” and as small as 0.454”. Headspace varies from 0.030” to 0.070” depending upon what brass you are using as a guide. I don’t own one, so haven’t had much shooting experience with them, but the couple of friends who have let me borrow theirs have the same issues that I did, some loads work well and some not so well.

Colt Model 1917 and New Service Models

All of these I have measured have had uniform throats from 0.454” to 0.455”. This must be from their .45 Colt specification that uses this size throat. The Colt 1917 has a reputation of being more accurate than the S&W’s and that is probably the reason. The one that I borrowed had a lot less headspace with GI brass and would shoot well with AR brass as long as you used hard alloy and loaded 0.454” sized bullets long.

S&W Model 1917 and between the war commercials

Cylinder throats of these are uniformly 0.457” -0.459” on all the specimens I could find. Until I bought a S&W Second Model Hand Ejector .455 caliber made for the Canadian Government in WWI, I could never understand why the cylinders were this size. This measurement was the size for the .455 British round that used a 0.450” bullet with a hollow base. This ammo works fine in the Second Model. This bullet also works OK in the 1917’s because the bullet will obdurate up to fill the throat. Jacketed bullets seem to work fine as long as they are loaded long and you keep the pressures down. Remember that S&W didn’t heat treat large frame revolvers until 1927 and these cylinders are made out of the same steel used to make the nails you find at the hardware store. Unless you make special cases for them, both the ACP and AR work as long as you use low pressure loads.

Two bullets that have worked the best for my S&W 1917 have been Lyman’s # 454309 and #454424, both .45 Colt bullets. I cast these from 30/1 alloy that I use for black powder bullets. The bullets are not sized, but lubed in Lee’s Liquid Alox tumble lube. From my moulds, they both cast about 0.455”. If you are not a caster, you have several options. One is to buy Remington or Winchester swaged lead bullets for the .45 Colt that are of very soft alloy. Another is Speer’s swaged 250-grain SWC part #4683. Avoid like the plague all of those hard cast com-mercial bullets. They are too small, too hard, shoot poorly in 1917’s and lead the cylinder and barrel as nothing else will.

.Powder choice is easy; you can use any of the flake shotgun powders, or modern pistol powders, that you can find load data for. Start at the minimum load and work up in lots of six rounds in 0.1-grain increments. Your maximum is 10% less than the top listed load for the ACP. I have always been able to find a load from 3.7 to 4.0 grains of Bullseye, 4.0 to 4.5 grains of Unique or 4.6 to 5.4 grains of SR7625 that would shoot to the correct elevation.

Is there a reason for the AR to still exist? Who still uses or would chose a 90 year old design? There are “pockets” of AR users around the US. One is the Appalachian Mountain folk and another is the Canadian border area of western Montana, Idaho and eastern Washington. There is one little gun shop in Eastern Washington that carries AR brass and they tell me that they sell a lot of them, as in 5000 plus cases a year. It works fine with light loads of 200 grain cast bullets at 600 f.p.s. That load has mild recoil and is accurate enough for 50 yard shooting. Commercial ball ammo works fine for store bought rounds. A 250 grain cast bullet at 950 f.p.s. will solve any “wolf at the door” problem you will ever have. It seems to still be popular because it is just enough power in a handy sized using pistol without all the flash and roar of the magnums.


]]>Wed, 12 Jul 2017 01:36:42 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/95/the-.45-auto-rimA .30-30 Wesson Rolling Blockhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/94/a-.30-30-wesson-rolling-block This article written by Mustafa Curtess appeared in the July/Aug 2000 #146 issue of the Fouling Shot. (Info on .30-30 Wesson cartridge found here) On the drive home from the ....





This article written by Mustafa Curtess appeared in the July/Aug 2000 #146 issue of the Fouling Shot.

(Info on .30-30 Wesson cartridge found here)


On the drive home from the 1998 BPCRS Nationals at Raton, NM, nephew Wes Windel, close friend Mark Cox and I conspired to each build a Schuetzen style rifle. We agreed that they would be of an obsolete late 1800s cartridge, use our many .30 caliber moulds, be something for which cases are available, and beyond all else, depart from the .32-40 and .32 Miller Short stampede.

A quick study of Cartridges of the World and the Donnally book on reforming cartridges narrowed it down to the .30-30 Wesson, using .357 Maximum brass necked down to a straight taper with a short cylindrical neck, accepting a .310” diameter CB. At the time, we did not know that die sets were stocked by C-H/4D, so we ordered finish and sizer reamers from JGS (which for some reason they marked ".310 Windel”).

I hoped to use as much of the case length as possible, so had to do some guesstimating as to what that would be after sizing down, fire forming and squaring the case mouths. The result is a "miniature” .32-40, and ultimately the C-H/4D dies matched our chamber precisely.

Wes had an extra .308”, 1-10 twist, 6-groove, 1.250” barrel blank and I had a Star Rolling Block action available, so we agreed that my rifle would be built first (besides, I’m known to get cross when I don’t get my way).

Gunsmithing of my rifle was done by Mark and Dennis Dyer (Oklahoma Territorial Arms), who builds replicas and restores originals. At my request, Dennis just polished and blued the 24” blank, keeping it the full 1.250” diameter.

If Dennis has a signature, it is exceptional heat treatment and color case hardening. Even though I had )not expected any cosmetic work, he would not allow the rifle to leave his shop until it met his high standards of workmanship and appearance. A "silk purse from a sow’s ear.”

I retained the original buttstock, and Wes fur-nished walnut for a suitable forestock which, once finished, appears to have been cut from the same tree. The new "bench rest” stock is longer, wider and flat to match my wide front bench rest bag nicely.

Case forming was straightforward, once I learned a minimal anneal of the neck area was needed for 100% success rate. I had specified a .310” throat .300” long, and a 3° leade into the lands. I can use any bullet from the Lee 130 RNGC to the 225 gr. Lyman #311284. The shorter bullets sized .310” can be seated in unsized cases with firm hand pressure, the gas check spring-back holding them securely in place. Longer bullets in the 180 to 225 gr. range are more easily seated with the seater die. As expected, the shorter bullets are best used for off-hand practice, while the longer bullets give better bench rest accuracy.

Load development was begun with some care,as no loading data could be found. I did not know how strong the .357 Maximum cases were, nor had I any experience with any similar size cartridge. As it happens, bullets up to 160 grs. work with loads for my .30-223 Ingram, and expansion volume for fixed .30-30 Wesson cases is quite close to that of breech seated .32 Miller short loads. This is published in the Schuetzen chapter of the Accurate Arms guide #1. The chronographed velocities of the same charges and bullet weights are identical.

The only surprise came when we ran out of IMR-4227 and began a fresh can of H-4227 (which is somewhat faster in this small case). Three small pistol primers were blown but extraction remained normal. Since then I have used small rifle primers only.

The barrel shank diameter and thread pitch in the Star action is the same as the M-98 Mauser. This action has been proven with hundreds of .30-30 Win. reloads, then thousands of .30 Herrett loads, so fundamental reliability was never in doubt.

Just about every likely powder from Bullseye to AA8700 has been tried, and very few have not been useful in some application, but the Accurate Arms loads mentioned have been clearly the most accurate and reliable (in my rifle).

This action is far from sophisticated. The longish lock time does not outpace the disruption generated when the massive hammer is set in motion. Mark Cox did spend an evening tuning and honing the trigger and sear surfaces, and achieved a clean, safe predictable break at about three pounds. Not a genuine Rolling Block, parts are a problem, so I am pleased with it as-is.

Initial trials were at 200 yards, with only marginal results, and since then the 200 yard range has not been available. However, improvements to the crown, throat and bore condition have been made, and exten-sive load development has been done.

Any number of loads do 1.00” to 1.75” at 100 yards fairly consistently, and frequent "advantages” crop up.

For instance, CBA member Wayne Schwartz (Der Schuetzenmeister, TFS 142-5) had a concern about fine ball powders (which I prefer) collecting in the primer pocket and causing hang fires. His tip to "screen” the primer pocket to exclude the powder seemed like a logical attempt to reduce velocity spreads, which I believe contributed to my consistent vertical groups. I concocted a simple, effective way to install nitrated paper disks under the primer when seating it. This expedient instantly converted 1.75” vertical groups to much rounder ones of 1.25” or less. (Editor’s note: Recently I have read of black powder cartridge shooters placing a newspaper disk over the primer to improve ballistic consistency. It sounds like they are slipping a strip of paper between the case head and the primer, then seating the primer right through it, cutting a disk in the process. Something to play with.)

For plain base experiments, Rodney Storie (Bison Mfg. Co.) lent me a fine Ideal #311278 mould, and Forrest Asmus made available the custom Hoch 667A with which he campaigned at Coors with much success.

Minor, but persistent lead fouling vanished when I began using Ed’s Red Solvent. Who knows what I will discover tomorrow?

I index bullets to the chamber but do not index cases. No load has yielded poor extraction, and although this is a well tapered case, fired ones can be re-inserted without indexing, so I am assured that my chamber is round, straight and the headspace is correct.

All my expectations for this project have been met or exceeded.

Mark’s Stevens 44-1/2 and Wes’ High Wall are well under way. They should shortly have their own successes to relate. 􀀁



]]>Sun, 09 Jul 2017 11:42:05 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/94/a-.30-30-wesson-rolling-blockA Revolver Accuracy Primerhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/93/a-revolver-accuracy-primer Written by Norman F. Johnson, this article appeared in the May/June 1996 #121 issue of the Fouling Shot. In a revolver, the throats are the areas in each cylinder chamber immediately ahead of the po....
Written by Norman F. Johnson, this article appeared in the May/June 1996 #121 issue of the Fouling Shot.

In a revolver, the throats are the areas in each cylinder chamber immediately ahead of the portion of the chamber where the brass case rests and into which the bullet projects. If the bullet is sized so that it is a gentle force fit in the throat, all else being equal your accuracy potential will increase greatly. When a bullet properly fits the throat, two factors come into play to improve accuracy:

a) The bullet axis is more nearly coaxial with the barrel axis.
b) Gas cutting, which will positively ruin accu­racy, is virtually

Gas cutting is the jetting of hot propellant gases past the bullet, causing erosion of the outer periphery of the bullet and plating some of that eroded lead onto the bore surface where the bullet runs over it, further increasing bullet degradation. When the cylinder throats are more than about .000511 over bullet diameter, gas cutting damage is severe even before the bullet hits the forcing cone, making good accuracy improbable. This is true of cast bullets, more so than jacketed, because they are far more subject to gas cutting.

The first thing I do with a new revolver is to shoot it with some of my "standard" loads and if it does well I accept the gun the way it is. For those that do not shoot as well as expected, I swage bul­lets, both cast and jacketed, to fit the revolver's cylinder throats. As a number of Cast Bullet Asso­ciation members have discovered, fitting the bullets to a revolver's throat is probably the single most important step that one can take to improve a re­volver's accuracy. Most of the revolvers I have owned in the past few years have throats that are oversize.

Despite what the gun writers say, my tests show that there are no observable pressure in­creases when using lead bullets up to .006" over groove diameter, and such bullets do not increase leading if other loading practices are reasonable. My Ruger Blackhawk has .4545" throats and a .449" slugged bore. Even when loaded with my 350 gr., 1300 fps ''boomers", the Blackhawk shoots .45411, 13 BHN bullets better than any other.

Using an old C-H Swage-0-Matic bullet swaging press and appropriately modified ( opened) dies I am able to reshape and resize most bullets, including most of my cast bullet rejects, to usable and usually very accurate projectiles. If the bullet is not too hard and the increase in diameter does not exceed a couple of thousandths, a sizer-lubricator with the appropriate die can be used to bump up a bullet to proper size. Bumping in a sizer-lubricator does not provide the same control and consistency as bullet swaging equipment. Be careful, it is easy to break the sizer-lubricator's handle.

I have improved the performance of a Redhawk .44 Magnum from a best of 2" at 25 yards, to a constant . 7511 at the same distance, by changing bullet diameter alone. Now that is satisfying!


The Ruger Redhawk is shown here with some cast bullet loads.

Note the integral scope mount cuts.

Ruger Blackhawk shown with some cast bullet loads.

It seems that many cast bullet shooters move to a harder alloy if their reloads lead the barrel This usually compounds the problem because leading is often the result of poor bullet fit. It sometimes pays to try a softer alloy so that the undersized bullet will bump up upon powder ignition. This fills the re­volver's throat and precludes gas cutting. All of my target loads, 1000 fps and below, are soft alloys made up of just about any alloy of 8 BHN or less. Harder alloys will work but must fit the throat more closely.

A more common and practical approach to obtaining proper bullet fit is to have a mould cut for your throat and bullet alloy. Veral Smith of Lead Bullet Technology, does this work for little more than the price of a production mould. Ask him to cut the mould to cast bullets about .0005" under your throat size. Minor bullet diameter adjustments can be made by varying the bullet alloy content.

To obtain the diameter of a bullet that will shoot well in your revolver, take a soft lead bullet and squeeze it gently in a vise until it is about .01011 larger than nominal bullet diameter. Attempt to push this slug through each throat of your cylinder using hand pressure only. If it will not pass through the cylinder's throats, your slug is large enough. If it will pass easily, you must increase the diameter of the slug slightly.

To prepare the cylinder for slugging, remove it from the gun, clean it of all lead and copper fouling, lubricate it lightly and make sure that it is solidly supported on a suitable wooden block. With an ap­propriate size brass drift, carefully drive the prepared slug through each throat from the rear of the chamber. What you are attempting here is to find the diameter of the smallest throat, so handle the soft lead slug carefully and drive it straight to avoid distorting it. This may take a couple of practice runs because the transition, between the area of the chamber where the brass case resides and the area into which the bullet projects, varies from cylinder to cylinder. Some cylinders have a sharp step, while others have a relatively long, smooth transition. If the revolver has a sharp step, it may be easier to avoid distorting the slug by driving it from the front of the cylinder.

The diameter of the slug should be the ideal bullet diameter to be fired in you gun. If the slug is the nominal diameter for the caliber, you will be very fortunate; usually you will find it is somewhat larger. Don't worry about the size difference in the throats in a particular cylinder, I find that even though they are sometimes badly oversize, they usually do not vary much more than .0005". If the barrel slugs larger than throats you have a problem and two options; either open the throats to . 00 I" or .002" larger than the bore or get a new gun. Fortu­nately this condition is rare.

You may encounter a condition where a throat ­size bullet is so large that a loaded cartridge cannot be chambered. In cases where this condition is marginal a taper crimp will usually solve the prob­lem. Where it is more extreme, the chamber, but not the throat, will need to be enlarged to accommodate the cartridge. The only revolver in which I have had this experience was a stainless steel Virginian Dra­goon .44 Magnum Interarms fitted a new cylinder to the gun. Use only enough taper crimp to hold the bullet securely, otherwise you will size the bullet as it enters the taper crimp die and ruin all of your careful efforts.

Remember that when shooting cast bullets the size of the expander plug is very important. If you use the standard size plug normally supplied by the manufacturer, the oversize bullet may be sized down when it is seated in the cartridge case, again ruining your efforts. The expander plug for cast bullets should be .001" to .002" smaller than your new bullet diameter.

I keep a supply of various size Lyman M die expander plugs. When I need a particular size, I con a machinist friend to turn one down to the proper diameter. The Lyman M die is an excellent design because it applies a step at the case mouth that makes for an easy way to start the bullet into the case with the bullet axis concentric with the case axis; a very important characteristic for pistol and rifle ammunition.

Another problem is one that few shooters know exists. In revolvers, the area of the bore adja­cent to the forcing cone, where the barrel is screwed into the frame, is sometimes smaller than the rest of the bore. This damages the bullet the same as an undersize throat and unfortunately, is a very common condition. The solution is to remove the constriction with an abrasive charged lead lap. This is not an easy job for the inexperienced. An excellent alternative is to shoot several hundred rounds, 200 to 500, depending on the amount of constriction, charged with a suitable lapping com­pound. This has the added advantages of polishing and very slightly tapering the bore. Lapping im­proves cast bullet performance and minimizes lead­ing. It is important that the proper lapping com­pound be used, Clover's Valve Grinding Compound is much too coarse. LBT can supply the proper stuff for about $10. 00.

When shooting the longer, fitted bullets, load them as far into the throat as is practically possible. This assures true concentricity of the bullet and bore axes for precise launch into the bore. It makes the cartridge fit independent of a sloppy chamber because the bullet supports the case rather than the reverse. I load my heavy bullet .45 Colt, .44 Mag­num, and .357 loads to clear the front of the cham­ber by about only .10". Of course, short bullets do not allow seating out very far.

I would conclude with one more tip that ap­plies not only to revolvers, but to cast bullet shoot­ing in general Slow powders seem to be much kinder to cast bullets than faster ones. I have devel­oped the practice of using the slowest powder that will provide the desired velocity. Most of my prac­tice shooting is done with cartridges loaded with some of the very slow, low priced swplus powders. Slow powders sometimes makes a .308 Win. into a .30-30, but paper and the appropriate game do not know the difference. Characteristically unburned powder is left in the bore but blowing it out be­tween shots does not change accuracy. Lead .45-70 slugs with 2% tin shoot well in my Marlin and Contender, with no leading at 1,300 fps when loaded with a case full of MR-8600 or MR-8700.

]]>Fri, 07 Jul 2017 08:41:21 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/93/a-revolver-accuracy-primerLoading Cast Bullets in the 9mm Lugerhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/92/loading-cast-bullets-in-the-9mm-luger Written by Steve Tucker, this article appeared in the Nov/Dec 1999 #142, issue of the Fouling Shot.The 9mm Luger has a reputation for mediocre accuracy with jacketed bullets and a worse reputation ....
Written by Steve Tucker, this article appeared in the Nov/Dec 1999 #142, issue of the Fouling Shot.

The 9mm Luger has a reputation for mediocre accuracy with jacketed bullets and a worse reputation with cast bullets. Much of this notoriety is due to the many military and police pistols, most intentionally made loose to guarantee functioning when dirty, and many worn from extensive use. Part of the problem is caused by the generous chambering chosen in some guns to insure feeding. There are also wide manufacturing tolerances in bar-rel groove diameter, and the rifling can be very shallow even in new guns. A contributing factor may be the NATO standard twist rate of one turn in 10 inches, when a twist rate half that fast would stabilize any normal 9mm Luger bullet.

None of this reflects on any basic inaccuracy in the cartridge, as well made 9mm pistols are capable of excellent accuracy. Many inaccurate guns have been made into good shooters by installing a Bar-Sto or Briley barrel with a tight fit in the slide, minimum dimension chamber, and deep rifling with slower twist rate. A properly fit 9mm pistol is capable of top notch accuracy with jacketed bullets, but as many shooters have found out, this does not necessarily carry over to cast bullets. There are inherent characteristics of the 9mm that make loa-ing accurate cast bullet ammunition more difficult.

First: The 9mm is a high-pressure cartridge, normal operating pressure is 35,000 psi. The 9mm operates at pressures that require special care when shooting cast bullets. Second: Chambering variations in 9mm pistols can negatively affect cast bullet accuracy far more than they do with jacketed bullets. For the above reasons, successful 9mm cast bullet loads are quite different from jacketed bullet loads and bullet fit is important to suc-cess.

With increasing pressure, fit in the barrel and forcing cone becomes progressively more important with cast bullets. Most cast bullet shooters know that cast bullets need to be larger than the groove diameter for best results. Groove diameters in 9mm barrels vary from 0.354” to 0.361”. This extreme variation means a barrel must be measured. Forcing cone fit means that the bullet seats into the forcing cone or leade when chambered. The effect of seating the bullet to an Over All Length (OAL) to contact the leade can be a 25% to 50% reduction in group size. This represents a huge improvement and is easily detected even in offhand shooting.

For example, in the EAA Witness, the Lyman #356402 seated to an OAL of 1.110” averaged 6.5” 25 yd. groups. Seating the bullet to an OAL of 1.243” resulted in 3” average 25 yd. groups. The long OAL rounds were far more accurate, but were over maximum OAL and would not fit in the magazine. They had to be chambered by hand and exposed the grease groove. This bullet is not suitable for loading in this length leade.

Leade length in a gun is easy to determine by loading a jacketed bullet of an appropriate diameter backwards, and seating it progressively deeper until it will just chamber.

Here is a typical example, this is a new barrel and is not worn, the throat is a taper so the leade length varies with the bullet diameter:
0.355” bullet 0.139”
0.357” bullet 0.120”
0.358” Bullet 0.112”

It is apparent that the projection out of the case needs to be quite long to engage the forcing cone. This throat is more than .360” at the case mouth, and easily accepts .358” bullets. Groove diameter is 0.356”, so 0.357” or 0.358” bullets work well.

A survey of more than thirty 9mm pistols, including both current production guns and older military and commercial models, showed that there is no standard throating in 9mm Luger pistols. Both the length and diameter of the throating varied over a wide range. Diameters at the case mouth ranged from 0.357” to 0.362”, some guns had a short cylindrical section, most were a straight taper. Leade length at 0.357” ranged from 0.050” to more than 0.210”, and the average was more than 0.110”. Some of the longest throats were in new guns.

In order to be suitable for leade seating, a bullet needs an ogive short enough to allow the full diameter body to contact the leade. It also needs a front band wide enough so that the grease groove is not exposed. With bullets lighter than 100 grains it is not possible to have both an ogive and the necessary band length. Bullets of 115 grains can be designed to leade-seat in short leade barrels, but loads powerful enough to work the action may develop pressure too high for best accuracy. I have found that maximum utility in 9mm Luger cast bullets is in the weight range of 120 to 140 grains. Bullets heavier than 140 grains need a tapered or gas check base to pre-vent interference with the case wall taper.

There is one more requirement for a good leade seating cast bullet design, that is a definite step or angle between the ogive and the front band. When rounds are seated into the leade, variations in bullet body length cannot be tolerated. When the bullet has a tangent ogive, variations in cast diameter cause large variations in body length after sizing. A long body bullet will cause a jam, because cartridge headspace is too long to fit the chamber. Cast bullet designs need a defined end to the top of the front band. This can be a small step, a secant ogive, or a shallow angle. Choice of the correct bullet design is a critical first step in loading cast bullets in the 9mm. Unfortunately many of bullet molds offered for 9mm closely copy the jacketed bullet profile, a long ogive with a very short bullet body.

The photograph shows some typical 9mm bullets in order of their leade seating length. The leade lengths given assume the grease groove is 0.010” below the case mouth. The very common Lyman designs 356242 and 356402 are suitable only for short leades. You need a leade seating length over 0.110” in order to leade-seat in the average 9mm Luger pistol.


9mm cast bullets, with maximum leade seat lengths:
Left to right: Lyman 356242, 0.046”; Lyman 356402, 0.062”; Oregon Trail 135 RNBB, 0.082”; Hensley and Gibbs 275, 0.087”; Saeco 377, 0.091”; Hensley and Gibbs 318, 0.113”; Oregon Trail 124 RNBB, 0.115”; Lee 356-125-2R, 0.116”; NEI 133, 0.166; NEI 116C, 0.178”

NEI #133, which is available in 125 grain bevel base and 147 grain gas check versions, can leade-seat in most guns. However this bullet has a truncated cone ogive that can cause feeding problems in pistols designed to function with ball ammo. In order to have a more generally useful bullet I designed NEI #116C. This bullet has an adequate ogive for good feeding and an ogive-body angle that matches the average leade angle in the throat. I designed it with the maximum leade seating length possible with an ogive NEI 116C design dimensions that will feed well.

.Walt Melander at NEI did an excellent job of translating my design into a cherry. The 4 cavity aluminum blocks are perfectly matched and easily cast faultless bullets. The bullet has lived up to my design intentions, giving good feeding and excellent accuracy. NEI #116C is not a “Miracle Bullet,” you still need careful load development to get good accuracy.

NEI 116C design dimensions
The load giving best accuracy is often just powerful enough to function the action, and is seldom over 80% of the maximum load. It is always best to start out as low as possible and work up. The starting loads in some manuals are excessively high for cast bullets, and shooters working up from them may never find the most accurate load. Powders matter, and switching to a slower powder may allow 100 fps more velocity with equivalent accuracy. Powders I have found useful include Bullseye, HP-38 and 231 on the fast end, AA-5, 4756, and Power Pistol on the slow side. Notice that these are all small flake or spherical powders that measure well.

Powder measurement is critical in the 9mm, small charge variations produce large pressure variations.

Pressure variations that go unnoticed with jacketed bullets can destroy cast bullet accuracy. Powder measures that work well with larger rifle charges are sometimes not capable of throwing consistent charges in the 3 to 5 grain range required for 9mm loads. If your powder measure is not capable of throwing small charges with a variation of plus or minus 0.1 grains you should weigh charges or purchase a measure suited to pistol use.


NEI 116C engraves over half its length, giving increased velocity and accuracy potential.

Bullet alloy needs to be sufficiently hard. This is something that varies from gun to gun and load to load. BHN 16 is a good starting point, but some gun/load combinations will require BHN 22 (Linotype) or harder. The bullet hardness giving the best groups may be higher than calculat-ed from the pressure, it pays to experiment. Some commercially cast bullets I have tested were BHN 10, these and commercial swaged lead 9mm bullets are far too soft for any but very light loads.

Case variation in 9mm Luger is extreme and this is especially damaging to cast bullets. Mixed cases can double group size:

-Browning High-Power Federal cases 3.5” average group

-Browning High-Power mixed cases 6.1” average group

Military 9mm cases are frequently thick and have a rapid internal taper, the smaller case volume causes higher pressure. If the base of a cast bullet extends below the taper it can be sized smaller, and this is very destructive to accuracy. Cannelured cases can damage cast bullets, if the base of a cast bullet extends below the cannelure it may create a bulge that prevents chambering.

For loading cast bullets where larger bullet diameters and deep seating may be required, non-cannelured commercial cases are the most satisfactory. In 9mm Luger, single headstamp selection is best for top accuracy and consistent results when testing cast bullets. After load development, you may find that mixed commercial cases can be used satisfactorily for informal shooting. If your gun has a groove diameter of 0.357” or larger and a tight chamber, you may have to select cases with thin walls, or resort to case neck reaming. Case neck reaming is labor intensive, but can provide a way to shoot guns with large groove diameters.




Left- 4 cavity NEI 116C mold




If your gun is one of the 10% or so with a leade over 0.178” long, there is no cast bullet design available that will leade-seat. If this is the case, you will have to live with the effects of bullet jump. In my tests with 3 guns and several bullets, the effect on accuracy was directly related to pressure. In 1150 fps loads, 0.010” bullet jump gave noticeably larger groups. In 1000 fps loads, accuracy did not noticeably degrade until bullet jump reached 0.020”. When bullet jump exceeded 0.050”, only low pressure loads, under 900 fps were accurate.

The only requirement for accurate low pressure loads is that the bullet be at least 0.001” over the maximum groove diameter. Fast powders like Bullseye work best, and 2.0 to 2.7 grains usually groups well. Depending on bullet weight, velocity will be 750 to 850 fps. Loads this light may not function the action of stock semi-autos. This can be overcome by installing a lighter recoil spring. Light loads can be exceptionally accurate in any gun, and are ideal for plinking at short range, or basement shooting. Just be sure to reinstall the standard recoil spring before firing normal power ammunition.

One thing has become apparent in my testing, and that is each 9mm pistol is different with cast bullet loads. Unlike the 45 ACP, where good cast bullet loads are easy to develop, the 9mm is finicky. As velocity and pressure increase, requirements become more and more exacting, and loads may have to be tailored to each individual pis-tol for best results. Experimenting with powders, sizing diameters and bullet alloys is time consuming. This can be frustrating if the bullet design chosen is not capable of maximizing the accuracy potential of the gun.

There are few good cast bullet designs suitable for leade-seating in the average 9mm Luger throat. Mold makers continue to try to imitate the design of jacketed bullets, and uninformed customers continue to purchase these designs with predictably poor results. Some cast bullet loading data contributes to the problem by recommending loads that are to heavy and by specifying an OAL that guarantees poor results even with well-designed bullets. This is unfortunate, because the 9mm, and other high pressure semi-auto pistol cartridges like it, can shoot cast bullets accurately and provide low-cost shooting enjoyment. 􀀃

]]>Tue, 04 Jul 2017 12:29:12 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2017/7/92/loading-cast-bullets-in-the-9mm-luger