.455 Ammo Info for Collectors

Hi Y'all,

I'm hoping it's OK to post this in the Hand Ejectors Forum.
It occurred to me to put it in with ammo, but the most likely folks to find use for this are those who own, collect, and perhaps, shoot their S&W 1st or 2nd Model Hand Ejectors in .455 caliber.

The link below is from the International Ammunition Association, Inc.
and their homepage is cartridgecollectors.org

One of the issues for those who shoot and, perhaps reload for, these great old-timers involves the long chambers typically encountered. Perhaps many of you have looked at the long chambers, then examined some of the available ammo, such as Fiocchi or Hornady, and wondered why the cases were so short?

For those even casually concerned with accuracy, the short .455 "Webley" case can be found wanting. My introduction to Bullseye shooting on a budget involved a S&W 2nd model in .455. I eventually found best accuracy when forming cases from 45 Colt. After turning the cases to reduce the rim thickness from ~ 0.060" to ~ 0.044", I experimented with OAL until I found a length that was just slightly shorter than the distance from the breech end of the cylinder to the beginning of the shoulder leading to the chamber mouth, plus rim thickness. The overall length of the cases was slightly longer than that of a Dominion .455 Colt case (0.870"), being about 0.920" (if I recall...). Compare that to the typical 455 MkII case length of 0.770".

Finally, for my purposes, match grade accuracy was possible (given correct cast bullets).
But, I was still left wondering "why the long chambers?"
I discovered it had a lot to do with the staggering variety of .455 revolver cartridges (some w/ shotshells) produced throughout the British Commonwealth, and to a lesser degree, the USA, with issues including the switch from Black Powder to Cordite.

Anyhow, without further adieu, here's the link:

Those Confusing .455s - International Ammunition Association

I hope this is helpful.
I do have many of these cartridges in my collection, and can post pictures and dimensions, should anyone be interested. Attached is a sample from my collection. You may notice the two variations of "Manstoppers"!

Best Regards and "HUZZAH!"

Jim

I’m a big fan of these old British-contract HEs and particularly like finding them in the original .455. Thanks for posting this

I found your post interesting.
I don't "try" to collect cartridges or even have a 455 but do have these none the less.

S&W 455

I have two of the MKIIs in 455 Webley and a few antique rounds accumulated in the process. Recently, I started hand loading the Webley .455 when Starline began producing the brass, I bought 250 cases along with a set of Lee dies. I must admit the recoil was a bit more than I expected and learned that you need to crimp the cases a bit harder. Had several rounds separate and jam things up a little. Enjoyed your post!

Hi Delta419,

That's a good sign that the bullets were able to drift out of the cases, assuming that a bit more crimp corrected the problem. A frequent reloading problem with .455 is that the resizing dies used are too small (often being repurposed 45 Colt or ACP...the former "can" work).
The resultant effects are that 1) the bases of the bullet are swaged down when seated, ruining all your hard work to properly size slugs, and 2) shortened brass life.
So, sounds like your Lee dies are made to good specs.

I saw that Starline brass. Years ago, I had spoken to them and encouraged them to bring out the .455, but in the longer "455 Colt" length or "455 MkI" on the premise that it could be trimmed to MkII length if needed. (This is kinda like when Bertram makes things like "45 Basic" brass, and leaves it to the end user to cut and/or reform.). They said they'd keep it in mind....
Oh well, at least they make something. It's probably a lot higher quality than the Fiocchi brass. Besides being the short MkII length, Fiocchi uses a small primer pocket, splits very easily, and is expensive!
(This is not to be confused with the sample Fiocchi in my first post. That's very high quality, but ancient, production.)

Enjoy!
Jim

Chris Punnett is a Canadian, and is one of the foremost collectors in the world of British cartridges, and is also somewhat of an authority on .30-'06 cartridges and has written a book on them. Until very recently he was the editor of the IAA bi-monthly journal. I have corresponded with him numerous times. He was formerly with ICI.

Anyone with the slightest interest in ammunition (any type) should be an IAA member.

6string said:

. . . A frequent reloading problem with .455 is that the resizing dies used are too small (often being repurposed 45 Colt or ACP...the former "can" work).
The resultant effects are that 1) the bases of the bullet are swaged down when seated, ruining all your hard work to properly sized slugs, and 2) shortened brass life . . .

Click to expand...

I use 45 Schofield dies for reloading. My understanding is that the bullets used in 45 Colt and 455 are the same size - .454", plus the brass is for both calibers are .476". What does not seem to work is using 45 Colt dies to reload such the short 455 cases since one cannot crimp the brass into the cannelure of a cast bullet.

6string said:

... at least they make something. It's probably a lot higher quality than the Fiocchi brass. Besides being the short MkII length, Fiocchi uses a small primer pocket, splits very easily, and is expensive!...

Click to expand...

I had the same experience with Fiocchi .455 cases splitting. They are really thin! To be fair, I only had splits from the ammo in one box, so maybe I just got a bad box (?)

Also wondered why in the world they used small pistol primers (? See photo below) However, since Hornady quit making .455 Mk II, you either have to buy Fiocchi or hand load. (Or find an old box of Dominion at a gun shop!)

Hi Gary,
Yes, good idea! Are they steel dies?
A 45 Colt steel sizing die is good, too. Unlike carbide dies, steel dies are usually machined to match the subtle taper of "straight walled" cartridges.
A 45 Colt seater/crimp die can be cut down in a lathe to work.

But, if you have a 45 Colt Lee Loader that can be quite useful, too.

Jim

PS: Hey Jack Flash! Love that Canadian stuff! I used to have a bunch of CIL brass! Some was once fired, but I did score a box of empty unprimed virgin brass! It was all balloon head. Great stuff, no problems. I loved the extra length

Jim,
What is the round I outlined in red?

Is it the round you made: "about 0.920" (if I recall...)" ??

It does not look like any Brit round I have seen.







Thanks.

handejector said:

Jim,
What is the round I outlined in red?

Is it the round you made: "about 0.920" (if I recall...)" ??

It does not look like any Brit round I have seen.

Thanks.

Click to expand...

I had that in my tray of British big bores and decided to add it.
It's actually a 455 Webley Automatic.
It has a semi-rimmed case. I have been told that besided obviously fitting the 455 Webley Automatic Pistol, it can chamber in at least some Webley 455 revolvers and headspace off the rim. I never tried it in a S&W for fit.
The jacket also is an indicator that it is late 30s or later production to conform to the Hague Convention. 455 revolver service ammo from the same period used a different style of jacket, being more of a half jacket over the forward nose of the bullet, and leaving the lower half as plain exposed lead. It sounds weird, but works in practice, as the design compliments the hollow base. Given that many British made 455s had straight bored-through cylinders w/o conventional throats, the hollow base is an essential part of the cartridge's design.
I'll look to see if I have a sample. I used to have a full 50 round box of unloaded bullets of this type made by Dominion.

Jim

Sorry to have digressed from your question!

6string said:

...It's actually a 455 Webley Automatic.
It has a semi-rimmed case. I have been told that besided obviously fitting the 455 Webley Automatic Pistol, it can chamber in at least some Webley 455 revolvers and headspace off the rim. ...

Click to expand...

That is amazing. Those Brits are pretty darned smart! Sort of like having a built-in moon clip.

The Colt M1911 was made in .455 Webley Auto for British service, and there is quite a bit of information about them available. The only real difference is in the barrel and the slide stamping, and I have understood that .45 ACP cartridge could be used OK in a .455 Webley M1911. I have a Colt M1911 which was originally in .455, but it has a .45 ACP barrel, not the original .455 barrel. I think there was also a slight difference between the .455 and .45 ACP magazines.

6string said:

I had that in my tray of British big bores and decided to add it.
It's actually a 455 Webley Automatic.
It has a semi-rimmed case. I have been told that besided obviously fitting the 455 Webley Automatic Pistol, it can chamber in at least some Webley 455 revolvers and headspace off the rim. I never tried it in a S&W for fit.
The jacket also is an indicator that it is late 30s or later production to conform to the Hague Convention. 455 revolver service ammo from the same period used a different style of jacket, being more of a half jacket over the forward nose of the bullet, and leaving the lower half as plain exposed lead. It sounds weird, but works in practice, as the design compliments the hollow base. Given that many British made 455s had straight bored-through cylinders w/o conventional throats, the hollow base is an essential part of the cartridge's design.

Click to expand...

The use of 455 Self-Loading pistol ammo in 455 revolvers was very unwise. It was unfortunate that this could be done. Ammo packets were marked "Not for Revolver for good reason". The 455 SL bullets were jacketed from the begining; adopted by the Royal Navy in 1913.

No British .455 revolver bullets were half jacketed. They were all plain lead alloy until the full jacket Mark VI was adopted in 1939, but yes, to conform to the Hague Convention.

The 455 revolvers were not bored through; the chamber mouths were nominal .450" diameter. The barrels were nominal .452", so again yes, the hollow base was as a result of this.

Peter

DWalt said:

The Colt M1911 was made in .455 Webley Auto for British service, and there is quite a bit of information about them available. The only real difference is in the barrel and the slide stamping, and I have understood that .45 ACP cartridge could be used OK in a .455 Webley M1911. I have a Colt M1911 which was originally in .455, but it has a .45 ACP barrel, not the original .455 barrel. I think there was also a slight difference between the .455 and .45 ACP magazines.

Click to expand...

The 455SL magazines and the magazine wells are slightly wider than the45 ACP ones. A 45ACP mag rattles in a 455SL frame. The 455SL is a semi-rim case so the barrel hood has a groove to give headspace. A 45ACP case ends up hanging on the extractor and will work, but new extractors are going to be hard to find!

Peter
Webley collector

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the info. There's a wealth of knowledge on the 455s from British Commonwealth countries and related areas. Most of my experience is from a former life in Canada.
1911s chambered for 455 Automatic had their breechfaces cut to a larger diameter to accommodate the semi-rimmed case.

A bit more 455 Data
I checked my collection and have some additional numbers.
- The 455 Automatic has a .453" diameter cupro-nickel jacketed bullet. The rim diameter is 0.500". That makes it 0.025" larger than the case itself at the base. The rim thickness is 0.044", which matches the headspace tolerances of most 455 revolvers. The case length is 0.925".
Compare that to the following rim diameters:
-45 ACP: 0.475"
-455 Webley MkII D.C. Co: 0.535"
-45 Long Colt WRA Co: 0.502"
-45 Long Colt Dominion for RCMP Colt New Service (aka 1909 load): 0.506"

There's a lot of conclusions that you can draw from these numbers.
Consider that many US made 455s (Colt and S&W) have been converted to 45 Colt. Also, consider that a 45 Colt SAA would accomodate the smaller 0.502" rim but not the larger RCMP load!
As far as the "advisability" of using 455 Automatic in a revolver is concerned, I think it's "do-able" in some circumstances, if not necessarily recommended. If a 0.502" 45 Colt rim (as per the old SAA loads) was problematic (main issue being unreliable ejection),then 455 Automatic wouldn't help. But, assuming it can accomodate the case length, and have a conventional cylinder throat, it can work.
The rarity of the ammo and pressure considerations are another matter....

Jim

I'll write under separate posting regarding some data I have on cordite vs. nitro-cellulose loads....

PS: see DWalt's next post for more numbers

"-.45 Long Colt Dominion for RCMP Colt New Service (aka 1909 load): 0.506""

Interesting comment, but the U. S. military Model of 1909 cartridge for use in the Colt Model 1909 revolver (basically the Colt New Service) had a 0.423"-0.427" rim diameter, not 0.406". It was the .45 Colt case with a considerably larger rim to aid positive fired case extraction. It could not be used in the Colt SAA unless loaded in every other chamber.

"The use of 455 Self-Loading pistol ammo in 455 revolvers was very unwise. It was unfortunate that this could be done."

Why is it unwise?

About 10-15 years ago, Hornady loaded .455 ammo, and produced brass as well(large primers). I have some that are on their 11th loading!. Lee made .455 dies (they may still). The only problem with the Lee setup was the auto prime did not seat the primers fully(the shell holder was actually for the thicker rimmed .45 LC). I started seating the primers with my single stage press primer tool, and all is OK now. Buffalo Arm has 250 gr. .454" swaged bullets that work well with a light load of Bullseye. Graf's has 265gr. .455" cast bullets made by Missouri Bullet that I'n going to try the next time I load up some 455.

Muley Gil said:

"The use of 455 Self-Loading pistol ammo in 455 revolvers was very unwise. It was unfortunate that this could be done."

Why is it unwise?

Click to expand...

I had the same question.
I am going to see if I can buy a couple of .455 Auto rounds. I have a Colt New Service chambered for .455 Webley Revolver and I would like to see how the auto rounds fit / seat in the cylinder.
Don't worry, I do not intend to shoot them.