I intend to be handloading for .41 Long Colt soon. Jellybean's powders and charge weights look to be THE place to begin on assembling safe, factory velocity duplication loads for .41 Long Colt. That's were I'm starting.
Meanwhile, here's some chronographed data for three different original factory .41 Long Colt loads I tested recently using a circa 1901 Colt New Navy with a 4 1/2-inch barrel. One is a Remington 195 grain load, one is a Western load, and one a Winchester Western load from a special run of the cartridge, made for L. M. Burney back in the 1970s. Some idea may be gained of the kind of performance to aim for when assembling handloads for the old round. I'm not "hotrodding" my .41 Long Colt handloads at all since they will be used in the wheezy ol' Colt New Navy.
The old Colt revolver may not look like much but, surprisingly has a perfect bore and locks up pretty tight for one of these types of Colt revolvers. It also gives really amazing accuracy which isn't suppose to be a characteristic of the .41 Long Colt round. A Colt Army Special or Official Police (they made a few) in .41 Long Colt would be much stronger revolvers than the New Army/New Navy models or the even earlier and creakier Colt Model 1877 "Thunderer."
Remington .41 Long Colt 195 grain lead round nose
692 fps muzzle velocity
207 ft./lbs. muzzle energy
48 fps extreme spread
18 standard deviation
Winchester Western "white box"
709 fps muzzle velocity
223 ft./lbs. muzzle energy
107 fps extreme spread
46 fps standard deviation
Western ammunition in the yellow box:
720 fps muzzle velocity:
230 ft./lbs.muzzle energy
16 fps extreme spread
6 fps standard deviation
10-shot averages, fired over an Oehler Model 12 chronograph.
Both Western and Winchester Western ammunition were headstamped the same, had bullets that appeared exactly the same, and gave the exact same appearance. Strange how the Western ammunition gave one of the most consistent performances I've ever seen of any factory load or handload and the Winchester Western gave rather poor consistency. The Western ammunition was the older of the two. Perhaps storage condition of the Winchester Western "white box" ammunition prior to my acquisition were less than optimal.
Here's a link:
Reloading the 41 Long Colt.
I've had good results using Gad for some other obsolete components. I'm going to try his .41 bullets
Gad Custom Reloaded Cartridges and Shell Reloading Services
