.45 Colt suggestions

[chief38]

My standard Cowboy Load is:

7.8 grains of Unique over a 255 grain RNFP bullet. Any major brand of large Pistol Primer seems to work well. These gets shot out of my 2 Colt SAA revolvers and my Marlin Lever Action. This load is accurate and does not beat up the firearms.

Chief38

 

[Skip Sackett]

Went to the range yesterday. Looking to develop a load using one of my lighter .452" bullets. Loaded up some H&G #68 & some Saeco 220gr LRN over 9.0gr of a surplus powder called IPP. It stands for Industrial Pistol Powder. It was raining so no chronograph but my M25 -7 finally shot to POA!
I have another 200gr mould to try boolits from but don't have any cast up right now. On a road trip too so, it will have to wait till I get home.

 

[da gimp]

Loading Bullseye in pistol cartridges scare me. You can easily put double charges (or more) in cases & never have an overflow, thus generating terribly high pressures. Conversely, years ago,I saw pictures of many fine handguns destroyed by under-charges of Bullseye powder detonating, (instead of progressively burning) by the old time match shooters.

 

[Ron H.]

Went to the range yesterday. Looking to develop a load using one of my lighter .452" bullets. Loaded up some H&G #68 & some Saeco 220gr LRN over 9.0gr of a surplus powder called IPP. It stands for Industrial Pistol Powder. It was raining so no chronograph but my M25 -7 finally shot to POA!
I have another 200gr mould to try boolits from but don't have any cast up right now. On a road trip too so, it will have to wait till I get home.

Sir, I've seen the same thing with my 25-9. 250s print hopelessly high, but 200s print pretty close to the sights.

A cast 200-grain bullet with 8.0 grains of Unique makes for a nice target/plinking load in .45 Colt. I've shot a lot of that recipe over the years.

Hope this helps, and Semper Fi.

Ron H.

 

[Skip Sackett]

Loading Bullseye in pistol cartridges scare me. You can easily put double charges (or more) in cases & never have an overflow, thus generating terribly high pressures. Conversely, years ago,I saw pictures of many fine handguns destroyed by under-charges of Bullseye powder detonating, (instead of progressively burning) by the old time match shooters.

gimp,
The folks that do the tech work on powders, the ones that are professionals, do not believe in powder detonation.

Personally, I am afraid that I don't either. If it was a "fact" it would be easily duplicated. I believe what you saw was guns blown up by squibs followed by full charges. Just me though.

 

[Dale53]

da gimp;
This is an urban myth. The handguns WERE destroyed but the cause was finally determined to be caused by a combination of a double charge and failure to clean the seating die when using cast bullets. Build up of lube in the die caused deep seating of the Hollow Base Wadcutters. The combination of a double charge (a "K" frame Smith will often handle the pressures generated by a double charge of the common weight of 2.7 Bullseye) and the deep seating caused catastrophic failure (blowing the cylinder open and peeling back the top strap).

After a number of these accidents being reported to various firearms manufacturers, and MUCH incorrect speculation, the NRA commissioned H.P. White Laboratories to find the cause. The cause was determined to be the above.

What we had was a bunch of new reloaders suddenly jumping on the Progressive band wagon without adequate knowledge. Careless operation resulted in a good number of problems.

The same cause occurred with progressive presses when Cowboy Action Shooting took off. A bunch of new shooters, with little reloading experience, jumping into Progressive presses.

Kind of like turning a bunch of Sunday Drivers loose with Formula One Race Cars - it will NOT be pretty.

The cause of damaged guns in .45 Colt caliber were a bit different - a typical Colt or clone single action does not have as much reserve strength as a .38 Special (less metal surrounding the cartridge) and a double charge will generally "do it" without the deep seating being the necessary "final straw"...

I was loading for PPC back in the day when all of this occurred. I was loading on a Star Progressive and when the Dillon 450 hit the market, Dillon sent me one for evaluation. I kept it (sent money instead of the press back to Dillon), then when the advanced 550B became available, went that route. I have loaded a couple hundred thousand of cartridges on my Dillons (I have two) and am aware of the pitfalls...

FWIW
Dale53

 

[LTC]

Once again, thanks for all the continued replies and advice.

LTC

 

[Skip Sackett]

These are the newest loads for the 45Colt. These are the 200gr LRNFPHP cast with the range lead from my other thread.

The load is with 10.0gr of I.P.P.

They look cool! Of course, that bullet looks cool in any case!

 

[da gimp]

I use Unique almost entirely for my handgun reloading needs.Very good velocities are obtained, with safe pressures, & it meters great thru mu Dillon powder throwers & the RCBS one too.

It is nigh impossible to drop double charges of Unique thru operator error, or machine malfunction, but with Bullseye, it can easily happen.

Been reloading for 40 years or so, load for our family & our friends too, though I've begun to ask them to bring their own primers now...........

 

[JoeHatley]

Loading Bullseye in pistol cartridges scare me. You can easily put double charges (or more) in cases & never have an overflow, thus generating terribly high pressures.

Just my opinion, but if using Bullseye scares you, maybe you should stick with factory ammo and not reload.

 

[Skip Sackett]

I wonder if he has ever seen what Titegroup looks like in a case! Talk about EMPTY!

Personally, Unique is the best powder for the 45 Colt. Sorry, just had to get that off of my chest! And, I am not "unique lover" so to speak.

I did start out with Bullseye only in a 38Spl case. Still use it as my go to powder for that caliber.

 

[trauma1]

Clays

In my CAS shooting days i used Clays powder for everything - It is Cheap, relatively clean, uniform to throw from a measure and easily found. Can't remember the exact recipe but used 250gr cast bullets at around 700fps. These shot perfectly out of 2 rugers and a marlin. Look them up online and check it out. I want to say I could load almost 1500 rds out of 1# of powder? Anyways.

 

[LTC]

Well, I set my Dillon 550B up for .45 Colt this afternoon. I used a 200gr. .452" LFPRN bullet over 5.2gr. of Bullseye with COL of 1.560". Thats as close as I could come using three different manuals that didn't call for the exact 200gr. bullet.

I only loaded about 18 rounds and will try them in my 25-5 next week. Does any one here see a problem with that loading?

Merry Christmas
LTC

 

[Ron H.]

Well, I set my Dillon 550B up for .45 Colt this afternoon. I used a 200gr. .452" LFPRN bullet over 5.2gr. of Bullseye with COL of 1.560". Thats as close as I could come using three different manuals that didn't call for the exact 200gr. bullet.

I only loaded about 18 rounds and will try them in my 25-5 next week. Does any one here see a problem with that loading?

Merry Christmas
LTC

Sir, that's really light--it sounds more like a .45 ACP load than a .45 Colt load. You might want to re-check your data.

For .45 Colt, Alliant's website lists a max of 7.5 grains of Bullseye with a swaged 200-grain LSWC, with a starting load of 10 percent below that, which would be about 6.7 grains. That more or less parallels my old Speer No. 11, which lists 7.5 as max and 6.5 as the starting load.

FWIW, I'd be very leery of the load you describe. You might stick a bullet in the bore. Was it me, I'd bump the load up to at least 6.5 grains of powder.

Hope this helps, and Semper Fi.

Ron H.

 

[keith44spl]

For those evil oversize throated revolvers I've had good luck with the Remington 250gr LRN, these are sized at .455 and are available in bulk from Midway. .454 dia bullets will work as well. I use these in one of my 25-5's and my 3rd gen Colt SAA's. My standard load is 7.5 to 8.0 grains of Unique with a standard primer, this duplicates the factory load's.

Right there ya go...I've used the above loads for forty years.
Shot equally well in revolver or carbine.

Su Amigo,
Dave

 

[LTC]

Ron H.,
I'll take your advice. I'll pull the bullets on the few rounds I have loaded and bump them up to 6.5gr. I thought I might be on the light side.

Once again, thanks for the advice and interest in a fellow forum member's requests.

LTC

 

[LTC]

Well, I pulled all the bullets this morning and bumped the 5.2 grains up to 6.5 of Bullseye and reloaded those 18 cases. This is the only powder I presently have on hand and the only powder I have ever used.

It sounds as though I should invest in a pound of Unique though.

I hope to post the results by later this week.

LTC

 

[Skip Sackett]

Bullseye will be fine for these loads. If you want some real mousey loads, get some Trail Boss. It is a fast powder but there is NO way you can overcharge a case, impossible.

Just be careful when working up your loads with Bullseye and watch the charge closely. Use recommended data, you will be gtg. (Good To Go)

 

[amazingflapjack]

I didn't read every post, so I will suggest you pin guage the throats. Soft lead will slug up in the revolver, as has been suggested, and another way to go is a hard cast bullet of around 18BHN sized to the diameter of the throats. Depending on what that size is, you may have to use something a little smaller in your lever gun, but you will have to use a hard cast bullet in my view, as the velocity will dramatically increase in your rifle barrel; I've heard around 40%. I do this in .357 mag, and the 18BHN works wonderful, and I'm able to use the same bullet in both revolver and rifle. I asked the owner of midatlanticbullets about this, and that's where I got my bullets. Go safely. Flapjack.

 

[LTC]

Well my first combination was less tham stellar. Maybe 4" group at 50' from a sandbaged rest. I used 200gr LRNFP .452" and 6.5 grs of BE.

I decided to try a few different .45 bullets I had available. I made up three different combinations. Tested all three from sandbags at 50'.

1.) 200gr .452" LRNFP with 5.5grs of BE = 6 rounds in a 2.5" group.

2.) 250gr .454" LRNFP with 5.5grs of BE = 6 rounds in a 4" group.

3.) 230gr .452" LRN with 5.5grs of BE = 5 rounds in a 1" group with one flyer 1" out.

I loaded up 50 rounds of #3 combination and will see it I can repeat the feat.

LTC