matts bullets .45 hbwc

[tomahawk223]

anyone have any starting load data for Matt's Bullets .45 (.452) 240 grain HBWC for .45 ACP. will be used in model 625 revolver

I ordered 100 just to test them out as well as the 250 grain wadcutter.

Thanks

 

[colt_saa]

For a hollow bass wad cutter to be effective it needs to be made of soft lead so the skirt can expand into the rifling

I have the same mold from MH, but have not cast any yet

I do not know if Matt's is casting this with hard alloy or a soft alloy

Do you own a chronograph? Or have access to one?

If they are soft cast you want to keep the velocity below 850 feet per second so that the skirts do not tear off. If they are hard cast you can push them as faster because I don't think the skirts will expand very much

I would be starting at 5 grains of 231 with this projectile

 

[huthike]

Let us know how this works out - I’ve been curious about using wadcutters in .45 but haven’t tried them yet.

 

[cowboy4evr]

Yeah , I shoot semi wadcutters all the time in 45 colt but never tried a wadcutter . Could be interesting .

 

[BillBro]

Matt is a master caster, he casts some really nice bullets. He will use alloys down to 7 or 8bhn if you ask for it up to 22bhn if asked. All of his hollowpoints are cast of softer alloys so I have no reason to expect his hollow based bullets would follow suit.
Ive bought thousands from him and have had no disappointments yet. I just got an order of 1k 45cal 305gr swcgc that are about 20bhn for use in my 20" 454casull levergun and three hundred 175gr himmelwright wadcutters at 8bhn for some 44Russian loads.
I buy almost exclusively from Matts Bullets these days.

 

[Forrest r]

Any starting load for a 230gr jacketed ball bullet will work with that cast hbwc bullet.

Huge difference between a cast hb bullet and a swaged hb bullet. A cast hb bullet can be driven a lot harder/higher pressure loads. (velocity has nothing to do with the skirts blowing off!!!!)

A 3.3gr of bullseye load/148gr hbwc 38spl. 800fps+. The base looks fantastic.

A 44spl hb hp swc 210gr shot out of a snubnosed 44spl, 1000fps 18,000psi+ load.

A side view of that same mushroomed bullet. Note that the skirt/base didn't blow off. It did compress and expand.

Some of the hb bullets I've cast/shot in the 45acp's over the years.

Playing around last year doing head to head testing with these 3 bullets and a max/4,3gr load of clays.

All 3 bullets held 1" or less @50ft for the 5-shot groups.

The only thing I ran into when reloading those 230gr hbwc's I cast for the 45acp was the bullets bases were getting swaged down due to having to seat them deep enough to chamber in my 1911's.

Deep seating issues are pretty common with hb bullets in short cases. Ran into the same thing reloading hb bullets in the 9mm's. The green bullet is a standard 125gr hp, the red bullet is a hb fn.

 

[StrawHat]

I shoot wadcutters nearly exclusively anymore from my ACP revolvers.

I have not tried any hbwc though so my comments are directed toward the 250 grain WC you mentioned. All of my wadcutters are solid based. I have used a 235-240 grain SAECO 453 for years over a hardball dose of powder. It works a treat! Accurate and hard hitting with nice penetration. One could not ask for more from a bullet.

This summer I played with a 250 rnfp and a 250 wadcutter. The results were good but not sure if they will displace the 453.

453 on the left.

Kevin