I recently purchased this gun from a older fellow and he told me when I started loading for it, to never use the 148 gr hollow base wad cutter bullet in it due to unexpected pressure spikes. He said to only use the double ended bullet. Anyone ever hear of this before?
Reloading for a S & W 52-2
- Thread starter BigGunit
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I don't know what could have given him that ridiculous idea!
The 148 HBWC is ideal - just load it too warm.
There are more than a few great recipes on this forum for the model 52.
boatbum101
Member
Complete & utter BS . The gun was designed to shoot 38 special mid range 148 HBWC loads . You can shoot cast but will get nowhere near the accuracy . Gil Hebert proved that in his original tests , which BTW are posted on this forum . Tons of info here from tech how to do , load data , test targets etc . Do your homework .
tndrfttom
Member
This sounds like hokum to me. When I bought my 52-2 (many years ago) it came with a Hensley and Gibbs mould for their double-ended .38 wadcutter. The guy that sold me the gun and mould swore that this was 'the' bullet that would take me to the Expert Class in short order. The combination worked fine at the 25 yard line but 50 yard targets sometimes showed evidence of tipping bullets. I switched to swaged HBWC bullets for slow fire and had noticeably better results. If you want to wring out the last bit of accuracy in your .38 loads for your Model 52 try some good swaged hollow base wadcutters.
Like everybody has mentioned above, HBWC's are the way to go...especially at the 50yd line.
My dad has a 52 that I absolutely love. At 25yd just about any cast wc will work great. At 50yds, most of them start to fall apart. I suppose with a stiffer spring and a bit more BE some of them might do ok...but the HBWC's shoot so well I've never messed with it.
My dad has a 52 that I absolutely love. At 25yd just about any cast wc will work great. At 50yds, most of them start to fall apart. I suppose with a stiffer spring and a bit more BE some of them might do ok...but the HBWC's shoot so well I've never messed with it.
Grayfox
US Veteran
All I ever shoot in mine are HBWCs. It works extremely well. 
BTW: The Model 52 likes for brass to be trimmed to minimum length.
BTW: The Model 52 likes for brass to be trimmed to minimum length.
noylj
Member
BUT...NEVER EVER shoot a HBWC over 800 fps. The skirt will separate from the rest of the bullet and, at best, you'll have two holes in the target or, at worse, you will bulge the barrel with the next shot due to the skirt obstruction in the barrel.
Some older loading manuals actually had separate loading data for HBWCs and solid wadcutters.
Some older loading manuals actually had separate loading data for HBWCs and solid wadcutters.
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Al W.
Member
HBWC = M52
AT LOW speeds the BBwc design has NO WAY to seal off the gases and
give a good barrel fit...........
like the expanding rear section of the HBwc bullet.
Now in a revolver with higher pressures, the BBwc has the possibility to become accurate.
give a good barrel fit...........
like the expanding rear section of the HBwc bullet.
Now in a revolver with higher pressures, the BBwc has the possibility to become accurate.
