Faithful traveling companion

[Navahojoe]

Yesterday, a faithful traveling companion departed from my possession!

I purchased a SRH .44 Mag a coupla years back, and it quickly became my favorite traveling companion, woods gun and bedside back up. It has been by my side thru thick and thin, never letting me down. I cast my first boolits for that weapon. Ahh! The memories that brings back, burned fingers, stuck boolits, spilled lead, a visit from the Tinsel Fairy. It is amazing how much that I learned about casting trying to reload for that pistola.

My Thanks to "fatandhappy and "44woody" for their advice on slugging the bore with a fishing sinker, cleaning a Lee mold, and a shipment of .44 boolits and alox to get me started on, hopefully, a lifelong passion for boolit casting and reloading. I now cast for and reload .45 Colt, .32 H &R Mag, and .45 ACP :castmine:

Alas! At about the same time, I aquired a son-in-law![smilie=1:
He developed a hankering for the SRH, and liked it as much as I did. After putting several hundred rounds of homemade cast boolits thru it with him, :Fire:
I finally gave in to his pleadings. and let him have it.

Now I have to make a trip before Christmas to my local Gun Shop and check out those FT Ruger .44 Mags. Since I already have on hand a couple of molds for the .44, along with brass, powder, and cast boolits, what the heck! I told the wife, who is pretty understanding about such things, that I couldn't get my money back out of the used molds, open powder, ect, may as well replace the .44Mag.

What do you guys think?

regards,
NavahoJoe

[Ricochet]

Dude, you can't be without a .44 Magnum!

[Sundogg1911]

wow. you're a great Father-in-Law!. Mine gave His guns to my Wife. (But that's ok. She into shooting as much as I am, and it's a few less that I have to buy Her) By All means get another .44 Mag! I have a Taurus stainless M44 with an 8-3/8" barrell. Took 2 deer with it last year with open sites (Same shot. Spined the Doe in front, and it continued to a lung in the Button buck) Can't wait to try it next week with the new optics. :-) I'm sure I won't get that lucky 2 yeears in a row!

[Bass Ackward]

Me, I hate new guns. Takes too damn long to get them broken in. Then you have to putts and still you may never get the quality of the one you had before.

You should have kept the 44 Mag you had and bought " the Son n Law " the new gun. :grin: Live and learn.

[Larry Gibson]

Oh bah humbug Bass......

Navahoejoe

Pretty nice of you to a son in law! Anyways I really like my Ruger 50th Anniversary FT .44. I've a small hand and the XR3 grip really fits me fine. I worked up some great cast loads with RCBS 429-250-SWC (Keith) and the Lee TL429-240-SWC. I've a GB 429421 6 cavity mould but haven't cast any with it yet. Hornady 240 XTP's over H110 are awesome at 1425 fps. The throats all mike right at .430. I slugged the bore several times and "thought" there may be some constriction but I could not measure any. The groove depth slugs right at .429. Barrel/cylinder gap is between .002 and .003. Didn't take much to tweek the trigger. I picked up 300 bulk jacketed HPs and loaded them over 23.5 gr H110 (1390 fps) and am using them as "break in" and have about 70 or so left to shoot, good practice. I've got about 600 of the 250 RCBS cast and about 2,000 of the Lee 240TLs so it might be a while until I cast with the GB 429421 mould. Anyways take a hard look at the Ruger FT, I sure enjoy mine.

Larry Gibson

[IcerUSA]

Sure , go get one , see if I care :) . Oh-Oh don't forget about the Lyman 44-300-K and it shoots great out of my Blackhawk Hunter with a 7 1/2" barrel .

Post a pic or 2 of the new addition to the family when you get it too . :drinks:

Keith