First time casting for 45-70

[Bird]

Hi guys,
I have been watching this site for a few years,and reloading close to 30 years. I have fired many commercially cast and jacketed bullets through my 1886 miroku/winchester and have decided to start casting initially for this cartridge.
Here is what I am trying to do, and would appreciate any suggestions.
I have experience with plain based rifle and pistol bullets upto 1500 or so fps, but would like to try for 2100 or 2200 fps using the rcbs 45-300-fngc bullet. My rifle loves the remington 300grn hp over a max load of aa2200, for a supposed pressure of 27000 psi, and would like to try and recreate similar performance using the same powder, (i have plenty to use up), but with the cast bullet.
The rifle slugs out at .457, and I see that the largest bullet the mold is supposed to throw is .458 using linotype. As soon as my lino arrives, I will cast up a few and check the size against the mold specs. If all is well, I plan to keep adding either clip on ww or pure lead to the pot until the cast size drops at .4575. i can't see that I would need a bullet harder than 18bhn, but to maintain a larger size, it may have to be straight lino. For the time being, the bullets will be tumble lubed. Alox or alox and johnsons wax.
Any forseeable problems???
Thanks guys.

[Tatume]

Welcome aboard.

In my opinion, you don't need such hard bullets. I'm running a 358 Winchester and a 9.3x74R at 2250 fps with bullets of 13 BHN hardness. Yes, they do eventually build up a little leading, but not much, and they are quite accurate. The same bullets at 1800 fps are even more accurate, and do not lead the barrel.

The 45-70 Govt. is one of the most forgiving of cast bullet rifle cartridges. With appropriate charges, it can be loaded to shoot very soft bullets, which are extremely effective for hunting.

On the other hand, I do believe you would be served better by a good lube and sizing your bullets to fit. I use and recommend LBT Soft Blue, but there are others that are also effective. The Alox-based lubes are good for low velocity, but my experience is that they cause problems at the speeds you're trying to attain.

Enjoy yourself, you're embarking on a long and pleasant journey.

Happy New Year, Tom

[44man]

Tom nailed it. Depends on what your mold does anyway and I would just leave boolits at .458" if that is what you get.

[Tatume]

P.s., I have the 405 grain version of this mold, and it shoots extremely well in all of my 45-70 rifles.

[Walter Laich]

Being a wimp with two shoulder surgeries I use the Lyman 292 gr mold. Shoots great at iron sight distances. Too old to try to prove my manhood

[John Boy]

* Buy or cast Lyman 457124 Govt bullets. Lyman #2 would be the best alloy
* Lyman "Reloading Handbook: 49th Edition" has plenty of smokeless loading data

[hickfu]

Have you slugged your barrel yet? My 45-70 barrel slugs at .4575 so I cast my boolits at .460

[Tatume]

The rifle slugs out at .457...

Par for the course.

[725]

I load for accuracy. I've found I don't need real hard boolits and chasing velocity just hurts too much for me to bear. I load a 415gr boolit at top end trap door velocities and it is very accurate and extremely deadly. Unless you are looking for brown bears, the trap door .45-70 should fit the bill.

[aharlow]

My Browning Winchester 1886 45-70 barrel slugs out at .456. I cast a Lee 405 Gr. boolit and size them to .457 through my Lyman 450 with Thompson's Blue Angel Lube. My alloy consist of COWW's + 2% Tin and get a BHN around 11-12 and i do not GC. She will eat these up all day with minimal leading in the barrel. I have also water quenched these and have them running around 16-18 BHN for some of my more stout loads that reach the 1500+ muzzle velocities.

[oldfart1956]

Puddy sure I get the gist of what Bird is saying. He's not using the lino to get a harder boolit, it might be the only way he can get the boolit diameter he's looking for. I do know lino casts larger. Sometimes much larger. Cast some 311041 boolits from Lyman #2 and got .311 or close enough. Cast from lino it went to .314 and beyond. So I get it. Bird I'm not sure this will work but wonder if adding a bit more tin to the lead (not the lino) would give the fillout/diameter you're looking for? Tin doesn't increase hardness as drastically as lino does but helps a lot with mold fillout. (to get the max diameter) A word of warning...if you do go with pure lino and you intend to run them thru a sizer...(even to seat the gas checks) best do it as soon as they reach room tempreture. Let em' sit a day, or worse yet water drop, and you'll be standing on the handle of that press. ;) Audie...the Oldfart..

[ballistim]

I've had good success using an old single cavity Lee 405 gr. FB mold, drops at .459 & sized shoots well in my 1895 & Buffalo Classic. I have other molds, but for a low cost mold really has produced for me.

[Bird]

Thanks for the replies guys,
OLDFART1956 has the right angle on my post. I am just a little concerned about the as cast diameter. Ultimately, I need to cast a few up, then take some measurements. Unfortunately, the lino did not arrive today, but my pid setup for the pot did.
The reason for going with the higher velocity loads, is that this powder,aa2200 similar performance to re7, shoots really well at near or full loads under a 300 grain bullet. Plus I have a few kegs of it to put to use.
I have shot plenty of lead 405 grain bullets at 1300 or so fps, with very good results, but not with the above powder.
I am trying to keep the amount of tin to a minimum, so the hardness for an extended shelf life will remain close to the fresh cast hardness. Just enough for good fill out and no more. I am under the impression that too much tin causes age softening.
If the lino does not arrive tomorrow, I will cast a few up with wheelweights and check the sizes.
I need a lube sizer, rcbs or star. what do you think? I will also be casting at a later date for 44 mag, 357, 308 and 356 plus a few more.

[45-70 Chevroner]

Being a wimp with two shoulder surgeries I use the Lyman 292 gr mold. Shoots great at iron sight distances. Too old to try to prove my manhood
I'll lean on Walter with this one. I have shot pretty heavy loads in my 45-70 in the past but shy away from them any more. As for the Lyman 292, like he said shoots real well for me out to about 150 yards and then from there on out the groups start to open up some what. All of my 45-70 boolits are WW with a little tin. I have two 45-70 rifles a Sharps and a Pedersoli and four different molds, Lyman 292gr, Lyman 320gr, Lee 405gr and Lee 500gr and none of them lead to amount to anything. The Sharps leads a tiny bit at the muzzle, and no leading at all with the Pedersoli.

[cajun shooter]

The Sharps leading at the muzzle points at a lube failure. Have you slugged the bores of both rifles and what alloy are you shooting? If you don't have good obturation, this will cause leading also as you most likely already know. I have had excellent results with the Saeco 645 and 745 molds. These bullets will remain accurate all the way to 1000 yards if you choose to shoot at that distance. The RCBS mold of the 500 bullet was designed by Mike Venturino. I have found that I receive better mold fill and bullet performance when I hand pour my heavy 45-70 bullets rather than use a bottom pour spout. Later David

[MtGun44]

Most likely no need for lino for that load. GC takes care of it and you should be able to use wheelwts
without any problems, in my experience with .45-70 in several rifles.

Bill

[454PB]

I agree with oldfart1956. I've broken the linkage on 2 Lyman 450 sizers, and both times it was while sizing hard 45/70 boolits.

I also agree with MtGun44, when you use gas checks, the alloy can be quite soft without any leading worries.

[bbqncigars]

Use a softer alloy and give them two coats of powder. That should get the diameter in the ballpark, and no leading at higher velocities. FWIW, I use the bb tumbling method for powder coating.

[Bird]

OK. So the lino arrived, but it appears to be monotype. Got the PID set up, but need a longer probe. I dont know who or where the gaschecks went to. I am doing well so far.
I am itching to start casting, but want to size and fit checks soon after casting.
I will go with the softest alloy I can if I can maintain bullet diameter close to .458, as I am not over keen on the additional step of powdercoating.
What lube would you guys suggest for the 300grn bullets at 2000+ fps?
Depending on usage, many people have broken the linkages on the lyman sizer, do you think a rcbs or a star would be a better press?
It seems strange that rcbs specifies the use of lino in this mold. I wonder if through testing they disovered that it performed well with this alloy, at least for target shooting, as it would appear rather brittle for hunting purposes. How they can even consider bullet obturation a factor with 27000psi or even possible I don't know. Also I have looked, but have not found any information regarding this from RCBS themselves.

[454PB]

I don't own an RCBS sizer, but I do own a couple of Lyman, a Saeco, and a Star. None of them will stand up to sizing long, hard, 45/70 boolits more than .001". You'll need a push through like the Lee for that, or do them in several steps.

[Bird]

I had the time this evening to cast a few bullets up. What a nice mold. Had good boolits dropping within 3 castings. Cast 80 in all for samples. I started with half pot of wheelweight set at low setting, and managed .459 diameter (no5 on lee 4-20) then as the mold warmed up the smallest diameter was .458. Got everything a little too hot once, and smeared the sprue plate. I tried a higher temp setting and water dropped, and the resulting diameters were much the same. Nicely filled out bullets with no frosting. Next I tried the monotype at a low temp setting, and that resulted in .460 diameter bullets. Roundness was within a quarter of a thou, which was slightly better than the wheelweights, but either way I think they would work fine without sizing. The gas check shanks came out at a taper of .426 and .430
I think I may have lucked out with this mold. I wish Rcbs included an allen wrench with it, I spent 1/2 hour digging through my toolbox.
A good experience so far, and even better when the gas checks turn up. At least I now know that I have a wide range of alloy choices. I may run 2 molds at a time to give each a chance to cool abit.
454PB, thanks for the suggestion on the lee push through. I did order one with the checks, I think it was .457 dia, but it looks like I will take it out to .4855 or .459, which should seat the gaschecks.

[Bird]

Just to add.
I will save the monotype, and maybe add a pinch to the wheelweight alloy if needed.
I put a piece of it in the vice, and side swiped it. It is very brittle and just snapped in two.

[44man]

I have been using Felix for everything but LBT soft blue is good too.
Lee push through is a good choice, I lube first, either pan or with fingers and push GC boolits through base first. Messy as all get out but it works.

[WHITETAIL]

I have a NOE mould and a Gould mould.
The NOE is a GC on one cav., and a PB
on the other at 425 gr.
The Gould mould is 330 gr. PB.
Which ever I shoot the boolits get a coat
of JPW and then sized to .459 dia with home made lube.
I am just stuck on the 45-70 Cowboy and shoot it as much as I can.:redneck:

[Bird]

Update time with questions and observations.
I did contact RCBS as to why they chose linotype for their molds. Their answer was to ensure that the gas check base was large enough to ensure a good grip for the gas check. The RCBS rep said he has been trying to get the mold modified to cast a larger check base for use with wheel weight lead, but their engineering dept refuse to make the change. Oh well.
I have got my hornady gas checks and lee sizer, and pid is set up. Sized bullets came out at .457. My smallest bullet was in wheelweight lead cast a bit on the warm side at about 700 deg at .458. I took the sizer out to .458, and sized mono, wdww and acww to that size affixing the gas checks base down through the sizer. Tried dish soap then sizing wax, both worked just as good.
The gas checks fitted nice and snug on the lino bullets with no movement. Perfect.
The checks fitted ok on the hotter cast wheelweight bullets, but if I hold the bullet and try to twist the check, it will rotate a few degrees back and forth. cannot pull off the checks with my thumbnail.
Question 1. Will these work ok? Do you forsee any problems ?

The wheelweight bullets cast at a lower temp have a tighter fitting check. There appears to be 3 to 4 thou difference in diameter between the lino check bases and the hotter ww bases, which is a much larger variance than the bullet body diameters using the same alloys.
A problem I am having is that the lee pot does not like to start to pour at below 688deg. The spout has to get to this temp then I start pouring for my coldest bullets.

Question 2. I would like to try pouring at 650deg. Is that possible with this pot?

I will melt 4 or 5 lbs of mono and add keep adding pure lead and see if I can get a softer bullet, and yet sill maintain a good size check base. I want a selection of different alloy bullets to test. I dont want to modify the mold yet until I find what alloy performs the best for me.

Question 3. What do you think of the above idea?

An observation. So far the wheelweight casts better bullets than the mono. Seems better, cleaner fill out than the mono.

Thanks guys.

[454PB]

Try pushing the gas checked boolits through the Lee sizer nose up. The Hornady gas checks have a slight taper at the top of the cup which "bites in" better when that taper enters the sizing die first. Even if it doesn't make any difference, as long as the checks don't fall off, you will be fine. The old style Lyman checks stayed on by friction alone. In a straight case, the gas check is held in place by neck tension.

I sometimes use a 50/50 mix of pure lead and monotype, you should see a diameter only about .001" smaller than you do with pure monotype.

[Bird]

Thank you 454PB,
I tried both ways up with bullet, but no real difference.
I practiced some more today, and got the pot pouring at 650 deg, had to hit the spout with heat from a propane torch for a couple of seconds. I will try checks in a little while.

I will try blending mono and pure lead, and I think that will fix my problem. I will also try a batch of 2, and 3 to1 lino and ww to see what happens.
Do you water drop your mix or not?
Thank you again.

[Wayne Smith]

Unless you are pushing those boolits way faster than my shoulder can stand you don't need to water drop, especially with a gc. I shoot plain base Gould cast of 50/50 ww/Pb air cooled and have no leading nor does my friend shooting them out of his Marlin.

[Bird]

Thanks Wayne.
I have been shooting cast bullets from various manufacturers over the years, for various calibers, all have been plain base. I take them all to the point of leading the bore, then back off the charge to find a nice accuracy load. Now that I am casting, I have a lot more room to experiment with. Gas checks, alloys and water dropping are all new to me. I don't get to the range as much as I used to, so I like to do as much testing and load development as possible on each visit. I will be looking for an upper end, and a lower end accurate load, and I am just trying to acheive a spectrum of bullets to experiment with.
My jacket bullet loads run at 2100fps for the 300 grain bullets, and although I can certainly say it is getting near my limit , I feel ok for shooting 10 shot strings with a break in between. On the other hand, I have tried the 405's at 1800 or so fps, and don't care for that load at all, even though the recoil energy should be about the same.
What powder and load are you using? What lube, and what velocity?

[454PB]

As Wayne said, there's no need for anything harder than wheel weights (12 BHN) when using gas checks.

I have used water dropped plain based boolits for 45/70, and have good results with the Lee 340 RF at around 1500 fps. Mine are fired in a Marlin GS, and sized to .4585", and lubed with BAC from Lars.

[Bird]

I sized the bullets from yeaterdays session, air cooled ww, and fitted the checks. They fit good enough. Best fit is when the bullets are not frosted. The .458 sizer just touched the sides of the bullet. It doesn't seem to take much extra mold temp and I can see the bullets dropping with frosting halfway up the nose. When this happens , the sizing die does not touch the bullet completely both sides, and the fitted checks can be twisted on their bases a little. It looks like I will have to cast slowly with this mold or maybe set up a fan to keep it cool. I was casting at a rate of 3 pours per min, 2 cavity=6 bullets, which appears too fast. Bullets were falling from the mold with no assistance for 2 pours, then on subsequent pours they would start to stick a little. The sprues are hardening fast, less than 2 seconds, but the bases look good. I have to give the cutter a few moderate taps to cut the sprues. I cant run the mold any hotter as the bullets won't size to .458.
454PB, the commercially cast bullets I have used, Bear Creek and Western were plain based, and the velocity was around 1350 fps for the 400 grain bullets. Both would start to lead before 1500fps. I have yet to get hold of lube so I will pay a visit to lars site.
Thank you.

[454PB]

I think you should worry less about pot temperature and concentrate on mould temperature. When I'm casting large boolits and they are taking too long to cool (in the mould), I use a cake pan with some water and a cloth folded up. Fill the mould, let the sprue set, then touch the bottom of the mould to the wet cloth for a second or two. This allows you to control temperature of the casting and does not harm the mould at all. Once a rhythm is established, you may only have to touch the wet cloth every third or fourth fill.

[Bird]

I cast up more bullets, and kept the mold temperature under control with a wet cloth. Perfect.
I think the first rule for casting, maybe it is already, is mold temp, and especially so casting wheelweight lead in a mold designed for lino. It did not matter what the pot temp was, so long as the alloy flows smoothly. I cast six bullets, then cooled the mold for 12 seconds or so, and all bullets fell from the mold. With plain wheelweight with no tin added, the bullets filled out beautfully. I could probably open the sizer out another 1/2 thou, but dont know at this stage if I need to. I am happy with what I have.
What I thought was mono, is lino afterall, according to the melting point. I made up batches of acww, straight lino, 1to1 ww-lino, 1 1/2 to 1, 2 to 1, 3-1 all air cooled, and a batch of wdww. That should give me a good range of BHN hardness, and the gas checks are seated firmly in place.
Sizing the the lino down from .460 to .458 took a bit of effort, and I ran them through my old chd 2 post press.
So far, so good. Most enjoyable. Now for some lube. Initially I will try pan lub, and see what lars suggests.
Thanks guys for your help and suggestions up to this point.

[454PB]

It sounds like you're now on track.

When you said you cooled the mould for 12 seconds, was that with the wet cloth? If so, I suggest you do the cooling more often, and at shorter intervals. 12 seconds is a relatively long time and is changing the temperature quite drastically. For me, it works better to do quick, frequent cooling rather than such drastic temperature changes. Kinda like tapping the brakes as you go down hill rather than jumping on them after your speed is too high.

[Bird]

Time for an update on how the bullets performed after my first attempt at casting almost a year ago. Its taken a year to get to the range, but I finally made it and had a most enjoyable day
I had prepared a hundred or so test rounds using the 300 grain mould. All rounds were loaded with AA2200 data powder from the mid 1990's batch. The best and only use I could find for it was for the 45-70 cartridge and 300 grain jacketed hollow point Remington bullets loaded to near maximum charge.Groups were around 1'' @ 100yds.I have plenty of this powder to burn up, so I wanted to see how it would perform with cast bullets.
Bullets tested were WDWW sized at 0.458, 1 part lino 2 parts lead sized 0.4585, 1 part lino 1 part lead sized 0.4585, and pure lino sized at 0.459. The pure lino was sized through a 0.4585 die, but later measuring they came out at 0.459. All bullets were copper gas checked and pan lubed with Ben's Red.
Powder charges were from 47 grains, and all the way to maximu charge of 53.5 grains of powder. Test s were done with 5 shot groups at 100 yds.

I found it quite surprising that group sizes were very similar regardless of the charge or bullet alloy. None were obviously bad, which I have never experienced before in my other rifles. The pure lino bullets grouped best with 50 and 51 grains of powder at approx 2010 and 2050 fps, for agroup size of 1.240'' The WDWW 48grains to 53 grains of powder in 1 grain increments each grouped close to 1.350''. The other alloys 3to1, 2 to 1 and 1 to 1grouped about the same as the WDWW.
These loads were fired in a Miroku Winchester 1886 Takedown Rifle. I took the barrel off after the first ten rounds and looked down it. Clean as a whistle. Put the barrel back on and fired off another 65 rounds for a total of 75 rounds. Took The barrel off, and once again it was clean. Ran a patch down the bore and could not detect any lead.
I was very pleased with the results at the end of the day, apart from the badly bruised shoulder. These groups were shot off a bench, but I know for a fact that they can be improved upon by an able shooter. I found the vision in my right eye has deteriorated to the point that target aquisition at 100 yds and even 50 yds was now impossible. I shot these groups left eye and left handed for the first time ever.

I will take the opportunity to thank those that posted previously and gave me good advice, which as it turns out was bang on, and no B.S.


All in all, I fell that the 45-70 may be one of the easiest cartridges to cast for. Next attempt will be the 30-30. That one should be a lot easier on the shoulder.
Thanks guys.

[claude]

I shot these groups left eye and left handed for the first time ever.

I changed to left eye some time ago due to right my right eye's failing vision as well, that is what truly started me down the road to lever action rifles, and ultimately pointed me towards casting my own.

The switch from righty to lefty shooting gets easier as I stay with it, and the awkwardness goes away with time and practice and retraining myself has been an adventure. I use first person because we are all different and you might find it much easier than I did, but in my opinion, from my experience, you did quite well, first time out or not.

[454PB]

I go a bit off topic here, but I've found AA 2200 to be a good choice in several other cartridges. It really works well in .222 & .223 Rem. I also use it for lighter loads in .308 Win. that I load for my 13 year old grandson.

[Bird]

454PB,
Yes, the powder seems to have good reviews for the 222 and 223. I may try some in the 308 and see what happens. What is your load and bullet for the 308.
AA2200 works great in the 444 marlin with 240 grain bullets. Quite accurate , but a lot of powder burns outside the muzzle creating a 2.5' flash.
Now that I have found a high end load for the 45-70, I will see if I can get this powder to work at 1500fps or so. A few full power loads are enough for me, and saturdays test session was quite brutal. I earned the bruises.
New sights and a shoulder pad are next, and more left hand practice.

[454PB]

My start load for AA 2200 was 36 grains for both 150 and 180 grain bullets. In my rifle, that gives 2350 fps with the 180's and 2500 fps with the 150's.