.45 Colt Recipe Advice and a question about 2F vs 3F

After shooting my musket and Lyman GPR, I've decided to try .45 Colt cartridges. I'm loading 35g (measured with a 2.2 Lee dipper) of Goex 3F in new Starline cases, with WW primers. I'm charging the case, setting a CircleFly 1/8" wad, then an Ox-Yoke felt wad with a little extra Mink lube added, then a 255g bullet with SPG lube.

There's only about 1/8" available in the case before seating the bullet - am I applying too much compression?

These cartridges will go in a Ruger New Vaquero and a Uberti 1860 RM Conversion.

Also, I only have one can of 3F Goex, but have a few of 2F Swiss on hand. Can I make up these same cartridges with the 2F Swiss?

Thanks for helping a new guy.

Purely my opinion and the way I load them so, take this for what it's worth. For that short a barrel I think you have both plenty wad and lube. 35 grs. should be just fine, a .020 to .030 card wad over the powder then seat the bullet. The bullet carries plenty of lube without the addition of the felt lubed wad.

Yes sir, you can use the Swiss Ffg. I want to remember that originally most handgun cartridges were loaded with Ffg....but my memory is always suspect.

For light pistol charges, you do not need a wad at all. I do not use a wad in my 38-40, 44-40 or 45 Colt for both handguns and rifles. Just seat the bullet on the powder and go shoot them. Be aware that 35 grains of 3 fg will provide you with plenty of recoil using a 255 grain bullet. I have used this load with 2 fg and it is a bit of a beast. It seems a bit too heavy for the break top revolvers so I use it only in my solid frame Colt's. 28.0 grains with a 230 grain bullet is the old military load and with the 250 grain bullet still is accurate and provides plenty of blast at the muzzle. Only caveat is to pick a bullet that carries plenty of lube for both revolvers and rifles. I pretty much settled on the Schofield case with 28 grains of 2 fg and a Lyman 250 grain cast bullet for my general use.

Drop the card wad and just use the felt wad.
FWIW 37 gr or Goex 3f, a thin card wad and the Remington bulk 255 gr lead bullet does right at 900 fps from my 5 1/2 in Vaquero.

Swiss is fine and bear in mind it do not like much compression.

When i duplex 8-10% of my BP loads i find that it burns so clean that i can shoot all day without the barrel fouling out.
8-10% in the sence that i load 2½grains medium smokeless pistol powder and on top of that 30grains BP.

If you only intend to kill paper then cut back a little on your loads, no need to compress the living daylights out of the powder.
I use a disc cut fron milk carton under the bullet and dip the finished cartridges in hot lube like 22LR (only the bullet!).
That helps a lot in keeping the fouling soft.

Gents,

Thanks for the swell replies. I'm new here and you guys are really helpful. Somewhere I read there was a risk of a lubed wad contaminating the powder over time, so it seems a thin card is the way to go. I got the load I was using from a guy on youtube, who used three wads - the overshot one, the lubed felt wad and a thin paper card - then the projectile. If it's pretty stiff, I'll just use them in the Vaquero.

I had a stock of Laser Cast 255's on hand, so I melted the lube out of them and pan lubed them with SPG (and made a spiffy tool to cut them out from a .460 S&W case).

For the Open Top, sounds like I ought to dial it back some to 30g, and I'll try the FF Swiss for those.

17nut - Would Unique or HP-38 be suitable as a medium powder? (I also would like to use two orphan cans of HS-7, now discontinued, and I don't have a suitable smokeless load to use it up...)

I'm not 17nut, but when duplexing smokeless with black to cut down on fouling I've always used a bulky and fluffy shotshell powder like Red Dot, Green Dot, Herco, but Universal or Unique are also OK. About 5% by weight of the BP charge being substituted with smokeless works fine and is safe in the older guns. Don't exceed 10%, even in the modern clones.

For both my 44-40 and 45 Colt loads I use the same Lee 2.2 cc dipper with Goex 2fg. Accuracy was the same with 3fg, but the primers were significantly more flattened. Fouling also seemed worse with 3fg in my rifles but it could have simply been a dryer day at the range. I did not see any improvements in accuracy with wads or cards so I do not bother with them in pistol calibers.

I cast my boolits with very soft alloy from stick on WWs. In the 44-40 I use s 200gr RNFP mold made by NOE that has an extra large lube groove for black powder. In the 45 Colt I use a copy of Lyman's 454190.

In my 45 cal revolvers I often shoot 45 Schofields. I cannot remember the size of the Lee dipper off the top of my head, but the Schofield case loaded with a 230gr Lyman 452374 makes for a nice mild load. Goex 2fg or 3fg seem to preform about the same accuracy wise.

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Also - another thought.
I have a bunch of .452 180g bullets that I could never get to group well with any smokeless load I tried. Was thinking about making them up for light BP loads for .45 Colt - 22g of Swiss 2F (Lee 1.6 scoop), 8g of corn meal and a .125 fiber wad. I’m guessing you don’t want the meal and the BP to mix, so it would be in the loaded in order of primer, powder, wad, meal, bullet.

Does that sound like a good BP load?

In general I avoid any sort of filler, but to each his own. 180gr will be easy on the wrist but likely pattern way low. Would be a good load for a Cap&Ball revolver with a conversion cylinder.


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Quote:

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I'm charging the case, setting a CircleFly 1/8" wad, then an Ox-Yoke felt wad with a little extra Mink lube added, then a 255g bullet with SPG lube.

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Waste of time - just let the bullet base touch the charge and compress it. Will this produce an inaccurate reload? I don't believe so: 454, 300gr Casull- 35gr FFg with no wad at 500 meters ... 2 in a row and then cleaned the bank
http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/d...7/PDRM2906.jpg

And if the the reloads are for Cowboy - your shooting at plates at short distance - not bullseye at 25yds

Quote:

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Originally Posted by John Boy

Waste of time - just let the bullet base touch the charge and compress it. Will this produce an inaccurate reload? I don't believe so: 454, 300gr Casull- 35gr FFg with no wad at 500 meters ... 2 in a row and then cleaned the bank
http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/d...7/PDRM2906.jpg

And if the the reloads are for Cowboy - your shooting at plates at short distance - not bullseye at 25yds

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Very impressive shooting with that Henry! How did you get those 300gr loads to feed? Or were you single loading the rounds? I have a Uberti 1860 in 44-40, but so far I have only shot it at 25, 50, and 100yard targets.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...2a13b48eae.jpg


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I have had good luck with both 2f an 3f I use a boolit that holds plenty of lube I use a thin wad but then if you dont want one that works to, experiment and be safe have fun! B.P IS COOL!

Thanks guys, I'm interested in accuracy for cowboy silhouette, and am not a SASS shooter.

Your method of loading currently is fine but can be simplified should you so wish. You can dump the felt wad and add a couple of grains of powder. If you aren't deforming bullets or brass, you don't have too much compression. And yes, you can use 2F with not much impact on performance.

Try the muzzleloader original dry lubed felt wads. They really help with the fouling and maintaining accuracy which is really important when you're doing the silhouette or other shooting that makes consistent accuracy a must.