Egyptian or Spanish rolling blocks?

Anyone shooting either of these? With black powder?

If so what sort of results do you get?

Thanks,

Mark

No, I use smokeless for the 43 Spanish
Good luck on BP
For Smokeless I use 4198 and a .439 cast bullet lubed with Javilina
Reasonable accuracy
BUT I did remove the rear sight, and made a scope base to fit the
original screw holes and installed a Weaver steel tube K-4 :)
Mike

Quote:

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Originally Posted by skeettx

No, I use smokeless for the 43 Spanish
Good luck on BP
For Smokeless I use 4198 and a .439 cast bullet lubed with Javilina
Reasonable accuracy
BUT I did remove the rear sight, and made a scope base to fit the
original screw holes and installed a Weaver steel tube K-4 :)
Mike

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thanks. How is the bore? With your loads and with your scope what results do you get at 100 yards? 200 yards?

Thanks for responding.

I have a 43 Spanish and also use smokeless AA5477 powder and a .440 diameter bullet, I also had to install a Scope because of my old eyes. Been getting 2 inch groups at 100 yards

YUP, 2 inch five shot groups at 100 yards
Never shot it at 200
Mike

Original 43 Spanish RB: 72gr FFg & 5gr 4759 ... or 78gr Fg with a Lyman 436186 bullet (370gr) ... accurate to 1000yds. Only issue, 43 Spanish sights are calibrated in metric so have to fiddle with the slide shooting at yardage targets. Accuracy of the 43 Spanish BP reloads is equal to the excellent accuracy of the 44-77 cousin caliber BP reloads used in many NRA Long Range BPCR target matches

Bought a 43 egyptian for really cheap that looked like it rode on a camel for ever. But the bore is nice. Shoots as accurate as my new Remington rolling block in 45-70. 43 Spanish is easier to get dies, brass and a bullet mold for. I shoot unique and can hit a 24” metal plate at 200 yards easily.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by John Boy

Original 43 Spanish RB: 72gr FFg & 5gr 4759 ... or 78gr Fg with a Lyman 436186 bullet (370gr) ... accurate to 1000yds. Only issue, 43 Spanish sights are calibrated in metric so have to fiddle with the slide shooting at yardage targets. Accuracy of the 43 Spanish BP reloads is equal to the excellent accuracy of the 44-77 cousin caliber BP reloads used in many NRA Long Range BPCR target matches

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John Boy, thank you, very interesting.

Mark

thanks!

Tried 200 yards and was holding 38 inch high, but was keeping them around 6 inch.

My old man bought a 43 Span at auction that was billed as a 45/70. He was perturbed to say the least. I normally wouldn't have fooled with it but was one of best military RBs I've ever seen. I had
a Rapine 387gr RN mold and dies. So I made up 20 cases from 348Win. Starting load was 14.5gr of
Unique at 1200fps. At 50yds it shot clover leaf groups (benched). I then increased powder charge to
16.5gr of Unique at 1350fps. Moved to 100yds and shot best group of 5". I think rifle was capable of
better but my eyes weren't with stock military sights. The bore in this rifle was like a dime. When we
got it it looked terrible. Then we found the barrel had some kind of dried grease, like old cosmoline
coating the inside of bore. Once we got it cleaned we were looking at perfect bore. Always wondered if that rifle had ever been issued. I don't know where loads came from, maybe Cartridges of the World by Barnes. As usual pulled the OMs fat out of the fire and sold rifle and recovered his money.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drm50

My old man bought a 43 Span at auction that was billed as a 45/70. He was perturbed to say the least. I normally wouldn't have fooled with it but was one of best military RBs I've ever seen. I had
a Rapine 387gr RN mold and dies. So I made up 20 cases from 348Win. Starting load was 14.5gr of
Unique at 1200fps. At 50yds it shot clover leaf groups (benched). I then increased powder charge to
16.5gr of Unique at 1350fps. Moved to 100yds and shot best group of 5". I think rifle was capable of
better but my eyes weren't with stock military sights. The bore in this rifle was like a dime. When we
got it it looked terrible. Then we found the barrel had some kind of dried grease, like old cosmoline
coating the inside of bore. Once we got it cleaned we were looking at perfect bore. Always wondered if that rifle had ever been issued. I don't know where loads came from, maybe Cartridges of the World by Barnes. As usual pulled the OMs fat out of the fire and sold rifle and recovered his money.

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So, what process did you use to convert those 348Win cases to 43 Spanish? A bunch of years ago I bought a 43 Spanish rifle with a good bore from a gun show for pretty cheap, and a mold from RCBS, and a sizer die, and a set of LEE reloading dies for it. But I couldn't figure out a way of swaging down near the base of the shell close enough to get the casing to fit in the Rolling Block rifle.

I used a 12 ton shop press and a wrist pin from a diesel engine and it took all the
oomph the press could do

Mike

We tried to use a bushing and press to reduce case. We didn't have a big enough press and bushing
would just dig in and sieze. We ended up turning them in lathe. The rim dia was just close enough
the extractor worked. I had gotten a box of Rem 43 Span from a show, Rem manufacture. They were
all duds and when we pulled bullets the case necks cracked. Each one a single crack and cases were
brittle. I think the instructions were in Cartridges of the World. There was Ammo available, also Rem
from Century Arms in late 80s. Today you can buy ammo from specialty outfits but it's pricey. About
the same time I had a 11.5 X 60mm Mauser that I started to fool with. Also was going to use 348
brass but traded it off before I got around to making cases.

I have used "belted magnum cases". Turn off the belt for "Close" fit in the chamber, resize, expand neck, anneal neck and shoulder area, fire form, resize, trim to length and reload. These cases can last a long time.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Safeshot

I have used "belted magnum cases". Turn off the belt for "Close" fit in the chamber, resize, expand neck, anneal neck and shoulder area, fire form, resize, trim to length and reload. These cases can last a long time.

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How do you get them to extract?