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Iirc the Remington 45/70 boxes has it right on the box, safe to shoot in anything chambered for 45/70, at least some of them do.
This would make them fairly anemic in modern guns, by my way of thinking.
I know ww guns in Anchorage modifies marlins and calls them 457 mag, I do not know what all is entailed. I do know they advertise that you can also shoot 45/70 ammo in them.
I do not know how many of these they have sold, but there has been at least a few of them.
I will say this, I do not consider it feasible to claim a slow moving 405 grain bullet would do the same as a faster one, I would think even 300 fps would make a difference in the shock, even penetration when hitting heavy bone.
Will the trap door loads kill anything in this country, you bet, BUT you will not see me carrying them in grizzly country.
I need to look it up, but I am not 100% sure trap door loads are even legal for buffalo here.
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Well, there you go. I guess I live a sheltered life, I didn't know there was a gas check version of the 457124.
I never found the need for a gas check in the Marlin but I did find that at top end loads in the Siamese Mauser, which had a longer barrel and was loaded significantly hotter, that I got leading in the last 2" or so of barrel before the muzzle.
My redneck solution was to add a .410 fiber wad under the boolit and that solved the leading issue.
I really did like that 457124 but it would be better with a meplat and HP option. I think anyway. It shot well in both my guns with both BP and smokeless... well, no BP in the Siamese Mauser.
I found that shooting steel gongs at 100 yards with the Marlin against a .58 Remington Zouave with traditional Minie (500 to 530 grs. ?) and same powder charge the 457124 hit the gongs much harder. Some would be ACWW boolits being harder than soft lead Minies but I think more efficient combustion in the brass cartridge played a large part and I suppose BC but 100 yards isn't very far.
All in all great cartridge with lots of boolits and load level selection.
But back on topic about expense, I was shocked to see the price of factory ammunition. The +P wasn't a lot more. I wouldn't buy either unless I didn't reload that's for sure... except if I was carrying for bear protection then the +P would get the nod.
In fact I have to think that most working class people would be hard pressed to shoot much .45-70, or for that matter pretty much any high power centerfire rifle cartridge, at factory prices. I usually take 100+ rounds each of .303 and .44 mag out to the range when I take the kids. I'd have to get a loan to shoot factory ammunition like that!
We cast and reload for many reason, low cost being one of them.
Longbow
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It would not take a lot of shooting factory ammo in a lot of calibers to use up a house payment. lol
Iirc the last time I looked the cheap 45/70 stuff was 55 bucks a box, just browsing around looking at prices one day, some of the weatherby ammo was as high as 140 bucks a box, ouch. That would be hard to use, even for just hunting.
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Well done Larry, well done. Thanks!