41 special

[brettb75]

Anybody have any good loads in 41 special. I want a good light load for my 41. Glynn41 gave me some awesome hollow points that shot great with 6.5 grains of unique, but I want a real pussycat load to plink around with. Ive tried the lee 195 grain bullet and it shot 5-7 inch groups in a ransom rest no joke. But those 41 hollow points shot .775 for 6 shots at 25 yards on the same day and same setup as the lee 195. Thanks for any help

[Rocky Raab]

Crank up your Firefox (IE will scramble my pages) and read this: 41 Special

[BerdanIII]

From: Shoot a 41 Special, D. Ward, Handloader's Digest, 17th Ed., 1997:

177-gr. NEI Hollowpoint
Bullseye - 4.7 - 854 fps
Bullseye - 5.5 - 975
AA5 - 5.5 - 769
195-gr. NEI
Bullseye - 4.5 - 807 fps
Unique - 6.5 - 911
AA5 - 6.0 - 751
215-gr. RCBS
Bullseye - 5.0 - 884 fps
AA2 - 5.0 - 843

How about using powder charges from .41 Long Colt Data?

From: Lyman No. 38

196-gr. Lyman 386177
Bullseye - 3.0 - 700 fps
Unique - 5.0 - 890 est.
200-gr. Lyman 386178
Bullseye - 3.0 - 700 fps est.
Unique - 5.0 - 880 est.

From: Handloading the Forgotten .41, Handloader #156, March - April 1992
The author tried 160-gr., 195-gr., 200-gr., and 205-gr. cast bullets in the .41 Long Colt and got the best accuracy for all bullets with 3.5 grains of Bullseye.

[Rocky Raab]

Home from SHOT and have access to my logs again.

With cast 215 SWC, the following are good to great loads:

5.0 W231 800 fps

5.0 Clays 900 fps

7.5 Acc#5 900 fps

5.5 Amer Select 900 fps

6.5 Universal Clays 1000 fps

9.5 BlueDot 1100 fps

I have pet loads with other powders but they are either discontinued or have been re-formulated from the batches I use. No sense listing those.

[brettb75]

Thanks guys, i never thought about looking at 41 long colt data that should work good.

[PacMan]

Not sure where the .41 special lands as far as Blue Dot but Alliant has a warning out not to use Blue Dot in the .41 mag. I found the warning a couple days ago and cannot find it now.
Dwight

[Rocky Raab]

ATK has not tested loads in the 41 Special because it is a wildcat. While I have used Blue Dot in mine, I won't in the future.

[Good Cheer]

If the 41 Special is to make use of a reduced case volume...why not just seat the boolit deeper in the mag case instead of to where the mold manufacturer put a crimp groove?

[Rocky Raab]

Or the flip side of that argument: If you are going to take the trouble to seat bullets extra deep just to get a better case volume ratio, why not just shorten the case?

[missionary5155]

Greetings
You can always just load a .411- .413 RB with 5 grains of Unique. Shoots accurate enough in all my 41´s out to 25 yards. I like it as a daily load in a Taurus Titanium when out woods walking or kayaking. 3 of those with 2 210 grainers for tougher beasties.
With the RB smear some lube on the RB´s before loading. A light roll crimp holds them fine.
If that recoils too much just keep dropping back o the Unique till one sticks in the barrel. But 5 grains Unique in a revolver is hardly nothing.

[brettb75]

I really really like unique in my larger revolvers, 44 spec and 41 special. It shoots great. Anywhere from 6.5 - 7.4 in 44 spec with 240 grain bullets and 5-6 grains in a 41 special with 200 - 220 grain bullets.

[sledgehammer]

My Blackhawk likes 3.5gr of TrailBoss under a Lee 200gr TL. My 12 year old stepdaughter could shoot it all day. I also load the same boolit over 6.4gr of Unique, although it's a little stiffer load than the TB powder. I use mag brass trimmed to length.

[targetshootr]

What kind of gun is it. Pics please.

[Rocky Raab]

Peecher? okeeeee-doke!

[peerlesscowboy]

If the 41 Special is to make use of a reduced case volume...why not just seat the boolit deeper in the mag case instead of to where the mold manufacturer put a crimp groove?

Isn't the purpose of the .41 Special to allow one to build it on an old 3 screw model Ruger Blackhawk .357mag which had a smaller frame than current models or larger calibers?

John C. Saubak

[Shooter6br]

I use "41 Special" loads in full lenght cases in my 657. I feel that the shorter 41 cases are better in a single action revolver. I find 32 Long cases eject easier than the longer 327 Fed cases .in my Blackhawk (Duh). Would be nice if someone would make a factory K frame size 41 special or even a j size frame. Guess no market for it. Just a thought

[NHlever]

Peecher? okeeeee-doke!

I respect your experience, and enjoy reading what you write, but making fun of folks around you is not very becoming, and drops my estimation of who I thought you were some. Sorry, but I just couldn't let it pass, and I certainly don't want to make it personal.

[Rocky Raab]

Making fun of whom? and how?

[NHlever]

Rocky, my apologies if there wasn't some sarcasm in that note. You had poked fun at the use of the "Boolit" spelling in this forum, and had questioned whether we should be spelling other words like pictures differently too. Since you had used that word as an example when you were poking fun at the Boolit thing, I assumed that you were still on that track when you replied with your picture. Kind of hard for us to figure out what your meaninig is when you use a word one day to poke fun, and another day you use the word spelled the same way innocently.................. sorry if that assumption was wrong.

[Rocky Raab]

I see what you mean now. While I did associate "peecher" with picture because of that earlier comment, I did not use it here in a derisive way. Just as most of you aren't slack-jawed mouth-breathers because you use "boolit".

However, it does occur to me that the reasoning behind "boolit" is flawed. If you intend "boolit" to differentiate between cast and jacketed, then why the heck do you call the site "Cast Boolits?" If boolit means cast bullet, why add the modifier? Department of Redundant Redundancy Department?

Nor can it be to to save typing, because cast boolits takes exactly as long to type as cast bullets. I still think it's silly.