.500 bullet from 45 ACP

[DukeInFlorida]

Brian, the roll over on the end looks nice. That's exactly how the Hornady ones are made.

That would be sweet.

I will retook the pictures, and posted them in place of the ones that were there, with something relative in place ( .44 magnum and .22 LR) to show relative size.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Brian,
I figured I wouldn't be ordering any more swage dies...

I'm not sure if you knew or not, but I do have a 500 S&W Mag revolver.
I am 99% sure I will order a set of 50 cal dies.
Please PM me a price quote.
Jon

[BT Sniper]

Nope, didn't know I just knew I could make a 500 bullet from 45 ACP so away I went. You guys know me. I don't have guns for half teh caliber bullets I make.

I'll certainly be making some extra of these 500 dies. I'll keep you all posted to my progress and get you price quotes. It sould be teh same price I have listed now in my sticky. Custom 2 die set.

I got one more idea to try out with the 500 core seat die. I'll make a cone shape punch to displace the lead a bit making it easier to form the finished bullet like this technique I use with the 45s



BT

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Seems like a 44 or 45 cal cast bullet of 255 grains perfectly fills the jacket without need for triming it giving us a 340 grain bullet. The 310 grain cast boolit core makes a BIG 390 grian bullet.

For 500 S&W Mag, the bigger the bullet the better.
Of the commercial offerings, the typical size of "hunting" loads are 500 gr.
I'm thinkin' maybe the Lee 457-340 FN mold for a 340 gr. core for a 430 gr. bullet and have some exposed Lead, as you know, I've always liked some exposed lead

I wonder what then limits of using the 45acp case and maximizing
the amount of lead and still being able to give a Star type hollow point.
I would be OK with a smaller sized HP if that is necessary to maximize weight.

Do you think my 44 cal notching die will work with the 50 ?
mine was one of the first you made, as I recall it was
specifically for 44 cal. I never did try it with 40 cal yet,
but you had figured it'd work for 40.
Jon

[BT Sniper]

Here is a thought....... all those 8mm berdine primed brass has a diameter of .473 at the base right!!!!!!!!!! Heck any of teh .473 based brass would work for a jacket with this bullet I bet.

As for the 45ACP limits???? well I'll have to see. I made some at 390 and barly had any lead exposed with a HP. I'm sure we could probably go 450-475 maybe 500 grains without the lead reaching the barring surrface of the bullet. Let me see what I can come up with.

BT

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Here is a thought....... all those 8mm berdine primed brass has a diameter of .473 at the base right!!!!!!!!!! Heck any of teh .473 based brass would work for a jacket with this bullet I bet.

well, currently I don't have too many spent 8mm Mauser (berdan style) cases.
I do have several hundred to shoot off though

also using rifle brass will mean alot of cutting (I prefer not to)
plus the rifle brass wall will be fairly thick and not tapered nicely
like a 45 acp is, for nice pedal peeling.
Jon

[BT Sniper]

True!

Like I said I'll see how BIG the 45ACP can go.

BT

[DukeInFlorida]

The Hornady XTP's are 350 grains.
I'd be happy with that!

For cast boolits, I have molds for all the way up to 700 grains.... That's 10 boolits = a pound of lead!

[BT Sniper]

The 45 acp typicaly weights 80 grains. You can use either 44 or probably 45 cal cast boolits for cores. So a bit of simple math and you are all set. The 240, 255 and 265 grain cores make good XTP type .500 bullets from the 45 acp case. The one I have been posting pics of have been made with the 240 grain 44 cal for a core. As I recall I made some at 350 grains today by adding a bit of lead to the bullet before forming but anything is possible with this bullet it seems.

BT

[BT Sniper]

Now accepting orders for these .500 cal dies. Please see my BTSniper sticky for details.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...76#post1490276

Thanks,

BT

[DukeInFlorida]

Brian, et al.......

I went to the range today, and test fired the samples I received.

Shot from 25 yards (75 feet!) away, off my range bag, through a paper target, plastic corrugated backer, and into ballistic sand. Fired them from my S&W .500 magnum with 6 3/8" ported barrel. I didn't do any scientific aiming, just my normal aiming. I'll post a picture of the target later on. I was happy with the grouping. Throw out the normal flyers, and it looks fine.

I tested the swaged ones against some baseline Hornady XTP 350 grain factory bullets, with the exact same TrailBoss powder load. The XTP's shot the same grouping pattern as the swaged versions.

I recovered two samples of the swaged bullets, and one sample of the Hornady XTP from the ballistic sand. The sand was damp (not wet), and there was ZERO expansion in either the swaged versions or the Hornady. I was glad that I had the foresight to also load some baseline Hornady's, or else I might have been disappointed with the lack of expansion. Seems it;s a function of the nature of this sand which the club just put on the berms. It's still somewhat fluffy. I had to dig 10" deep to recover the bullets. That is very deep penetration.

I will also post a picture of the recovered bullets later on when I set up the camera.

It was a nice day at the range, probably one of the last I will get to spend there as my packing for the move intensifies. It was nice to spend part of the day doing the testing on these rounds.

Brian, I definitely want one of the .500 magnum die sets!

[rockrat]

Durn you, BT for making these

[BT Sniper]

Glad to hear they shot well. Imagine how much better they will shoot when they are not my first batch of R&D bullets out of the die but actually production run bullets!

I imagine I will make atleast 5-10 of these .500 die sets to send off to heat treat in my next batch. I'll be happy to offer a set of these dies to anyone interested.

As for expansion.... well we can work on that. The trailboss loads are somewhat "reduced" as far as the 500 S&W is concerned right? I would bet these bullets will have plenty of potential for expansion. Even without expansion it is still a 1/2" hole you are punching in something, but imagine the hole it will leave when it expands at faster speeds! AWESOME!

Good shooting, Thanks for the report.

BT

[DukeInFlorida]

Yes, the TrailBoss powder is a lower pressure powder, but I used it because it gave me a fast test without having to work out a fine detailed load sheet. As long as I didn't overfill the sace, I could use same powder load for all of the bullets in the sample firings.

Here's the pictures (again, these were shot from 75 feet with a springy rest, my range bag):

[BT Sniper]

Cool!

I have some trailboss as well. I have read about the reloading techniques using this powder. I thought I would give it a try in my 300WM to test bullet to 30-30 speeds. Havn't got around to it yet.

Can't wait to see more results from these bullets from more shooters.

BT

[BT Sniper]

Some fun stuff that can be done with these bullets since they still have a rim on them. We can trim the nose a bit to give a new or different finsihed look to the bullet or possibly allow it to feed in the 50AE AR-15 platforms.

[trench]

Unless you are talking about 2000+ fps, the shock wave does no damage to the organs. At lower speeds, the only damage done is by direct crushing-tearing of the tissues that are contacted by the bullet.

[BT Sniper]

Sounds good. So what can the 500 S&W do with a 325 grain bullet is the question I guess.

BT

[oneokie]

Unless you are talking about 2000+ fps, the shock wave does no damage to the organs. At lower speeds, the only damage done is by direct crushing-tearing of the tissues that are contacted by the bullet.

Can you post some links to the data you are using to justify that statement?

[BT Sniper]

Jon B,

I'll have to check into the notch die you have. Does it look like this? or the redding 40 S&W bodied die I offered earlier? If so either one will work to notch from 17-50 cal jackets. I recall I may have made you one that was specific to the core seat die and in that case ?????? Send me a Pm and we shall see what we can come up with.