35 Whelen and pistol 38/357 boolits

[Nobade]

You will likely find better accuracy with Trail Boss at 12 - 13 gr. That 17gr. load is running over 25,000 psi, a bit too much for plain base boolits. With big bottleneck cases it is easy to get too much of that powder in it for best performance. It won't blow anything up, but pressure is often too high to shoot well.

[swheeler]

SWV; lacking a chrono I would chamber a round, point the muzzle straight up then slowly lower to shooting rested position, fire a group on target. Then I would repeat with muzzle pointed straight down, slowly raised to level and shoot another group, this should tell you if accuracy improves by placing powder against the primer, and I think it will but know nothing about Universal powder, have never used it. Dacron makes a good filler and there is a sticky about its correct use.

[sthwestvictoria]

I'll try the lower Trail Boss loads and the lower AP70N loads as well as a position test. Thanks for the great tips.

Nobade - I have just taken possession on a copy of Lee's Modern Reloading and am reading through his section on pressure as it relates to boolit hardness. Interesting approach.

[sthwestvictoria]

No great shakes with the 11.0AP70N and either boolit:


Nor the 10.5grains AP70N:


I am sure these are signs of position sensitivity of the lower weights of AP70N in the large Whelen case. Case necks were also quite sooty with the 10.5 and 11.0grain AP70N loads so probably not getting a great seal.

The Trail Boss was slightly more promising at lower charges than I had tried before - thank you Nobade:


So I'll probably call the 11.5grain AP70N with RNFP the best load so far. If I want to improve it I feel I'll need a faster, less position sensitive powder - Unique or Bullseye, as my betters suggested at the beginning of the thread!

I hope to have a 250grain mold soon as well - more normal weight for calibre with GC and this will enable some slower powders like AR2206H (H4895) to be trialled with better case filling and published data. I guess I need to think about a chronograph as well.

[Bodydoc447]

Has anyone tried the group buy 180 gr WFN boolit? I have some of these cast up and sized to .359 and was wondering if these would be a good boolit for the Whelen.

Doc

[sthwestvictoria]

Has anyone tried the group buy 180 gr WFN boolit?

It that PB or GC? I don't have that mold. The Lee Modern Reloading has a number of loads for a 180grain Jacketed in 35 whelen, including a load in H4895, you could then apply the Hodgdon youth load approach or Lee's 1% reduction method? I have read here of people doing this with H4895 (AR2206) as a safe reduced load powder but as I say cannot give direct experience.

The Lyman Cast 4th Ed only has two loads for 35 whelen - 195grain cast and 204grain cast.

[Ronb]

I use 9 gr of 231 with 185 wfn sized to .360. They shoot great!

[Bodydoc447]

Thanks! The ones I have cast up are GC but I do have an older Lee mould from a group buy several years ago for a plainbased version. I am going to try that 9 grains of 231 next time I get to the loading bench.

Doc

[sthwestvictoria]

Just a bit of an update. No stellar advances in accuracy but as others have suggested as I have gone slower with less powder accuracy has improved.
This is 12.0grains of Trail Boss under the 158grain RNFP plain base at 50metres:

Worth repeating the group.

And I realised I had tried the RN (358-150-1R) but not the RNFP (358-158-RF) with 12.0 of hodgdon Universal (AP70N):

Is that a real group with a flyer? again I believe Universal suffers from position sensitivity more that Unique.

Using ADI's 70% of case volume rule for Trail Boss suggests 12.25 grains is the minimum. I will go a little lower because I believe this is safe - I am still over 50% of case volume and Trail Boss is quite a fast powder so SEE is not a concern. I'll go to 11.5 and 11.0grains Trail Boss and look for stuck projectiles and loss of accuracy as an indication of position sensitivity (no chrony as yet).

[sthwestvictoria]

Best group so far with 158grain RNFP and 11.5grains of Trail Boss:

No chronograph unfortunately, certainly still sound supersonic. Group is 1.125" (measured outside edge of uppermost hole to inside edge of lowermost).

[Nobade]

Looks like it is starting to work quite well! You have a good rabbit shooting load now it seems.

-Nobade

[sthwestvictoria]

Just an update to the data set. I have tried a few more at the lower AP70N (hodgdon Universal) loads:

Unfortunately I was out of prepped brass so only a three shot group at the lower, need to reshoot that. The velocity consistency looks good however, given how little powder 9.5grains is in that case. The blue triangles were the hold points, with scope set for my 1810fps 250grain load at 100metres so that lower load is all the more encouraging if it shoots to point of aim for rabbit in close without changing dials for the heavy load.

My loading notebook also suggests that I shot a 3/4" inch group at 25metres in April using the 158grain RNFP and 7.0grains of Trailboss for 991, 1028, 1000fps. However I can't find the target for that so you'll have to take it on faith. I'll prep some more brass and reshoot it at 50metres.

The earlier parts of this test was shot using a Mauser rebored to 35 whelen that did not like these pistol bullets from the magazine. This test was with a M70 post-64 which liked the Lee 158grain RN from the magazine but not the Lee RNFP.

[sthwestvictoria]

Have finally been trying a bit more of pistol bullets and the Whelen and Trailboss. This is replicating 38special loads:



and this one with AP70N (Hodgdon Universal) and the RCBS 200grain (that Lee have just brought out a clone of):

[helice]

So glad you came back to this post. I don't have the Whelen but I have a 350 Rem Mag on the old M-600 action. This is very much what I found when using light pistole' bullets. (jacketed loads I hot rodded up to 3000'/s.) I had pretty good results with 231 Winchester, Red Dot and 700X behind a 180 grain LBT WFN but I don't think I ever got over 6 grains of powder and if my memory is correct 5 grains worked better. I worked with pistol primer with these and had no troubles. Right now I'm trying to get a "beer can checked" 240 grain LWN up past the 2000'/sec mark. Keep the photos coming, if only for me

[LAGS]

I think the issue is the twist Rate of the Whelen barrel being wrong for that light of bullet if driven too fast.
The heavier the bullet , the faster the twist rate is required to stabilize it.
Pistols are like a 1 in 16
Whelens are a 1 in 14 or 1 in 12.
And that small of powder charge in that Big of case , even with a Filler cant be good for consistant Ignition.
But going as slow as they are, it isnt much more than a Gallery load.
But Dont go too slow, or the bullet may not exit the longer barrel.
I have tried some Pistol Bullets in my Whelen, but gave up early when I saw they would be very limited range hunting bullets for even small game. they Dropped like a Rock

[sthwestvictoria]

I think the issue is the twist Rate of the Whelen barrel being wrong for that light of bullet if driven too fast.
The heavier the bullet , the faster the twist rate is required to stabilize it.
Pistols are like a 1 in 16
Whelens are a 1 in 14 or 1 in 12.

I think that is a good point with the lighter (around 158grain) bullets . My Whelen is 1:13

And that small of powder charge in that Big of case , even with a Filler cant be good for consistant Ignition.

I can't find the velocity data for the 7.0grains Trail Boss loads, i have the spread for the 13.0grains AP70N (HOdgdon Universal) were:
1445, 1440, 1462, 1445, 1449fps
So pretty low variability. That is without filler and without any positioning like lifting muzzle up before firing. It was a Winchester Large Pistol Primer.

[helice]

Years ago - back in the 1970s - Al Miller wrote a cast bullet article of his experiences with the 350 Rem Mag. He attributed the 350's grand performance with cast to the leisurely twist: 1 in 16". He wasn't using pistol bullets though. He was "flame throwing" 232, and 292 grain Lymans. As afore said, there may be a consideration of twist here.

[granville_it]

If you can scrounge some "Blue Dot", it's worth the trouble with cast, reduced loads.

I use it in a 30-30, 30-06, 45-70, all with cast bullets, with pleasing results.

As far as "Trail Boss" is concerned, .... with "rifle" loads, my jury is out.

Have you tried AR2206H?, I find it works well in the above mentioned cases.

It's been an interesting read.

Cheers Mark