"Real" Keith Bullets

[MakeMineA10mm]

Thanks for the reply BA. I see what you're saying. I was pretty impressed with 2" groups at 90yds with a 44 Magnum rifle, because of a prejudice I have that pistol-caliber rifles shouldn't be that accurate. This results in my being impressed/suprised when they are merely reasonably accurate. I really should have known better, because I have handguns that are that accurate, and there's no reason to think a carbine would be less so, when it has a longer barrel and is easier to shoot...

As far as stability of the bullet, I think you are right in your descriptions, but I also harken back to one of my instructors who taught us a technique for long-range pistol shooting wherein we imagined the pistol's sights and barrel are in a pipe, and if you hold correctly, align the sights correctly, squeeze the trigger, and have reasonably consistent and accuracy-supporting fundamental skills, one can shoot very respectable groups at virtually any range. Applying the same principles to closer-range shooting results in ragged-hole groups.

The modern-day experts I'm speaking of when I describe sizing bullets to chamber throat diameter are folks who write for Handloader magazine, like Mike Venturino, Dave Scovill, and Brian Pearce. I know some here don't think much of any gun rags, including Handloader, but they are about the only ones who publish any articles about casting that go beyond "buy such-and-such brand commercial cast bullets." They actually talk about casting, moulds, sizing, loading techniques, etc. By the way, the example I used in my post above was an exageration, but it illustrated my point.

[Lloyd Smale]

youve got to keep in mind that theres a small group of guys here that have forgot more about casting bullets then most of the gunwritters have ever known. Not to knock them as some of them are more knowlegable about other aspects of the sport then they are. I personally have probably casted more bullets then all the ones youve mentioned combined and there are guys on here thats knowlege compared to mine is like comparing a preschooler to a college graduate.

[frank505]

20 years ago I got my custom 45 colt just in time for a month in the hills guiding hunters. had some 310 keiths loaded. 15 years later jeff and i measured the cylinder throats and were surprised to find throats that started at 451 and ended at 455 or so. no wonder i have had to set the barrel back twice in 20 years of shooting it hard. now i wonder how inell i have hit anything with that sixgun, it has made some really good long range hits over the years despite having reverse funnel throats.

[Lloyd Smale]

Frank i can tell you a simualar story about a bisley vaquero box stock 5.5 inch gun that was as sloppy as a rattle the day i got it new. Had excessive end shake and side to side play and the chambers were all to tight. Thing is the gun shot and shot well. As a matter of fact it was one of the most accurate out of the box rugers ive ever owned and is for a fact the most accurate out of the box 45 colt ruger ive ever owned. I shot the snot out of that gun with heavy loads that id never publish and being plagued with sloppiness out of the box did nothing but get worse. Thing is it would still shoot and had become one of my favorite guns. I sent i to dave clements had him shorten the barrel to 4 5/8s recrown it recut the forcing cone throat the cyinder to 4525 and tighten the gun up. It came back a beauty i had him also round but it and case harden it. I had a pair of scott Kolars french walnuts taht i had dave fit to it when he round butted it. I was dammed proud of that gun when i got it back. It is flat beautiful. But does it shoot better NOPE! It shoots some loads as well as the best loads did before but it is a much more finiky gun to load for now. Before a guy could about throw some sand in a case and cap it with a rock and it would shoot under 2 inch at 25. Now it has maybe 3 or 4 loads that will do the same. Just goes to show you that the minute you think you have all the answers you find out you dont even know what the questions are! John Linebaugh will tell you that some handguns are possessed by the devil and no matter what you do they just wont shoot. Sometimes without an explanation and i beleive it myself. Probably a good reason why FA or none of the custom gunsmiths would ever gurantee an accuracy level in there guns. You can do everything right sometimes and its wrong and you can have about everything wrong sometimes and its right. The best a guy can do is to aquire all the knowlege he can and apply it and hope for the best. Thats whats nice about this site. A guy has to wade though a little bs but there are a few people on here that even an old dog can learn new tricks from if hes willing to open up his mind.

[45r]

interesting thread about long range keith boolits,shot some saeco 255GC boolits with the smallest drive band you ever saw and a short nose with a fat metplat in my 454 casull and that boolit shoots 1 inch groups at 50 yards in 45 colt brass or casull brass.you wouldn't think such a short boolit could be so accurate with everybody saying got to have a long boolit.the casull brass likes 16.3 hs-6 and the45 colt brass likes 20.0 2400.1 inch groups at 50 yards don't come easy with short boolits.really liked the picture LAH had up on that 45 keith heavy weight with equal lenght bands that could shoot round holes at 1300 yards.great looking boolit that could harvest any game animal out there.the rcbs 300GC shoots 2 to 3 inch groups at 100 yards out of my model 83 and havn't tried practicing further out but never had to since bucks around here will come within that range if ya put your tree stands in a good spot.some day I might go out west and try that type of hunting but in the midwest woods where I'm at ya got to put your deer down quick or somebody else might add more holes to em by the time you get to your deer.I'm a big fan of the high shoulder shot.no tracking needed.

[Dale53]

>>>You can do everything right sometimes and its wrong and you can have about everything wrong sometimes and its right. <<<

I had an old friend many years ago that made match quality muzzle loading barrels. He was a shooter, also. I asked him one day (I was but a lad) what he did when a gun wouldn't shoot in spite of all he knew. His reply was priceless, "Well, Dale, THOSE guns you just sell. I only keep the shootin' ones!"

I have personally been blessed. It has been RARE when I had a gun that wouldn't shoot. However, I have had a gun or two that I couldn't shoot. They would shoot just fine from the Ransom Rest but in my hands they wouldn't. I would find a good home for those...

Dale53

[dromia]

I have nothing to add to this thread other than to say when I had pistols my .357 magnum was a Colt Python that just loved the Lyman 358429. I got the 4 hole mould and didn't hand it in when the ban come in, I'm going to get an underlever in .357 Magnum some day to shoot that bullet again.

Anyways this thread has been the best read I've had in a long long time, thank you all for the education.

[AKtinman]

Fellas, I've enjoyed this thread. I haven't had time or space to do much loading and shooting in the past 3 years, but I am still accumulating molds and reading up on subjects like this in anticipation of doing a lot more shooting in the near future.

I started casting in 1970 with a single cavity 358156 and have been hooked since. I still have LOTS to learn and appreciate all the knowledge shared on this forum.

My favorite molds (not necessarily favorite boolits) are LBT. They are light weight and allow a high production rate. I have NEI, H&G, Lyman, Ideal, Saeco, and Lee as well.

I have to chuckle when I look at an LBT mold and see Veral's logo - LBT within a Keith bullet profile. Veral told me that HIS .44 Keith design was a TRUE Keith (how many have made that claim?) and really wasn't promoting that mold design. I did buy one of those as well as the 250 gr LFN and one day will do some serious accuracy comparisons between those two. Most of my shooting is at paper, so accuracy is #1, followed by production.

From WW alloy, the LBT Keith is difficult to fill out, but no problems with the LFN, so I am predisposed towards the LFN.

This stuff is fun!

[LAH]

From WW alloy, the LBT Keith is difficult to fill out, but no problems with the LFN, so I am predisposed towards the LFN.

I have Keith moulds in Ballistic, NEI, and Lyman. All of these fill well with W/W metal but seem to work better at 725 to 750 degrees......Creeker

[AKtinman]

I have Keith moulds in Ballistic, NEI, and Lyman. All of these fill well with W/W metal but seem to work better at 725 to 750 degrees......Creeker

Thanks, Creeker. I'll try varying the temps next chance I have to do some casting.

My old 429421 I bought in 1977 never gave me any problems with fill-out.

The recent afternoon I spent casting was the first time I had poured any boolits in about 3 years, so I am a little rusty.

[LAH]

Understand, just try a little warmer and see if that helps.

[45r]

Smoking aluminum molds with a butane lighter helps fillout for me also.If that don't work sometimes a little mold release sprayed on very lightly and the cavities brushed out with a soft toothbrush and then smoked has worked well for me.Go very light on the mold release so you don't reduce the diameter on your boolits.If you over do it brushing out with the toothbrush will remove most of the graphite.You can remove all of it with denatured alcahol if you don't want it on later or it didn't work.

[Hamish]

Bump to resurface. Wow.

[MakeMineA10mm]

Thanks for bringing this one back. We ought to sticky this thread -- it's been resurrected twice, and there's a lot here to garner.

We, to include myself, recommend stuff here every day to get a majority of shooters to be successful shooting lead. It's basically kept very basic and you don't hear accuracy standards thrown around much, so the information is designed more for fun and expansion of the sport. I get criticized from folks all the time for being .... anal in my testing. OK, I can live with that. My mom has said a lot worse.

The coarse and the Professor becomes a lot more intense if you want to do better or to go on out.

This is intriguing and bothersome at the same time. I find this website to be full of fantastic knowledge, but there IS a lot of time spent on basics to increase the spread of boolit casting. That is a good and worthwhile goal, but I wonder if we should have an on-line magazine about boolit casting set up like the pic-of-the-month section, where people submit research/knowledge articles which are reviewed by mods for quality of the info./research and then posted in a locked forum for reading? We could get into the more advanced stuff that way without aome of the strife that happens in such topics when they become " discussions."

[waksupi]

Try Castpics.

Thanks for bringing this one back. We ought to sticky this thread -- it's been resurrected twice, and there's a lot here to garner.



This is intriguing and bothersome at the same time. I find this website to be full of fantastic knowledge, but there IS a lot of time spent on basics to increase the spread of boolit casting. That is a good and worthwhile goal, but I wonder if we should have an on-line magazine about boolit casting set up like the pic-of-the-month section, where people submit research/knowledge articles which are reviewed by mods for quality of the info./research and then posted in a locked forum for reading? We could get into the more advanced stuff that way without aome of the strife that happens in such topics when they become " discussions."

[S.B.]

LAH, how close are Verbal's .45 Colt/Keith bullet molds from LBT to what Keith actually designed?
Steve

[LAH]

I cannot say Steve. I've seen no bullets from his mould. Sorry.........Lynn

[45 2.1]

It may interest you to know that one of the first two 429421 original molds (circa 1927 or 1928) made by Lyman for Elmer Keith has surfaced. The story is detailed out in: Handloader magazine, Dec 2013, article by Brian Pearce. It isn't quite what you think about a Keith mold either.

[9.3X62AL]

Really.....so Lyman's design poetry isn't a new trend, then? Interesting.

[bhn22]

Pearces mold wasn't what I expected either. I did notice that the mold number was stamped freehand, but when I compared it with my early 429422, they didn't appear to be related very closely at all. This just deepened the mystery surrounding my mold. Every time I think I get early Keith molds sort of figured out, a new version appears.