How Heavy a .45-70 for a Shoulder Pass Through?

[Lucky Joe]

kinda like a freight train.

Precisely, well said Mr. Anderson.

[sharpsguy]

Keith Anderson got it exactly right. A 480 to 510 grain bullet at 30-1 and 1200 fps is THE ticket in a 45-70. A Lyman 457121PH is a great flatnosed greaser, and either a round nosed or flat nosed 30-1 paper patched bullet at 500 grains shoots all the way through bison and elk, not to mention kudu, wildebeast, and zebra. BTDT.

[offshore44]

Thanks for that. It cracked me up. I work on getting 45-70 velocities out of my 458 Win Mag. It does work a lot better on game.

A lot of you guys make the big mistake trying to get .458 win mag velocities out of your .45-70. The high velocity with the 300 or 350 gr bullets are chasing your tails. Most of the time they will not pass through especially when you hit bone at near 2000 fps velocities.
You will have a lot better results with the .45-70 if you keep your velocity at around 1200 fps with a 485 + gr cast at 1/30 bullet. I have yet to be able to recover a bullet shot through a Buffalo even hitting heavy bone using a 1/30 alloyed bullet. I have taken deer with angling shot that started behind the back of the rib cage and taking the shoulder out with a 485 gr flat nosed bullet and I did not recover the bullet. With the .45-70 the high velocity of close to 2000 fps does not penetrate as deep as it will at 1150 fps.

KA

[nanuk]

BruceB wrote a great thread on casting softnose boolits.

start HERE!

[nanuk]

then search for "softnose" from "BruceB" and you'll find great info on it

[Lead pot]

Mixed alloy bullets where common in the past. Ideal even made a two part mould for casting those bullets either hard nosed or soft nose.
Here is a cut for one of them and they used to be made for several different nose shapes and calibers.