.455 Webley loading tools

[iomskp]

Good Afternoon All
I have recently purchased a .455 Webley Man Stopper round, they are a bit thin on the ground, they only made them for about 6 months 1899-1900.

They are a hollow base hollow point bullet and the bullet appears to be held in with a groove below the rim of the case, are the projectiles put in and then the case is crimped with a type of crimp pliers into one of the lube rings, any information would be appreciated.

[Outpost75]

Stake-type crimper used on these worked on the same principle as the Lee Factory Crimp die, but had a star-shaped collet rather than full ring type. This has been standard manufacturing practice since black powder days and is still used.

[robert12345]

Humm...
.
The .455 Webley:

I street walking in Portsmouth England, about 15 years ago,
I came across a little gun shop, so I stepped through the door.

Behind a glass, was a pile of revolvers... (???? !)

I asked to look at the best one, it was a Colt New Service, caliber .455, with a 6 inch barrel.

Full working order.

Price, 400 English pounds, out the door, ...in a paper bag.

Fully legal purchase !
.
It seems in England, some revolvers, are blind to English law, and they sell, not as guns, but as antiques, ..rather like a grandfather clock,
and that .455 was one of them.

Thinking to self, so many years ago, ....how will I get it on the airplane..... ?
.
As far as I know, that revolver is still sitting there...
.
.
.
The .455; well, you can make the cases from 45 colt.

You chuck them by the case mouth in a lathe, then turn the rim thin, to .455 rim dimensions, from the top,.....down, then cut the case off to length.

Reload dies,, as I recall, you can use 45 colt dies.
.
The crimp, ...dunno, you got me, maybe a cut down 45 ACP die....
.
That's about all I have on the .455.
Big, pointy, slow moving bullet, ..little powder charge.
.
But then, as we all know, the average Englishman is not that hard to kill.

[robert12345]

Sir,
I would add something:
The .455 was loaded with several different bullets over the course of it's history...

As I recall; one load used an inverted hollow base wad cutter, designed and first used against unruly Africans on the "dark continent."

Another loading used a big flat face fully blunt bullet, used mostly on the Indian Subcontinent,

and lastly a 265 grain pointed bullet.. for shooting the more civilized peoples of Northern Europe.
.
I may not be so far from the truth;
given that it was "The English," who invented a firearm featuring two barrels, ...one barrel shooting round bullets for use against the civilized men of Europe, and the other barrel shooting a square bullet for use against unruly tribal subjects of "the crown.."

Following the logic;
one could reasonably assume that the .455 was loaded with a wide range of bullets, so to put down the varied races, and rather unruly subjects of Queen Victoria's far flung British Empire..
.
A little web search will bring up a wealth of information on the .455 , and photos of the types of ammunition used in that revolver.

[Wayne Smith]

If you are loading a heeled boolit talk to Bernie at Old West Bullet Molds - he modifies the Lee crimp die to close under the boolit and crimp on the heel.

[17nut]

[Der Gebirgsjager]

Humm...But then, as we all know, the average Englishman is not that hard to kill.

Now THAT was funny!

Sir, I would add something:
The .455 was loaded with several different bullets over the course of it's history...

As I recall; one load used an inverted hollow base wad cutter, designed and first used against unruly Africans on the "dark continent."

Another loading used a big flat face fully blunt bullet, used mostly on the Indian Subcontinent,

and lastly a 265 grain pointed bullet.. for shooting the more civilized peoples of Northern Europe.
.
I may not be so far from the truth;
given that it was "The English," who invented a firearm featuring two barrels, ...one barrel shooting round bullets for use against the civilized men of Europe, and the other barrel shooting a square bullet for use against unruly tribal subjects of "the crown"

And THAT was even funnier!

[Cheshire Dave]

This doesn't answer your question about a stab crimp, but I being cheap I feed my S&W Hand ejector with a cheap Lee 255 gr RF mold. It has a nice big flat and I " Beagled" it out to drop .456. I lube with a .458 die I had for my 45-70. I bought Lee dies again because I'm cheap. They work well after I percussion machined the shell holder. I beat on it with a hammer till it worked with the thin rims of the Starline 45 Scoville brass I shortened and thinned the rims on. I chucked the cases in my drill press and thinned from the top with a file with a safe edge. You can be sure I don't want to lose any of that brass. My S&W has 1" chambers so I trimmed to .990. Guess it's more of a 455 Eley or Colt then Webly. Very fun gun to shoot. Hope this helps other Cheap Webly shooters.

[eagle27]

I made cases for my 455 Webley as robert 12345 has outlined above. Simple task in a small lathe and no other work needed on the cases other than thinning the rims and cutting to length. I cast 250grain Lyman bullets using Lyman 45 Auto dies, the bullet seating die has a crimp function and used the case mouth flaring die when loading cast. The auto dies work perfectly.

Loaded rounds for the 455 Webley, cases made from 45 Colt, 250 grain Lyman cast, loaded in 45 Auto dies.

[Bigslug]

I can only imagine that such a crimp, as depicted in the photo 17nut pasted in post # 6, was either a simple matter of typical British belt-and-suspenders overkill to keep the rounds from separating in rough handling or getting contaminated by moisture. Could also be that they did it as part of the same reasoning that they used chamber throats smaller than the bore coupled with hollow base bullets - to help build a little back pressure for complete combustion. You CERTAINLY don't need it on a gun in this caliber to keep recoil from pulling the bullets. . .unless maybe S&W started making a titanium/scandium alloy revolver in .455 Webley nobody told me about.

The Lee die set does a wonderful job of loading MKII round nose bullets from either the RCBS or MP molds, and it makes do with a simple roll crimp - as does the factory Fiocchi MKII load. We're still waiting on the MKIV flat nose group buy production run from MP to be completed ( http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...pper-Group-Buy ). I don't think he's started milling yet, so you might be able to wheedle your way in. That's probably as close as we are going to get to the MKIII Manstopper without buying swaging equipment and custom dies.

And for the benefit of readers who have not heard, Starline just recently did a run of .455 MKII brass for us. https://www.starlinebrass.com/brass-...5-Webley-MKII/ As a result, I am now feeling the warm and fuzzy glow of the Set-For-Life.

[Outpost75]

Yeah, I want one of those scandium .455 bulldogs on the miniature Webley-Fosberry frame with the optional Webley-Pryce folding bayonet!!!!