.44 mag whitetail pistol hunting

[NorthMoccasin]

I Agree with outpost 100%. 44-40 or 44 special with 200 to 220 gr at 900 to 1200 fs is plenty for any deer. I have also shot some with a 180gr 38-40. In my 44s i have settled on the Lyman 429215 hp cast of 95/2.5/2.5 alloy. It expands well and penetrates clear through on broadside shots.

[Three44s]

Well, I am not a deer hunter but I have been into the 44 and revolvers since the mid to late 90’s.

I have the Lee 310 mold and for the cost of the mold it is a dandy but I also believe it is serious over kill for deer or someone new to the cartridge. For a new to cartridge shooter a 310 gr bullet at any reasonable velocity is brutal. I like the dual crimp groove that boolit and seat my Ruger Redhawk loads in the rear groove and stoke the case with a full charge of H110. I consider it more of a bear load.

If I were going to hunt deer with one of my maggy 44s I would chose the RCBS 250K. It is plain based and weighs 255 - 260 gr. It is a great boolit and is IMO closer to a true Kieth than several other choices such as later variants of the Lyman 429421. Elmer Keith was very upset with Lyman when they failed to heed his objections as they gradually morphed away from his design. RCBS was handed original drawings and lobbied by some influential shooters to produce a mold and the “250K” is the result. If you have a HG mold of that ilk or a clone (503) then good for you as you are there but in my case I run the RCBS mold plus a Clone in five cavity. Of the two molds I like to cast my serious slugs from the RCBS mold, to my hands there just is not a better brand around.

There is a lot made of flat nose boolits and for good reason as metplat matters but a shooter with a 44 deserves a true Keith in their mold selection. Deer are not made of armor and the fine ranging and accuracy capabilities of a real Keith are just too good to ignore. A heavy boolit in flat nose also kicks the snot out of newbies as well. The RCBS 250k coming at just north of 250 gr. is a good comprise.

Powders

There is a lot made about Unique and to be sure it is an “essential” powder when it comes to truly enjoying a 44 Mag handgun but there are better choices in certain instances. Lots of folks like Universal Clays and I have used it some. It is certainly cleaner but I am not in a position to claim more than that since my experience is limited with it (other than the cleaner burn).

There is another powder that better fills the spot just above where Unique makes sense and that is Hodgdon’s HS6. This powder is a much better choice than Unique around the upper end Unique’s pressure range. If you are looking at turning up the juice on Unique to make a good upper end mid range load, forget that and switch to HS6. Trust me, you will be very pleased.

To get 1000+ FPS with the 250k burning Unique you have to push it and in doing so you are subjecting that boolit to a mid 30K pressure swat on it’s keester. If you want that sort of velocity out of HS6 you are subjecting that same slug to only 24k.

The mid 20k pressure range is just what Richard Lee writes is about optimum for cast boolits made of alloys that expand sufficiently to hunt with.

My experience with HS6 is that it produces fine accuracy and meters like sin from a powder measure. It lights off well with magnum pistol primers and while is not clean by many shooters it is about average amonst the cross section of magnum powders for large bore revolver cartridges.

My experience is that if you are looking for hunting performance from large bore revolvers and can not tolerate some cleaning chores to gun and fired casings you need to trade off those guns and find another hobby, it is just that simple.

My favorite load with a Keith bullet and HS6 is the 250k in a 44 Mag case charged at 11.8 gr. and in my case lit off with the Federal 155 Mag primer. I trim my cases to a uniform length and debur the inside of the flasholes and then crimp with a Lee carbide crimp die. In calibers where I have the Redding profile crimp die .... all the better.

The above load gives me 1066 FPS out of my 4” Mountain gun with just 7 FPS standard deviation and accuracy to swoon over. In my 7.5” Redhawk my velocity jumps to 1176 FPS with 15 FPS standard deviation.

I do use and favor Alliant’s 2400 very much and there I run 20.5 gr with a standard primer. Do not use a magnum primer with 2400 at the upper charge levels as they spike pressures. I do switch to Mag if I am dropping the 2400 charge to around 17.5 gr however.

It has been my experience that the boolits heavier that 260 gr require a powder slower than 2400 to really shine. That is where powders like H110 and WW296 take over.

The problem is that recoil is generally more than a unseasoned large revolver shooter can handle.

That is why I suggest looking at a medium heavy boolit like the 250k and a upper medium powder such as HS6 (or possibly 2400 on the heavier end). The recoil impulse from the HS6 load and the 250k boolit is a pleasant surprise, trust me.

Best regards

Three44s