Playing with the 40 calibers...

[Magnum Wheel Man]

Started out by getting a custom 401 Powermag cylinder made for my Buckeye Blackhawk... hmmm... where do you get 401 cases...

bought some new Starline 41 Magnum cases, machined about .010" off the solid case head just above the rim, swaged cases in a carbide 10 mm Die... had my machinist buddy make me a hardened steel die for forming, that gets the bottom of the case straight... had my buddy make me a tool to knurl & flatten the case head to remove the 41 Magnum headstamp... trim to length, & I was good, as my chambers are not recessed, so I can leave the 41 Magnum rim untouched...

then I had Dave Clements & Michael Gouse work on my 1st revolver I ever purchased ( a 4" Stainless GP-100 in 357 Magnum ) now an engraved 3" barrel in custom 10mm Rimmed chambering... which required breaking out my old tooling, & & buying some Starline 41 Special cases...

a couple pics if this works









Knurling & flattening produces this pattern on the case head



& the 10mm Rimmed Ruger GP-100

[Magnum Wheel Man]

Couple of the custom Buckeye cylinders ( also load for 10 mm Magnum )



Buckeye Burl grips on the Buckeye

[3leggedturtle]

Wow I never seen such a great looking GP100 as that! Todd/3leg

[Magnum Wheel Man]

Thank you... Dave Clements did the conversion, barrel shortening & slab sided the barrel, & some action work Michael Gouse did the engraving, the grips are new Ruger Compact GP-100 rubber grips, the inserts are Dall Sheep made by Zane at Lone Star Custom Grips... the Holster is a Simply Rugged Gator Skin Pancake

[Magnum Wheel Man]

I don't have any pictures, but the target is shot with 180 grain lead RNFP 38-40 bullets... still making cases, but have 3 different bullets loads... the HST's some 180 Grain XTP's & the Lead 38-40 bullets

[3leggedturtle]

The Dall Sheep grips look darn near good as Ivory. Had a guy bring in both Elephant and Walrus tusk in. All i could think about was how many grips could be made out if them. Older i get the mire I like the shirt barreled revolvers with medium loads. Todd/3leg

[AntiqueSledMan]

Hello Wheel Man,

It's nice to see someone with an obsession for the old Power Mag, Herter's was ahead of the times.
I always thought it would make a good lever round.
Being from Minnesota, I must admit back in the day a lot of us didn't really think much of them,
but I never made it down to Waseca to walk through his main store.
I can remember paging through the catalog's, man they had everything.
I've heard gunsmith's claim Herter's stocks were the best, to bad you can't still order them.
I have quite a barrage of Herter's Dies on my bench, 2nd to none. George Herters claims weren't that far from the truth.
I can remember seeing the 401 cartridges stacked up for sale at different times.
Your doing a fine job at keeping it alive, I really like how you re-work the head stamp.
And for those of you wondering, Yes I do have one Herters Snowmobile in the bunch.

Keep up the good work, AntiqueSledMan.

[Wayne Smith]

Wasn't the original 401 PowerMag made by cutting down 30-o6/308 brass? Yours looks good and I'll bet it works well.

[Magnum Wheel Man]

Thanks guys... I only live about a half hour from where the main store was, & while I've seen the catalogs... I wasn't of gun buying age when Herters was in their "hay days"... you still see one of the big German made ( Sauer & Sons I think ) Herters single actions for sale on Gun Broker now & then... I'm quite happy with the custom Blackhawk cylinder for my Buckeye though...

being this close, I see various Herters stuff show up once in a while... I have some unique things I put on my Gun Show table, but being so close to the ol mother ship, most people will point them out, but not a lot of buyers for those items...

My retired Tool & Die buddy ( I work my brass on his old worn out lathe ) actually worked in the Herters machine shop for several years, back in the day... he remembers when they recalled a bunch of 401 Powermag ammo... it was loaded with too much powder for the dead soft lead bullets they were using... they had to pull them all down, tossed the bullets & powder, & reloaded the cases for resale... so if anyone has old Herters 401 Powermag ammo, you may have cartridges that will lead the guns quite heavily... The cartridge is near identical to the 10mm Magnum ( a cartridge without a gun ) I actually had one of the Automags chambered in 10mm Magnum, which is how I got into the cartridge... had a Contender barrel chambered in 10 Mag as well... also have a S&W 610 chambered in 10mm Magnum, that now shoots 10 Mag, 10 auto, & 40 S&W with the moon clips... Accurate Arms has load data in their load manuals for 10mm Magnum , & that's a good starting place for the 401 Powermag... or reducing 41 Magnum loads by 10-15% to allow for the slight caliber restriction...

[blackbahart]

georgous Ruger and very tastefully engraved !!!
can not own one in that barrel length in Canada -under 4.2" is a prohib
Actually did up a small martini with a 10 mm barrel earlier this year and thought I was inventing a rimmed 10 mm mag LOL,,,Then a member on this site let me know that is how he formed cases for his obsolete 401 power mag
did similar to form cases ,but mine still are head stamped 41 mag

[Magnum Wheel Man]

thank you for the positive comments... there is really not very many "new" or undiscovered things anymore... prime example, is all these "new" AR calibers, that are just renamed Contender cartridges from the 60's