Mold for a 44spl.?

[Shuz]

BD -- You indicated you had several 265g Saeco's in .44 cal. Would you consider a swap for a 2 cav Saeco #439?--Shuz

[Bret4207]

Shuz!!!! Welcome home. Were ya been? Haven't hardly seen anything of you in a while.

[TCLouis]

Harley45
I have an 4 cavity with original square lube groove I will part with for fair price under list.

I am getting shed of some molds and I am loaded with more 44s than I can cast.
Email me or PM and I will quote the price. I have not laid eyes on it for several years, but it is sealed in an ammo can so it should be OK.

LouisB

[BD]

BD -- You indicated you had several 265g Saeco's in .44 cal. Would you consider a swap for a 2 cav Saeco #439?--Shuz

Shuz, someone may have beaten you to the one set up for hand casting. I have to confess I have no idea what the Saeco #439 is?
BD

[harley45]

Thanks for the offers guys but while at the range today a buddy offered me a trade for an ar15 in .45 Automatic and I'm considering doing it

[Shuz]

Shuz!!!! Welcome home. Were ya been? Haven't hardly seen anything of you in a while.

Oh, I been around, I just haven't been around much or posted much. You see I gots a "dial up" system that is super slow, and we live in the boondockels so there ain't much hope for improvements. Besides, I'm a little too frugal(cheap) to spend the big bucks to go satellite etc. I still receive all my TV channels the old way with an outdoor antenna!
Now..... when I go over to my daughter's place in Seattle, I manage to get on quit a bit! She has cable or DSL or sumthin like that.

[Shuz]

Shuz, someone may have beaten you to the one set up for hand casting. I have to confess I have no idea what the Saeco #439 is?
BD

BD--The #439 is a swc gas checked design that weighs about 240g. Last time I checked it was still being offered by Saeco, at least it is in the latest Midway catalog.

[nevada duke]

Well, this is my first time post here, and I am glad to find a bunch of .44 Special fans. I have had two .44 mags, one a Ruger Super Blackhawk, and another a S&W model 29 with 6.5 inch barrel. Back about 1983, 1985, or so, I ordered a S&W model 624, in .44 Special. 4" barrel, square butt and , stainless, it came from J&G down in Arizona. This revolver has been traveling with me for the last 20 or so years, and is all you could want from a sidearm. Most of the time it is sitting on the seat of my truck when traveling the outback of Nevada. Handloading the .44 Special is easy, every thing remotely sane will work. I have put thousands of rounds through this gun, and most of them were in the 6-7 grains of Unique class. But many were put through with a full case full of Winchester 296, when power was needed. The .44 frame S&W revolvers, when equipped with the 4" barrel, fit nicely in the back pocket of a pair of Wranglers. So you don't need a holster and belt if you want to go for a little walk. I've got all the other important handgun calibers, and the .44 Special is the Super Classic in my book. If I ever get down to one handgun, the S&W model 624 will be the one.

I have a much newer .44 Mag. S&W 629-5, and it is very nicely fitted and would be my choice if I wanted to hunt with the .44, but the 44 Special is still my pal.

Regards from Nevada duke.

[9.3X62AL]

I sure enjoy my M-624 x 6-1/2". I haven't tried any of the "full case of 296" loads in my gun, just about all its shooting has been done with "Skeeter's Load" of 7.5 grains of Unique beneath either Lyman #429244 or #429421. These run about 950 FPS.

What kind of velocities do the full case/296 loads achieve?

Good seeing ya here, Duke!

[nevada duke]

Deputy Al, thanks for the welcome back. I realized later that when I started ranting about how much I like the .44 Special, that I didn't answer the original question. My favorite boolit molds for the .44 bore are the Saeco 245 grain SWC of Keith design, and a rounded flat nose gas-check of 250 grains, also by Saeco. The SWC is the number 441, and the FN is the number 431. After holding out for a couple of decades, I have learned that a gas-check design is good to have in this caliber. When you add a Marlin .44 mag. model 94 to the equation, the plain base boolits start to look bad at 1800 fps in the rifle. They are also better than J-word bullets when used to clean leading out of your revolvers, because the gas check really does clean up the rifling. I have tried various lighter boolits, but I keep going back to the 240-250 weights. Lighter boolits require sight adjustments, and I am getting too old to remember to do that with too many guns. The old adage of "beware the man with only one gun, he probably knows how to shoot it", should be amended to "beware the man with one gun and one load, because he REALLY knows how to shoot it".

As to Winchester 296 velocities with the 245 grain SWC, 19 grains with Win. std. primer gives me 1150 fps out of the 4" barrel. Probably 1250-1300 fps out of your 6.5" barrel. No pressure signs or extraction problems, and a great fireball at night. This is a full case load, and that is where W296 works the best. I don't think you can over load any modern S&W .44 with a case full of W296. The extreme spreads of the chrono get smaller and smaller as the case gets fuller and fuller.

Most of my shooting these days however is done with 7 grains of Green Dot at around 900 fps. Green Dot is a GREAT powder for reduced loads in big almost empty cases. Tried it first in the .45 Long Colt, and later in everything up to and including the 45-70. Much better than Unique or Herco as to velocity spreads.

May all of your BB's fly straight, Nevada duke, over and out.

[Bret4207]

Funny, here I am getting away from gas checks after using practically ALL GC boolits and Dukes headed towards them. Thats what I love about this hobby. Always something to learn. Great thread BTW. Fer sure a keeper. I'm gonna print this one.

[nevada duke]

Tpr Bret, I don't think that I am moving towards gas-check bullet designs as much as realizing their worth under certain circumstances. The Marlin Cowboy 1894 with its 24" barrel, pushes a 240-250 grain boolit out the muzzle at right around 1800 fps. with a case full of W296. And my plentiful plain base bullets produce some leading at that velocity. Almost all of my .44 caliber shooting is done with the Saeco 245 grain Keith type boolit with the plain base. It is only in the rifle that the gas-check is an improvement. BUT, the gas-check boolits are IMHO more usefull than J-word bullets, when used to remove leading out of my revolvers. I don't like to use gas-checks and have tried several combinations of wads and lube under the boolit to eliminate them, but some times they work for me better than anything else, at least so far. Experiments continue.

Best regards from Nevada duke.