Taurus Judge, Oversize Throats

[Down South]

I bought a Taurus Judge a couple years ago. The main reason that I bought it was for a tractor gun to shoot rats with while bush hogging.
Anyway when I first bought it, I shot a couple boxes of different brands of factory 45 Colt ammo through it. The dang thing was key holing at 25 yds. I didn't think much about it at the time since I figured it was poor boolit fit and I really only wanted it for 410 shot shells. I always thought that I could cast a boolit that would work well if I wanted to and planned on doing just that some day. Well, today was the day. The first thing that I did was measure the cylinder throats and slug the barrel.
What I found sort of blew my mind. The throats measured +-.464", yes .464". That is not a typo. I used pin gauges to measure the throats with. I even took my micrometer and measured the pin gauge to make sure it was correct.
The bore slugged right at .452" which is good. The problem is that the Throats are .012" larger than the bore.
The Judge has long throats so a boolit sized correctly for the bore would have to rattle its way down the throats to the forcing cone. If the boolit obturated to the throat it would be at least .010” too large when it comes into contact with the forcing cone. I could see a real problem here.

I was wondering if any of you folks that have a Judge have measured the throats and what that measurement is.

I'm also going to contact Taurus about this and see what they have to say.

[Deadeye]

I ran into the same key holing issue with a Bond Arms Snake Slayer .45/.410 Derringer. The chamber/throat dimensions of your Judge have to be that big to shoot .410 shells (If you don't believe me, get your calipers out & measure a .410 shell). A .452 bullet has to wobble thru an inch+ of that oversized chamber before it enters the barrel.

My solution (a hollow base WC would probably also work):http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=75976

P.S. I haven't tried them yet beyond about 10' but plan a range trip soon. These pistols are designed for close up self defense, 25yds. may be a little too ambitious. Just my 2 cents.

[Down South]

I ran into the same key holing issue with a Bond Arms Snake Slayer .45/.410 Derringer. The chamber/throat dimensions of your Judge have to be that big to shoot .410 shells (If you don't believe me, get your calipers out & measure a .410 shell). A .452 bullet has to wobble thru an inch+ of that oversized chamber before it enters the barrel.

From the little research that I've done if you want to call it that. I remember others having a keyholing problem with these revolvers. Again, I didn't think a lot about it since I believed that a boolit could be made to fit and shoot straight. (that was until I measured the throats)
I do remember a couple threads here or on other forums where some guys were having a hard time extracting 410 shot shell cases. I first thought that it might be due to the brand of shot shell they were using since I never had that problem. Now I'm thinking that their revolvers had tighter cylinder throats than what I do.
I may have to resolve to my original function for the revolver, to shoot shot shells only. I don’t need the Judge for SD or hunting since I have a variety of other revolvers and pistols that are better suited for those purposes.

Like I said in my first post, I will contact Taurus and see what they have to say.

[lathesmith]

Yes, that Lee minie-ball is your best shot at a .45 slug that won't tumble. I would also try the "extended brass" trick if you could, some 303 or 460 or something, just to get rid of some of that freebore. I don't know if that will help, but it seems like it should.

Those Lee's are easy to cast, they are a very slow, one-at-a-time deal, but they make good bullets. I ran mine through a lube-sizer, they measured .453 or so as cast so that is the size die I used, just to lube them.

Keep us posted on your project, it will be very interesting to see if you can get a non-tumbling load going.

lathesmith

[Down South]

I tried using a piece of S&W 460 brass this morning. I ran it through a 45 Colt sizer about half way then seated a .452" boolit in it (Dummy Load). I measured the OD of the case where the boolit rest in the case and it’s too large to fit into the throat much less have room to expand enough to release the boolit. The only way to get around this would be to ream the throats up to where the 460 brass would stop at. That may be an option that would work but there is still some room to travel to the forcing cone.

This may be a project that I will pursue. I may look into other brass options if there are any out there. Hmmmmm, 444 Marlin comes to mind. A reamer job and some fire formed 444’s just might work. I don’t remember the length of 444 brass but,
I’ll look it up. Just a thought, I ain’t looked at a manual to check any kind of sizing. 444 brass may or may not work.

Yes, that Lee minie-ball is your best shot at a .45 slug that won't tumble. I would also try the "extended brass" trick if you could, some 303 or 460 or something, just to get rid of some of that freebore. I don't know if that will help, but it seems like it should.

Those Lee's are easy to cast, they are a very slow, one-at-a-time deal, but they make good bullets. I ran mine through a lube-sizer, they measured .453 or so as cast so that is the size die I used, just to lube them.

Keep us posted on your project, it will be very interesting to see if you can get a non-tumbling load going.

lathesmith

[bayhawk2]

I tried casting for my Judge.It has a 6 1/2 " barrel.Leading was bad at the chamber.Not good.
Jacketed bullets worked o.k...Not bad on groups.I,like you,never intended to shoot
the Judge with .45 ammo...I just tried it and was very disappointed.
With that said,I use the Federal .410 - 000 buckshot handgun loads in my Judge
with excellent results.At 10 yards it just leaves 4 very compact holes grouping about the size
of a tennis ball.It really doesn't start to come apart until after 20 yards.Don't get me wrong.At first I thought it was a big mistake.Groups sucked.Then came along this round and
what a turn around!Thank you Federal!Another good round for snakes and such
is the Remington .410 long range #6's.Tried all others and these were the best.
Had a guy tell me once that a .410 will only leave a superficial wound.Especially with a short barrel.Showed him this.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgxuAUajH8w
He still didn't accept it.Whatever.

[NickSS]

I do not own a Judge and probably never will but I do own a 45 Colt/410 barrel for my H&R handy rifle that I have experimented with. I have put iron sights on the barrel that comes only with a shotgun bead. This barrel with the choke tube inserted shoots 410 shot shells very well but as for 45 Colts you can forget about it. The jump between the shell and the case is just too long. What I ended up doing is make brass by blowing out 303 British brass after annealing it and loading bullets sized to .454. I get acceptable accuracy with them but you need to remove the choke to shoot them.

[Bass Ackward]

Lots of options. For my Uncle, I just mold 20-1 at .456 and use an upside down GC to help keep the lube on the bullet.

9 gr of Unique with a 250 gets him 3" - 4" groups off hand at 15 to 20 yards. No tumbling and leading (none in the bore) that is manageable. Just use some regular lube and LLA on top.

Quite surprising actually. My next go was going to be a 410. shot cup (just the base) if the check hadn't worked. I didn't have any to try and he is happy so ...................

[Bret4207]

No offense, but did anyone really expect a handgun/shotgun that only uses a rifled barrel to avoid Federal Law to be all that accurate? It's a shotgun guys. It's designed around the 410 not the 45.

[Down South]

Wow, this thread got woke up from the dead. I actually put the project on a back burner. I may take it back up sometime soon. I tried to chamber .454 Casuall and .460 brass but the throats are very deep and the chambers will not accept brass much longer than the 45 Colt. I do wish that someone else with a Judge would measure the throats just to see what they are.
Another note, My Judge is one of the older 2-1/2". The newer Judges will accept a 3" shot shell.
As mentioned in my first post, I bought the Judge for shooting shot shells. It's my tractor gun for shooting rats and an occasional rabbit with when I'm bush hogging.
The .45 part of it was never a big issue with me but since it would shoot .45's I thought that I would give it a try. I don't have a Lee minie-ball mould but I do wish that I had a few Lee minie-balls to try.

[kweidner]

i will measure mine when i get home....I have the 2.5 as well in an ultra light.......tried some 250rn back when i first got it. ran into the same thing. not keyholes mind you but BAD lead in cone. i benched it as well to work on some of my other projects.....This gets me thinking.........i wonder if there would be a way to run a sabot? kind of like a Muzzle loader.........would it work? or what about brass shotgunshells loaded with the boolit?

[NVScouter]

I load for my Dad'sJudge and found 2 things:

1) Do not attempt to load under a 250g boolit. The Judge needs all the bearing surface it can get.

2) Dont expect much past 50yards. If I had a nice Hollow base mould I think it would do better. You can get some swaged ones that should do nicely.

[lathesmith]

I might point out here, for those of you who want to try some Hollow base boolits, they won't necessarily offer much of an improvement with just any old powder. According to some of the guys who play with these for their oversized throat/barrel black-powder era revolvers, black powder will actually give you the best results with hollow-base slugs. Try finding some posts about this by HarryO and others, they have done a lot of research with these, and will probably save you a lot of time and effort concerning what works and what won't. No use re-inventing the wheel!

lathesmith

[Sprue]

Well just trade it in for a S&W "Governor" when they hit the shelves.

[MtGun44]

I think Bret has the gouge on this one. IT'S A SHOTGUN!

My guess is that a throat that would work well for .45 LC would be dangerous with
a .410 load. Guess only.

I wonder what they actually state in the specs, probably something like
"Also can fire .45 Colt ammunition", I'd bet. It CAN fire it, apparently just not
accurately. Across the bedroom, a sideways 250gr .45 boolit would probably
be pretty darned effective, and accurate enough.

Good luck guys. Handy to carry around little .410 shotgun.

Bill

[Phat Man Mike]

got the 3 inch cyl 3 inch barrel one! out to 10 or so yards it's great . but after that it's tumble city! bought it for what it was made for S/D or carry while hunting for a back up good luck with trying to get 2 inch groups at 50 yards.

[bjeffv]

A buddies judge actually had the cylinder slide out/not lock up on him after he had shot about 200 rounds through the thing. He sent it in to be fixed, 50 rounds later it broke again. Anyone else have issues like this after shooting it more than a couple hundred times? (no reloads used in this gun either)

[Down South]

No, but I just don't shoot mine that much. I would say it has had 300-400 rounds, combination 45's and 410 shotsheels through it.