Shooting 44 Special out of a 44 Magnum lever action

[HollowPoint]

There was a gun show here in Mesa, Arizona today. It was just down the road about a mile and and a half, so I thought I'd go over and look around.

Just more of the same old stuff. More long lines, more want-to-be local polititians trying to get votes and more over priced gun related stuff.

Some of you know that I recently bought a Puma model 92 in the 44 magnum caliber. While I was at the gun show I bought 50 rounds of 44 Special ammo. I wanted to see how it would compare to shooting 44 magnum ammo.

When I got home I stuffed a few rounds in the magazine and tried to cycle the action. I wanted to see if they would feed like the magnum rounds.

Everyone of them would hang up at an odd angle into the chamber. I'm assuming it was because they are shorter cases.
The top of the bullet seemed to hit the top edge of the chamber so as to stop its travel into the chamber.

I was wondering if one of you more experienced lever action guys had experienced the same situation and what did you do to remedy this symptom?

I've already come up with several "Smart-Ass" replies to this question on my own. What I was hoping for was a solution from someone that's been there and done that.

It simple enough to feed them into the chamber one at a time. And I know they'll fire. It would be nice if they'd feed into the chamber without having to fiddle around with them. The 44 magnum rounds feed as smooth as can be.

Is this just one of those things one can expect from a lever action set up like this?

HollowPoint

[RP]

I have found with my 357 and 44 levers that shooting the shorter rounds 38 44 spl that the nose of the bullet has alot to do with the way they feed. A round nose works better for me and a wadcutter is a waste of time. But always the longer rounds work the best. PS iam not a expert just my findings.

[calaverasslim]

You have it figured right. The overall bullet length is the culpert. The Puma 92 is a clone of the Winchester 92 and as such the lifter starts to drop when you start to close the lever. To correct this, try using a long nose bullet in your 44 special cases. My Winchester does the same thing so I ended up loading the 240 SWC or the 250 KSWC which lengthens the overall length of the cartridge. This solved the problem for me. If you don't reload, then your stuck.

I found with my Marlin 44, the length has no bearing on the matter. They all feed just fine

[mike in co]

one of the things i did when i had a feeding issue in my marlin 44 was to double half cycle the gun.
pull down eject, pick up new round, up a little, back down a little and then feed it in.
in my case, the second stroke the round was pretty flat and fed well.

mike in co

[Four Fingers of Death]

Thats interesting, I loaded up a heap of 44 Specials in my Marlin and they worked fine, I must try them in the Rossi. Range day tomorrow, so I'll check it out then.

[HollowPoint]

Thank you gentlmen:

From fiddling around with this Puma I had kind of come to the same conclusions as most of you guys have listed.
If having a slightly longer overall length might solve this symptom, I may only have to wait a little longer for the fix.
I have a Mihec mold coming soon that is sure to be a little longer that the 200 grain 44 Special loads that I'm having problems with. Hopefully that fix will work for me too.
As luck would have it, I am a reloader. After I've shot all these 44 Special rounds I'll be able to do a little experimenting with OAL; regardless of what bullet I use.

I just thought perhaps one of you guys had come up with a alteration of sorts to one of the guns internal components.
For example: slightly increasing the thickness of that lifter-thing about 3/4" back from the front edge.
From cycling the action as slowly as possible and watching the movement of the bullet, it looks as though this is the area where a slight alteration might work as a last resort.
Of course this is only if one decided to shoot only the shorter 44 Special. Such an alteration might foul up the works when shooting the 44 mag..
I think I'll just load them one at a time for now until I can start reloading them; then I'll go from there.

Just out of curiosity, what was the overall lenght of the 44 Special you loaded up? I mean the ones that cycle/feed reliably.

Thanks again everyone.
HollowPoint

[shotman]

You can take a drimal and do a little work on the "feed ramp" which in this case is the top of the chamber. It dont take much. I have win 90 in WRF and the "NEW" hollow points would hang. The little time worked

[RP]

Dont hand feed them just get a pistol problem sloved you can thank me later.

[cajun shooter]

I have two 92's that are different in what they feed. One was done over by Steve Young (the 92 guru) and the other stock. They are both in 45 Colt. The one with the action job will feed 45 Schofield and the stock one will not. The bullet is the RNFP 200 grain that I load for CAS. After I did the action on the stock one it too will feed the shorter round. Before this was done the stock action had a lot of stiff and hard spots in the lever travel. The parts that were modified was the extractor, hammer spring, trigger spring and the bolt and locking lugs were smoothed of all burrs and high spots. The loading gate was also done by lightening the spring. The ejector spring was also changed out with a Wolf spring. The Puma's are good guns and with a little help can be great guns. The RNPF bullet will help also if you are using the SWC bullets.

[HollowPoint]

It's been a little to hot outside today to do anything outdoorsy so, I thought I'd stay in and try to solve my 44 special feeding problem.

I took apart one of the 44 special cartridges I purchased yesterday, then I proceeded to reassemble it with as long an OAL as possible. From the longest to the shortest OAL, at each length change I attempted to cycle the action on my Puma lever action.
No matter the OAL, the shorter 44 special cartridge would not feed properly.

I had some Semi-Waddcutters in 45 caliber so, I resized one of them to .430". I tried them at different OAL's and they fed a little better but, most would hang up on the sharp shoulders of the bullet right at the chamber mouth.
If I turned the rifle sideways when ever I cycled the action these Semi-Waddcutters would feed most of the time.

A while back I purchased a Lyman Devistator bullet mold in 45 caliber. The nose profile of these cast bullets is slightly pointier than the previous two bullets I tried. I had some of these Devistator bullets aready made up so I resized one of them to .430".
Eurika! I tried them at various OAL's and they feed perfectly regardless of the seating depth.

Allthough the shorter length of this cartridge played a major role in the feeding problems I was having, it seems that it was the bullet's profile that would make it hang up of the mouth of the chamber.

This supports every bit of input you guys offered as replies to my initial posts. Well done gentlmen.

As a side benefit for me was that I just learned that I can now resize my .452" Lyman Devistator cast bullets down to .432 and use them as fodder for my 44 special loads.
Out of curiousity I weighed the resized Devistator and it came out as 190.8 grains. These cast bullets generally drop from my mold at 200 grains; give or take a few 10ths.

Now I won't be as tempted to buy another bullet mold for the 44 special loads.
Life is good.

HollowPoint

[JesterGrin_1]

I do not have a PUMA but I do have the Marlin 1894SS in .44 Mag and I have found it will feed the longer AOL rounds as slick as can be. And they are in the 1.610 to what I run now 1.620 or so. And they feed GREAT. When I get down in the 1.55 Range they tend to catch on the case at the mouth of the chamber. So as Mike said I have to chamber them in with two half moves. It does work but it is a pain.

I have to say I feel you are on the right track as from what I read I think you were talking about the 44/444 group buy. As I am also in on this purchase. And since this BOOLIT will have 3 crimp grooves if you wish you can use the Special brass and just space the BOOLIT out or all the way in for the Mag brass and keep your AOL about the same. As my Boolit of choice right now is the Lee 310Gr till I get my hands on the 44/444 GB Mould.

Happy Shooting.