.357 Mag, 358429 and Lil'Gun

[Treeman]

Anyone have results to report? My standard load for 160 grain SWC in a 4inch Ruger SS has been 9.8 grains of Blue Dot but I'm thinking about buying some Lil gun for th e175 grain Keith bullet.

[felix]

Stay with the BlueDot in that gun. No reason to spend more money for another 50 fps or so. Cash for the powder, plus more grains per shot for almost nothing. Granted, BlueDot prefers boolits light for the caliber, but your application doesn't require the mostest anyway. Consider strongly the increased recoil as well. ... felix

[slughammer]

I don't know that I have tried Lil-Gun with 358429. I have shot plenty of it with a Group Buy 180gr GC. Great powder for the heavies in 357. My shooting is from an 18" Marlin though.

From a 4" revolver it is going to be a fun ride when you feel like shooting a magnum. I would use it, but not without muffs.

[fecmech]

Treeman--I loaded 296/h110 and AA9 for years and had good results. When I tried to use them in my Auto Champ progressive they bound up the measure because they were so fine grained. I tried some Blue Dot because of the big fluffy flakes and that cured the binding but I also found an excellent magnum powder. I'm running 1200fps+ in the .357 with 358429 and 1300fps+ in the .44 mag with 429421, both using Blue Dot and getting excellent accuracy to boot. Felix is right, you won't gain much speed but you will burn a lot more powder with Lil Gun or any of the similar ball powders. Good luck Nick

[TCLouis]

Wanta post a hint of what BD load is providing that performance in the 44 and 357.

[GP100man]

treeman

i tried lil gun under lees 158 rnfp & the lil gun likes a full house to burn good,
no flexability at all.
the loads that worked well where between16.5 gr. & 17.5gr&stripping lead.
any lower & igot smoked cases & very inconsistent ing. using std or mag primers

its a finiky powder to me in 357mag& very touchy in 44 mag , on the hi end it will get very spiky!

GP


:castmine:

[fecmech]

Wanta post a hint of what BD load is providing that performance in the 44 and 357.

Sure TC happy to. 10.0/ Blue Dot and the 358429 gives 1231 fps avg. (56 es/16 sd) out of my Ruger 6" GP100, this is a max load per Lyman cast bullet handbook. In the .44 mag I use 18.0 Blue Dot(also close to max in Lyman manual) for 1363 fps (47fps es/14 fps sd.) thats out of a 7 1/2" Ruger SBH. Both loads will group 6 shots under 3" at 50 yds.
I've also found Blue Dot to be an excellent powder in the 9mm for max loads with cast bullets, minimal leading and good accuracy. That Auto Champ powder measure made me try something that I would not have normally tried.