Hard or soft cast in 44 mag / spl?

[atr]

just beginning to cast and load for a recently purchased Ruger 44 mag.

Never having cast or loaded for this cartridge I am wondering about casting hard or soft....for velocities between 950 and 1500 fps using the 429421 keith type plain based. Powders would be Unique and 2400
any and all thoughts would be appreciated

thanks
atr

[MT Gianni]

Hard cast should work @ velocities over 2200 fps. I have never pushed a 44 that fast. Soft cast, bhn 12 or ww works best for all others I have used, especially in the 44 special.

[Rick R]

I'm new to this too, so far I've had the best luck with water quenched wheel weight 429421 boolits and 2400 out of my new 4 5/8" SBH. I tried air cooled with Unique and got poor accuracy and worse leading. My Lyman mold throws .428-.429ish bullets and apparently harder is gooder for that combo. ;)

With the WQ bullets and 2400 my groups are under 2" at 25 yards and cleaning is a breeze.

Next up is try the air cooled again using 2400 and see if it was the soft boolit or the Unique or both causing my problems. I may also send the mold out to be opened up.

HTH, I look forward to learning a bunch more. :D

[Lefty SRH]

just beginning to cast and load for a recently purchased Ruger 44 mag.

Never having cast or loaded for this cartridge I am wondering about casting hard or soft....for velocities between 950 and 1500 fps using the 429421 keith type plain based. Powders would be Unique and 2400
any and all thoughts would be appreciated

thanks
atr

You should slug your barrel so you know what size your bore is, hopefully .429". Next you should measure the cylinder throats of the gun, hopefully they are .001"-.002" larger than the bore. That makes them .430-.431 ideally.
Try and find a mold that will drop close to your throat size and ideally a little over.
Size your casted boolits to match the size of the cylinder throats.
Alloy does play a role in leading but I believe propper boolit size is more critical!

My personal Ruger SRH .44mag doesn't lead one bit. I regularly push a 260gr Keith boolit (RCBS 250-K mold) at 1430fps. I have shot both 18BHN alloy boolits which is on the hard alloy side and I have shot air cooled WW alloy (my casted Keith boolits) at the same speed, same load with BETTER accuracy than the commercial Keiths, STILL no leading.

[Lefty SRH]

I'm new to this too, so far I've had the best luck with water quenched wheel weight 429421 boolits and 2400 out of my new 4 5/8" SBH. I tried air cooled with Unique and got poor accuracy and worse leading. My Lyman mold throws .428-.429ish bullets and apparently harder is gooder for that combo. ;)

With the WQ bullets and 2400 my groups are under 2" at 25 yards and cleaning is a breeze.

Next up is try the air cooled again using 2400 and see if it was the soft boolit or the Unique or both causing my problems. I may also send the mold out to be opened up.

HTH, I look forward to learning a bunch more. :D


Your Lyman mold seems to be dropping small. Have you tried any TIN the your alloy mix to get them to fill out a little more and maybe at the same time bumping the diameter up? A .428" cast boolit is smaller than a store bought jacketed bullet. I would guess thats where your leading is coming from.

[jwp475]

Hard cast should work @ velocities over 2200 fps. I have never pushed a 44 that fast. Soft cast, bhn 12 or ww works best for all others I have used, especially in the 44 special.



IMHO & E hard cast work perfectly in revolvers and long as the cast bullet are of the same of the cylinder leads & bore diameter or larger. A bullet of 20 to 24 is very accurate and IME more so than bhn 12 or so

Not saying that 12bhn is inaccurate just that harder is more so as long as they are of proper size.

[Snapping Twig]

I've been making 44's since the early 80's.

Straight wheel weights, air cooled - nothing special. Sized and lubed, they should be dropped through the cylinder and need to be forced out to pass through. If they drop straight through, they are too small.

Slugging the bore is good, but until then you can use this method for fit and if it doesn't lead, you're good to go. Typically this is all you'll need to do.

Move 'em as fast or as slow as you like.

Check out White Label Lube for fantastic and inexpensive lubes, you won't be sorry.

[Silver Jack Hammer]

I shoot the RCBS 44-250-K at just under 1200 out of my SBH 7 ½”. My 44-250-K drop diameter is .433” and I re-size to .431”. Wheelweights don’t give me much better than 4 to 5 inch groups at 25 yards. I lube with Alox. Heat treating wheelweights at 450 degrees for 30 minutes then dumping them in cold water tightens the groups down to 4 to 5 inches at 100 yards. Probably better if I mounted a scope. Re-size before heat treating the lube afterwards.

I get equal quality high from casting straight linotype as I do heat treated wheelweights.
Get a 3 ring binder and keep good records of what you have constructed and how they do at the range.

I’m off to the range with my SBH right now.

For powders I use Blue Dot, 2400 and am shooting mostly Unique right now.

[429421Cowboy]

Your Lyman mold seems to be dropping small.... A .428" cast boolit is smaller than a store bought jacketed bullet. I would guess thats where your leading is coming from.

That was my initial thought, maybet the Unique wasn't enough uoomf to obturbate the boolit a bit to get a better fit when it hit the rifling?

[Markbo]

I'm new to this too, so far I've had the best luck with water quenched wheel weight 429421 boolits and 2400 out of my new 4 5/8" SBH. I tried air cooled with Unique and got poor accuracy and worse leading. My Lyman mold throws .428-.429ish bullets and apparently harder is gooder for that combo. ;)

With the WQ bullets and 2400 my groups are under 2" at 25 yards and cleaning is a breeze.

Next up is try the air cooled again using 2400 and see if it was the soft boolit or the Unique or both causing my problems. I may also send the mold out to be opened up.

HTH, I look forward to learning a bunch more. :D

Have you ever tested the hardness of these?

[Rick R]

Markbo,

I've only use the thumbnail test. The air cooled can be scratched with a nail using a bit of force, the water quenched are too hard to scratch with thumbnail.

Still getting started and haven't purchased a lot of the casting paraphernalia. :)

[Frank]

RickR:

I've only use the thumbnail test. The air cooled can be scratched with a nail using a bit of force, the water quenched are too hard to scratch with thumbnail.
If it comes off with your fingernail, what do you think is going to happen when it hits the rifling? Soft is nothing more than a putty plug. Putty plugs will group at 25 yards. But so do round balls that don't go through any rifling. :brokenima

[462]

This works for me: Air-cooled wheel weights sized .001" larger than cylinder throats, and various amounts of 2400. Mr. Keith's boolits were softer.

[Frank]

462:

This works for me: Air-cooled wheel weights sized .001" larger than cylinder throats, and various amounts of 2400. Mr. Keith's boolits were softer.
What kind of yardage?

[462]

462:

What kind of yardage?

My shooting skills are nowhere near those of countless forum members, but I can hit the 300-yard gong (12" X 18") with enough regularity to keep me excited. The gun is a box-stock, 6 1/2" S&W Model 624.

[44man]

You really can shoot a lot of alloys pretty good and without leading.
I go harder for accuracy because soft gives me too many fliers. Many times I will have 3 shots touching but there are always a few way out and I am not one to not count them or shoot one chamber. Those out were shot after all so they can't be ignored like some gun writers do, just count the best. Not to be, my guns have 5 or 6 chambers and all count.
I water drop WW boolits for normal shooting but for extreme accuracy I add some antimony and tin.
The Keith came around at 28 to 30 BHN. Some of my calibers will not shoot a Keith style at all.
If you think bumping a small boolit will aid accuracy, not to be! Any boolit bumped has lost integrity, shape, skid stop and alignment.
Some guns will actually shoot a hunk of lead wire, mine like boolits as cast.

[mdi]

I cast for my .44s for mebbe 9 years, successfully, before I started looking at BHN numbers. I use wheel weight alloy, air cooled and fit the bullets to the gun (my Ruger SBH and S&W 629 like .431", my Dan Wesson likes .430", depending on cylinder throat measurements, my Contender likes .430", and my over-bore Puma needs .432"). I might add the bullet design makes a difference too. My .44 Lee T/L bullet, WW alloy, air cooled, is shot unsized with 45-45-10. My Ranch Dog mold drops bullets at .432" and shoots well in all my .44s. My favorite though is an old Ideal 429421 plain base sized to each gun...

For starters, to get used to casting I'd suggest a 240 gr. Lee SWC T/L 2 cavity, and tumble lubing with xlox or 45-45-10. Won't be long before you try different molds and lubes though...

[Frank]

462:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frank
462:

What kind of yardage?
My shooting skills are nowhere near those of countless forum members, but I can hit the 300-yard gong (12" X 18") with enough regularity to keep me excited. The gun is a box-stock, 6 1/2" S&W Model 624.

Thanks. I try to save my WW's and use a mix of range lead and water drop. That way I get both hardness and bullet that is low in Sb.

[atr]

thanks guys,,,I am getting the picture...
as soon a I have some range results I will let you all know
atr

[MtGun44]

+1 on 462.

AC WWts, Unique, H110 or 2400, Keith or LBT PB designs. GC are unnecessary, as is extreme
hardness. IME, neither hurts but neither helps and are more expense or effort for the
same results.

Bill

[sixshot]

I shoot them as soft as I can get away with but hardness has to go up as velocity goes up. Bullet fit is #1, hardness is #2. The term "hard cast" should have never been dreamed up because its caused a lot of people a lot of grief.
Elmer didn't shoot hard cast, his slugs were quite soft compared to todays standards.

Dick

[MtGun44]

I'd put hardness far below #2, behind design, lube and powder, at least.

For pistols, it approaches irrelevance by itself if all else is correct, IME.

Bill

[jwp475]

i shoot them as soft as i can get away with but hardness has to go up as velocity goes up. Bullet fit is #1, hardness is #2. The term "hard cast" should have never been dreamed up because its caused a lot of people a lot of grief.
Elmer didn't shoot hard cast, his slugs were quite soft compared to todays standards.

Dick



+1...............

[Lloyd Smale]

I agree totaly!!
IMHO & E hard cast work perfectly in revolvers and long as the cast bullet are of the same of the cylinder leads & bore diameter or larger. A bullet of 20 to 24 is very accurate and IME more so than bhn 12 or so

Not saying that 12bhn is inaccurate just that harder is more so as long as they are of proper size.

[Lloyd Smale]

another correct answer. this is about amazing! everyone is agreeing today!!
You really can shoot a lot of alloys pretty good and without leading.
I go harder for accuracy because soft gives me too many fliers. Many times I will have 3 shots touching but there are always a few way out and I am not one to not count them or shoot one chamber. Those out were shot after all so they can't be ignored like some gun writers do, just count the best. Not to be, my guns have 5 or 6 chambers and all count.
I water drop WW boolits for normal shooting but for extreme accuracy I add some antimony and tin.
The Keith came around at 28 to 30 BHN. Some of my calibers will not shoot a Keith style at all.
If you think bumping a small boolit will aid accuracy, not to be! Any boolit bumped has lost integrity, shape, skid stop and alignment.
Some guns will actually shoot a hunk of lead wire, mine like boolits as cast.

[Markbo]

LLoyd, Dick, Bill... what do ya'll use for lube?

[MtGun44]

NRA 50-50 or LBT soft blue, or a special mix that I got from .357 Maximum.

Bill