270 Ren cast bullets

[Jim S]

I have a 270 Ren barrel , 10" TC , on the way to me and I would like to find a cast bullet load for it. I had a 10" 270 ren in the past and tried a plain base 90 RN , from a friends mold, but did not get good results, poor groups with everything I tried. Has anyone out there tried a 85-100 gr cast .278 bullet out of a Ren?
I would also like to but some cast bulltes in the size range I mentioned if you know any one who cast them thanks . Jim

[felix]

Jim, check out the twist in that barrel, and that will help decide on the velocity you will need to hold for any cast projectile. Some of these 277 barrels for the TC came out with a 7 twist years ago! That would be a condom use barrel only for any power shooting. ... felix

[Johnch]

I had a early TC 270 REN barrel ( First run I think )
I tryed every cast bullet I could find and the only one I could get to group at all was a strait lino 150 gr GC bullet .

So I stuck with jacketed

I sucked at feild pistol so I sold the barrel

Johnch

[Jim S]

Felix I'm apparently not thinking well tonight ? Condom use barrel? What do you mean, not used to the terms in reference to a gun barrel?

[45nut]

Felix I'm apparently not thinking well tonight ? Condom use barrel? What do you mean, not used to the terms in reference to a gun barrel?

Ahh,the "condom" as referred to here is "projectile full length gas checks".
Otherwise known as "jacketed bullets"

Some gun barrels are full of trouble when you approach them with cast boolits,the twist may be too fast and the boolit simply rides across the rifling for instance. The 6.5-55 Swede "Karlina" is a potent number and quite accurate within the fps threshold,you push past 16-1700fps and certainly you will have issues according to the history that has been purchased here by many.

Another troublesome occurance is rough bore surfaces,that tidbit will be poked at by another I am sure.

As usual,I have more thoughts than words at this point. I defer you to the regular vocal locals.

[Jim S]

Cute way to describe jacketed bullets. I have a couple of TC barrels that I thought would be great with cast bullets but just will not shoot them worth a damn. I have had slower twist .308 barrels 1:14 30 carbine that shot cast like a champ. My current 1:10 doesn't shoot them above OK , not good. I have a 25/20 that I thought would be the cast bullet barrel with 85 PBFN also just so-so . I have a 1:9 twist 25/35 barrel that shoots the same bullet just great? A friend uses 100 GC in his 25/20 and they will shoot under 1" at 100 yards. barrels can be VERY tempermental in what they like!I would like to either try some of my 100 grain .258's or get soem 65 gr .258's and see which way the thing goes. Currently 11.5/H4227/85PB shoots arround 1.5" at 50 yards but nothing else will. Thanks for the info. Jim

[Jim S]

Well I picked up a Lyman 280473 on E-bay reasonable. I'll see how it works . The 1:10 barrel should spin it enough to stablize so it will be finding the right powder , probably H110 or AA1680. Little gun may be good but don't ahev any data on it except it is about 5% slower than H110.

[Leftoverdj]

Jim, what's the twist on that .25-20 barrel? My ancient slow twist Savage 23 just loves cast bullets. It's a rare load that won't give 1"-1 1/4" 50 yard groups, and some do a lot better. My current pet is 11 grains of WC 680 under the 79 grain group buy GC bullet. It was promising at .259 with Liquid Alox, and seems to be doing even better at .258 with Felix.

[35remington]

Jim, I've been working with a T/C Custom Shop barrel in .25-20 for the last four years. It's been an interesting time getting it to shoot lead. If it's a Custom shop barrel it should be 1-10 twist. A technician told me all their .25's are 1-10, no matter the caliber.

Some modifications might be in order to get T/C barrels to shoot lead.

That, and one hell of a lot of persistence.

[Jim S]

My 25/20 barrel is from a run of 50 that Ed had made up so they would be legal for NRA silhoutte. The barrels are "facotry limited production" . I was told by another silho shooter that they came out of the custom shop. My 25/20 is a 1:10 and I wanted to be able to shoot the 85 PN RN/FN commerical bullet for small game and short range silhoutte. I have been up and down the scale on powders with the 85 gr from 2.5BE to 12.0 Reloader #7.I have a friend in Washington state that uses a 100gr gass checked bullet and gets good accuracy with a hot load of AA1680, 16.0 if memory serves me correctly, and gets 1600 with the combo. The 12.0/R#7 /Rem 86 JSP will shoot under .5" at 50 yards and does about 1200 so it would be a good short range silhou load. The only cast bullet load that I will even talk about in the 25/20 is 11.5/H4227/85 RNPB. It is a usable load , accuracy is OK but nothing to write home about. I picked up 1000 Remiington 87 PHP's cheap so I will try them.The barrel will shoot with jacketed bullets but will only give so-so cast bullet accuracy with the 85 grain. I guess I can use Lary's recipe with the 100 grain bullets for Silhou but that is not what I bought the barrel for.I have wanted to try the 65 GC to see if they would work but do not access to any at this point and time.
Now my 25/35 is a different story all together. It shoots the 85 PB with 11.5/4759 very well , good small game very accurate about 1250 fPS. THe 25/35 also shoots a 100 GC just great and it is a very early flat lug 1:9 twist barrel.
Another good friend talked about his different calibers and how he spends most of his time with a caliber that dosn't shoot well and the god shooters just get a load worked up and put away.I guess we just like the challange.

[35remington]

Jim, first off, you need to discontinue the H4227 load if you're truly using 11.5 grains of it under the 85 bullet in the .25-20. It is way too hot, and it may be that you are really slugging up the bullet, which is why it sorta shoots. The T/C has no throat, which is most of the problem. You should be around nine to nine and a half max with the 85 bullet. Since it's a plainbase, in an ideal world it should shoot only at 1500 or less, and you're way, way past that. I would guess that charge is shooting the 85 at 2200 or more, and needs to be discontinued. GC bullets are needed for high velocity in this barrel. An 85 at 2200 is too hot for the 25-20, GC'd or not.

My .25-20 barrel is (was) identical to yours, and the only loads it would originally shoot were very light charges of shotgun powders under plainbase bullets. This was not spectacular, averaging around 1.5 inches at 50 with the best loads. Bullets shot somewhat better, I think, because they obturated to fit the chamber before being guided into the barrel, but increasing the charge overdoes it, and accuracy falls off again. This was expecially true when I used the RCBS 85 without lubricant in the grooves. It would slug up and eliminate the lube grooves, and accuracy was OK as a result, but still not all that good. Slower powders that did not bump up the bullet shot horribly. The Lyman 257420 GC would not shoot at all when cast of linotype at low or standard speeds, and only as well as the plainbase bullet at higher speeds. When cast of softer mixes it would not shoot period.

The combination of overlarge chamber neck and no throat whatsoever make this .25-20 custom shop barrel an extreme challenge to get to shoot lead. This proved to be so much of a bother that I throated it. All was not roses, though, because I had to relearn some things after doing so.

Up to this point I can say that I've tried almost everything, and some things work. Most don't, and the .25-20 barrel is extremely velocity sensitive, most especially with the shotgun powders, even after being throated. That is, charges a few tenths of a grain below or above optimum make the accuracy fall off. Slower powders are much more forgiving in this regard. After throating, the rifle shoots hi-vel loads using 4198, Lil'Gun, and RL7 very well.

DJ's comments about the Lee group buy 25-20 GC he helped bring to us are the same sort of good results I've been having with it, but sad to say, your rifle may not respond well to even a good cast bullet design. What are you willing to do to get the barrel to shoot lead? Send me a PM about the .25-20 barrel; I've got more to say. I've cluttered up the board with this post enough already.

[Jim S]

Send me an e-mail to jwstacy214@yahoo.com and we can talk about the 25/20. My barrel is a 10" bullTC that Ed had 50 made up. I am amazed at the velocity that you say the 85 gr is doing? I'm pretty sure it is not going that fast out of a 10" TC barrel ? Please don't be offended at the comment. I have not chronographed these loads but I will , I would be real surprised if they were going over 1250-1350 range from my barrel. I have shot BE ,Unique ,Blue Dot, HS-7,2400 and AA1680 out of my barrel with the 85 PB and like you said it is fussy , more so than a 22 Hornet even.
I do have a friend in Washington state who has a 24" 25/20 TC barrel and he also has had very lack luster results out of his barrel, except for the AA1680/100 gr load.

[35remington]

Jim, let's keep the texting on this board so we don't have to shuttle between here and our email accounts. Check the upper right hand corner of your screen; it will show that you have a private message waiting. Respond via the same route, and we should get a good discussion going.

John