.380 bullet in a .36 Remmie

[Fly]

Has anyone ever tryed a .380 bullet in a .36 cap & ball remmie?I have
a .380 Lee mold & was woundering if that bullet can be used.

My new Remmie should be here tomorrow, but my round ball mold
will be mostly a week.I want to shoot it.Mmmmmmmmmmmmm

Fly:drinks:

[Idaho Sharpshooter]

mike your cylinders first. My RB are .005" oversize. They cut just the slightest ring, and I haven't had a chainfire yet. Y-E-T...

Rich

[Fly]

mike your cylinders first. My RB are .005" oversize. They cut just the slightest ring, and I haven't had a chainfire yet. Y-E-T...

Rich

Yea that's what I planned to do, but I wondered if anyone else had tryed
a .380 bullet in one.
Fly:cbpour:

[mooman76]

Sounds like allot to size with that little hand lever. It's one thing for a roundball that has lots of room to smash the lead into shape. I believe Lee makes a conical bullet mould for the .36.

[Hellgate]

It is no problem at all. I use .380s whenever I shoot my Euroarms 36 Remmies. They have beveled chamber mouths so the balls get swaged down. No problem. I just wouldn't cast the .380s from hard lead. Keep it soft and no big deal. LEE makes a double cavity RB mold that is just fine. Also their 130gr Conical double cavity mold is fiine too. The conicals, being heavier, shoot a couple inches higher than the RBs.

[carbine]

My wife uses .375 RB in her 36 Rem.

[Omnivore]

Lots of .380s are used in 36 revolvers, especially some of the Ubertis that have slightly larger chambers, but you can use them in any 36, same as you can use .457s in your 44. Just don't try to ram them in too fast.

[Hellgate]

Just remembered: Sharpshooter molds makes a 0000 Buckshot mold that throws a .380" dia shot. www.buckshotmold.com I have one and they are great for volume casting (10 balls per cast). The buckshot are not perfect spheres but for 90% of what we do they are fine. The LEE molds throw almost perfect spheres. The buckshot has a slight flattened band along the circumference. So what. It gets shered off anyway with seating. They are not for presision shooting but for dinging steel they'll work fine. Just an afterthought.

[Fly]

Well fellows my gun came in & here is what I found.The .380 bullet falls
right thew the barrel with no fit at all.I put a mic on the bullet & it's
.355.

First thing I thought was the bullets were under size.So I tryed it in the
barrel of my .380 semi auto.Tight as a button.My cap & ball .36 is a pietta.

The cylinders mic .368, which is about right for a .375 ball to shave a little
lead.So that's the case here.Well I looked it up & yes a .380 bullet is
the same dia as a 9mm = .355
Fly

[Omnivore]

OK; I, and I believe others on here, thought you were talking about a bullet, or ball, that was actually .380" in diameter. I guess that's the difference between a .380" and a .380. So you meant a bullet for a 380 Automatic pistol cartridge. Yeah; whole different deal. And a 38 Special takes a .357" or .358" bullet-- not even close to "38" caliber.

Same goes for a bullet that's made for a 44 Special or a 44 Magnum. They're around .429" or .430" and will drop right through a percussion "44" revolver which needs at least a .451" and usually larger projectile. I had to argue with my state's game department about this. A "44" percussion revolver is technically a 45 caliber gun (though "45s" are actually .452" or .454").

Later cartridge naming is sometimes even worse than the caliber naming of the percussion era. A 44-40 cartridge takes a .427" bullet. Go figure.

[Fly]

Ya this stuff gets mighty confusing at times.

Fly

[Combat Diver]

And don't forget that the 38-40 is actually a .40 cal bullet. It started from when cartrigdes used a outside diameter heel bullet (think .22LR). A .38 cartridge then was actually .38 cal. Later inside lubed bullets that fit inside the case where used reducing the diameter to what we still experience.


CD

[Hang Fire]

Boolits for .38 S&W cartridge have a diameter of around .361"

[curator]

Fly,

First slug and mike both the chambers and the bore. Most .36 cap & ball revolvers have bore (groove) diameters that range from .370 to .385. Many of these replica revolvers also have chamber diameters considerably under groove diameter. If you have a good one you will have groove diameter and chamber diameter the same or possibly even better, chamber diameter slightly larger than groove diameter. My original .36 Whitney Navy has chambers of .375 and groove diameter of .372. It is very accurate with .380 round balls.

My original 1851 Colt Navy had groove diameter of .376 and chamber diameters of .378. The original mould that came with it cast balls that measured .383. My newly acquired Uberti .36 Navy Colt has groove diameter of .373 and chamber diameters of .375. I shoot .380 diameter balls in this with no problems loading and good accuracy.