10.4X42 swiss

[Toothmaker]

I have my brass made. I am going to use 235gr. hollow base. I talked to the people at Alliant Powders. They suggested that I use 15grs. and no more than 20grs. of 5574. Anybody out there have a better load out there.

[Nobade]

I shoot mine with KIK FFg black powder and the Lyman .446" Mauser bullet sized down to .433". This load tracks exactly to the sights out to 750 yds (furthest target we have at the range) and is super accurate. Since the neck doesn't have any parallel in it, I don't resize the cases and use the powder charge to stop the bullet from dropping into the case. Of course you can't do that with smokeless, so you are going to be reforming your cases with every reloading.

[smokemjoe]

I have used all the loads and used some from powders that had no listing, I always come back to 13 grs. unique with all wts. of bullets. Make your brass long, I go .125 longer as the of the long lead in the throat, It will also shorten up aboiut .020 when you fire form.. Joe

[texassako]

I used a load similar to smokemjoe for a 10.4x47r Italian Vetterli, a very close cousin. Unique shot so nice, I think a try with BP for an authentic load is about the only other powder I will try. I was just loading a 218gr boolit over 13.5gr of Unique since I shot up all I had the other day.

[quiver]

Can't help with your weight of boolit. But for mine using lymans 370gr. 43 Spainish boolit I get great results with 30.2gr. of reloader 15.

[Toothmaker]

What do you fellows think of blackhorn powder. It is a smokeless powder which burns like black powder and cleans up with regular solvent. Thanks for all your in put.

[Nobade]

At $30/10 oz. I have never tried it, others here seem to like it plenty. I'd imagine it would work fine in the Swiss rifle. Regular black powder sure does work well in them too. And cleans up with water.

[quiver]

I have used Blackhorn in 8x56 Styer. Same recoil as a full power load. All research showes that it is a semi-smoakless powder. It uses nitrates to control the burn rate. Salts are probably produced when fireing. It should be ok to use in the 41 swiss since semi-smoakless loads were used in these rifles latter in their life.

Blackhorn is pretty darn expensive. I think this is mostly due to making the grains a hollowed cylinder as opposed to the irregular shapes in bulk powders past. Semi-smokeless is hard and brittle. Don't crush it as that will change the burn rate. It also means that they have a high reject rate.

[Toothmaker]

Thanks for the input. Let's go shooting.

[The Virginian]

Any other safe smokeless powder loads and where can you get data?

[jonk]

Cartridges of the world has data. I've done some work with trail boss, 4198, and 4759. Also a mousefart load of 5 gr of red dot.

As I don't have the book in front of me I can't say the charges off hand.

[Old Iron Sights]

Is this for a swiss vetterli or italian? Isn't 41 Swiss 10.4X38?
I use 18.4 gr Alliant 2400 over the Lee 44 cal (sized 430). Very accurate and pleasant to shoot.

[jonk]

To address old Iron Sights' question, the Swiss Vetterli round was made both with 38mm brass and 42mm brass, apparently both fired in the same chamber without issue. I just did a chamber cast and used that as my trim to length. Shoulder position in both is at the same point.

[Chicken Thief]

10.4x38R is the military cartridge.
10.4x42R is the civilian one.
They were indeed loaded with smokeless at the end (from late 80's and forward)
Most civilian rifles were centerfire and had to compensate for smaller case volume.
The Swiss has a thing where they enter the military at 18 and leave at 40. They keep all their equipment and rifle, thus many rifles were converted when the military ammo ran dry. And the same reason why so many ended up as wallhangers.

[Chicken Thief]

All the info you need:

http://theswissriflesdotcommessageboard.yuku.com/

[The Virginian]

Thanks, this is very informative and does anyone have a load using Green Dot, Blue Dot or Universal Clays?