Day dream

[Tatume]

Hi Folks,

I’ve always thought I would like to have a five-shot Blackhawk conversion barreled for 0.458” bullets. My day-dream is to use 458 Win Mag cases, cut to length and inside neck reamed. The cylinder would be counter-bored for the belt, but it would work just as well without being counter bored. I imagine shooting 300 gr bullets about 1400 fps, and 400 gr cast bullets about 900 fps. I’ve never heard of it being done. Of course, there is no practical advantage to the proposal, but to me it would be neat. What do you guys think?

Take care, Tom

[mellonhead]

It has been done. Lee Martin from singleactions.com has done it. There is also a conversion that is called the .458X400 which uses 45-70 brass cut to 1.285 and loaded with .458 400 grain bullets. I think it was John Gallagher that can up with that one. I seem to recall reading of the later conversion being used with 480 Ruger brass to simplify brass making.

Toby

[subsonic]

And humble old .45 Colt brass has enough taper to it, that when straightened out, you can easily shoot .458" diameter boolits without all the work mentioned above. Just open the throats to .458" (Ruger chambers are sloppy enough to chamber cartridges loaded with .458" boolits anyway) and screw on a .458" barrel. Done. Brass is made simply by hitting sized .45 colt with a .45-70 expander.

Of course, for all of that, it's just as easy to size down .458" boolits to .454" or .452" as needed, and there aren't many animals we hunt that cary a caliper with them.