429640 for B 92 44mag??

[randy merta]

I have been shooting my B 92 everyday in prep for the Indiana gun season. I have a rifle range in my backyard so shooting is a matter of grabbing the lever and pulling the trigger. I have been shooting alot of 240 xtp bullets and my gun shoots five shots 2 in groups at 100yds rested. That is with factory sights. I am wanting to get a mould to cast my own boolits and have been pondering a couple of lyman moulds. I have the 429640 as my number one mould to order upon hearing your thoughts on this boolit and the B 92. Will this boolit cycle good in my lever? If your suggestion is other than this boolit mould what do you suggest? This boolit will be used for Indiana deer hunting with shots out to 150 yds.
Thanks.
Randy

[44man]

That boolit should work fine through the gun. I would be very leery of using the 240 XTP. They open too fast in a revolver to suit me. With the added velocity of a rifle, they could be explosive. I even question a hollow point unless cast fairly hard but not hard enough to fracture. With 250 gr's you might not have enough weight at long range and could lose penetration and you sure want two holes in a deer.
We need someone to chime in here if they have used it at long range. (150 yd's.) It is a hard question to answer unless a lot of deer have been taken out there. One dead deer does not say anything.
I like the Lee 310 gr. It works through a Marlin just fine even when seated to the lower crimp groove.

[randy merta]

44man thanks for the reply. Most don't know but I am from Indiana and we are not allowed to use centerfire rifles for deer hunting. This year we will be allowed to use pistol cartridges in cowboy type firearms. I have killed a very large number of deer using a Knight MK85 loaded with Hornady 240XTP bullets. My farthest shot was on a big ten pointer at 167 yds that I lasered before shooting. The 240 is pushed by 100 grns of loose pyrodex. FPS?? I have a coffee can full of recovered XTP's that are mushroomed perfectly. I have found that the bullet passes all the way through to end up just under the skin[bruising the skin] on the opposite side it was shot. I used the 260 grn hp for several deer and it passed all the way through but I lost some inches on trajectory out to 200 yds.
I live in Southern Indiana aka coal mine country. The county I live has been almost mined from border to border. I hunt the open reclaims fields. That is why I used the Knight for all these years. I also hunt the creek bottoms I live in and plan to use the B92 for hunting the bottoms. When I get out to the reclaim I will use the Knight. In reality my shots with the 44mag will be 100 yds or less.
With my range out my back door I shoot alot and buying xtp's is getting costly so why not get a mould and cast my own and plink and hunt with the cast.

Randy

[Bass Ackward]

Randy,

Ask someone to send you about 5 to load and cycle. I don't have any anymore or I would.

Making a long story short, Dad's and mine (B92s) won't cycle the same length. Won't even cycle the same meplat width. Even when the length is shorter than standard OAL max. Of coarse you can trim your brass some.

The only way to tell for sure for sure, is to try them.

[randy merta]

Bass your reply is why I was asking. I have heard that some of the cast boolits will cycle very slick and others not so slick. I have heard good things about the 640 and ready to buy a mold if it will work out. I bought a box of 100 xtp today for 18 bucks at a local gun shop to get me through until I get a mold.
RanchDog sent me some bullets to try in my 86 that I had questions about and they functioned just fine and shot even better. I got that mold working overtiime now.
Randy

[Boomer Mikey]

I cast these yesterday at 825 degrees with 50/50 WW/LINO. The pot needed to run hot to keep the hollow point pin hot enough to let the nose fill out. These dropped at 0.433" and I sized them to 0.432". You should size these nose first for best concentricity.

429640's have a reputation for accuracy, the blended ogive to the body seems to work well. The COL here is 1.700", this may be too long to feed in many rifles. This bullet is a great bullet for large frame revolvers too; my S&W 629, Ruger Vaquero's, and Dan Wesson 44's like this design. For shorter COL's I seat the bullet deeper and crimp over the ogive with a Redding profile crimp die. You will usually find a good load between 20.5 - 23.5 grains of 296 or H110, the usual cautions of working up loads apply. Groups of 2" or less are typical for my revolvers at 50 yards and my S&W 629 and Marlin 1894 will do that at 100 yards.

They weigh 266 grains with the gatorcheck, these are air cooled at BHN 15. I consider 265 grain bullets an ideal weight for the 44 Magnum. At 1600 + fps from my Marlin 1894SS these should be a perfect combination of expansion and penetration. You probably won't find one in any deer you shoot with them as they will completely exit the other side.

If there were two deer in the path of this bullet there would be a problem with your tags.

Boomer :Fire:

[44man]

15 BN should be great for that monster hollow point.
Randy, the reason I said that about the 240 XTP is that all the deer I used it on never had a hole on the other side with the bullet under the skin. These were rib shots and I worry about hitting a bone or a quartering shot. I went to large meplat cast boolits and will never go back. Two holes makes a massive blood trail but I have never had to track one anyway. Rarely has one gone over 30 yd's. I see or hear them crash.
One large buck I shot with the 240 XTP had the top of the heart taken off and I seen him go down but walking his trail to him, I didn't find enough blood to track him if he went out of sight.

[buster]

Randy I live in your neigbhor hood and if you want try some of ranch dogs 265/44 boolites pm me. Rob

[randy merta]

Double thanks on the replys. I do appreciate the replys and Buster I sent you a PM. Those pics of the 640 have me placing a order. I really look foreward to putting some deer down with my lever gun this fall. Randy

[dubber123]

I shot a decent 8 pt. a few years back with a 240 XTP from a Marlin lever. Muzzle velocity was 1,800 fps., the range was 100 yds. I nicked one rib going in, and it still failed to penetrate well. Fortunately he didn't go far, only a couple of feet, but if he had run, I would have had a bugger of a time finding him with no blood trail, and no snow on. I have gone to a heavier bullet since. Unfortunately my Marlin won't feed a cast bullet with a wide nose. Good luck this season.

[AnthonyB]

PM me your address and I'll send a few for you to see if they feed. Tony

[44man]

Marlins are funny! :( Mine will feed the Lee 310 and the LBT 320 WLN but not a boolit I made. It won't even go into the magazine. I have another Hoch mould with a pointy boolit that won't feed unless I trim the brass a little. I have 50 that I took to 1.250" just for these. With 7 gr's of unique, they are deadly accurate and punch one hole at 50 yd's. Great plinking load.
My boolit won't enter the tube even though overall length is only .005" longer then the LBT and Lee.
Here's the boolits, the Lee is just stuck in a fired case, I have none loaded. The far right one doesn't feed, it weighs 330 gr's and shot several 1" groups at 100 yd's from my SBH.
If I load them in the shortened brass, they work fine.

[felix]

429640 is NOT for the Ruger carbines. Too long by a fraction using magnum cases. Trim the cases and they would work. 44 Special cases? That short? Never tried it. ... felix