410 Judge loads.

[Tackleberry41]

I know the Judge is well not very practical, not that I have one. And conventional 410 'self defense' loads are not that great. But Rossi does sell a matched pair pistol with a 45 colt/410 barrel and 22lr barrel.

It has a practical barrel length, and with the little screw in choke/rifling counteracting piece actually didn't pattern to bad. Almost better than my actual 410 shotgun. Haven't had a chance to see how it does with the colts yet. Might do okay with the stepped 45 colt then 410 chamber.

I know using regular 410 shells your a bit limited even hand loading, since it has to fit in the shell. But the thinner walls of converted 303 brass to 410, a 451 bullet or round ball will fit.

I looked a little but not really finding any info on a 2 or 3 451 cal ball load? Probably not a whole lot of demand for it. No idea if using longer cases like the 410 to reduce that unrifled jump would be worth the effort? I had tried some 45 to 40 cal sabots in my revolver, but got plastic back at me from the cylinder gap, single shot wouldn't be an issue, but that stretch of unrifled chamber may not be very helpful.

[cpileri]

Hey tackleberry41,
Sorry about taking so long to reply. i hate it when a post gets ignored (or seemingly so anyway).
So what load are you looking for?
What are you trying to accomplish that isnt availabel commercially?

is it the 3x451 round ball load?

451 wont fit in a 410 hull. not even a magtec brass one.

If you want to look into the 450 Mongo to make a really looooooong 45LC case, that might be more doable. The 450 Mongo is a 9.3x74R case fireformed into a super long 45 Colt. SOme guys load it pretty heavy, so the weight requirement for 3x451 balls is there. But it would be an experimental load, if limited to 45LC pressures.

C-

[cpileri]

here is how you make long fireformed hulls from the 9.3x74r, just in case.

First thing you need to do is stick one in the cylinder, and mark then cut off any excess brass otherwise your cylinder wont close.

I used the 10gr Unique, plus dacron filler, plus a 148grain .357 projectile which fits loosly in the unformed casemouth; and wax to hold it all down. Firing resulted in not much more than a "pop" and dacron wafting down out of the air. No, i didnt bother to check for accuracy of a 357 slug in a 452 bore!
The resulting cases are "semi-fireformed", as in they appear unchanged from their 9.3x74R dimensions from the rim/base and up the first 1/3 of the case; then the case is blown out to chamber sized for the rest of the cartridge length. Extraction was kinda sticky the first time (no case lube used).

Folks who have done so have said that it takes either more power in the load, or several shootings to fully fireform the case.

next,
use the 10gr Unique plus wad/dacron and 200-205gr #7 shot for the forming. Recoil is pathetically light, and noise is a pop. But this load usually gets the case 'mostly' fireformed, that is, with the casemouth ready to accept a 44 or 45cal projectile. If not another firing with this load will.

Once the casemouth will take a bullet, I load with 12.5gr of trail Boss and a .452 lead 255gr SWC with no gas check. Sometimes, I need to go down to 44-cal for one firing. This load will get the case 90% fireformed, which means, all but the length of case nearest the base is expanded to chamber dimensions. Again, the recoil is minimal and noise is a slightly louder pop. I have tried up to 17.7gr Trail Boss, which is 70% of the case volume. But it fares no better in fireforming.

After that, you'll need to slowly work up safe loads. i definitely would not exceed 45LC psi loads since that is what the gun is maximally rated to handle, ~14,000 psi.

A few guys have worked up round ball loads for the 45LC, which should be adaptable to this long case:
http://www.castpics.net/LoadData/Round%20Ball%20Loads.pdf
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?76536-Two-round-ball-45-Colt-454-Casull-load
With each ball weighing ~140grains, most load data is going to correlate to 2 balls. After that, you'd be in relatively uncharted territory.

C-

[Tackleberry41]

A 451 bullet will fit in the fire formed 303 brass, just flare like you normally would and they slide in. Its a moot issue as the 410 section of chamber isnt big enough for the bullet and the brass around it. I was looking to avoid the accuracy robbing jump from 45 case to the rifling. I like to experiment, sometimes it works out, sometimes doesn't.

The 303 to 410 works pretty good, nice durable cases that look like they will take quite a few uses. Been nice to avoid buying 303 thats loaded and have to take it apart, but couldnt find any brass online, well when I looked. Gonna pick up some of the longer 9.3x74r to mess with. You can nearly make the heavier 3" loads in the 303 cases. Without the plastic wad taking up so much space and thinner walls alot more fits in those shells.

[cpileri]

Yeah, sounds like the 9.3 is the way you should go, they make nice long cases; and the Hornady brass comes pre-annealed so I just fireform in a few steps as described above and have a nice chamber-formed loooooong case to use.
C-