Lee 310gr in S&W?

[NSP64]

Does any one use a Lee 310 gr in their S&W mod 29(629)? wasn't looking for fast. I have been using 12gr 2400 for 850fps, in my SRH and a friend at work wanted to try some of the loads in his Smith. I don't think it would hurt it, but was wanting some input.

[James C. Snodgrass]

I've tried 21.5 grs of H-110 and got good accuracy out of my 4". For a lighter load I would try unique or hs-6. Good luck .:coffee:

[HCL]

I run 20gr h110 and only issue I had is ejector rod coming loose and locking the cylinder from opening. Took it apart cleaned really good and re-assembled with a dab of lock-tight and have not had any more issues. I crimp on the top crimp grove so it feeds better in the 1894, I don't change crimp position for the 629.
I use this load pretty exclusively with my 629 and 1894, very accurate and with Lee 310 and hard hitting.
Could not tell you how many rounds have been through that 629 other than I can pretty easily empty a regular ammo can full over a winter, and probably twice that over a summer.
Water dropped WW will punch through 11" of green cut birch from the 629, and
13" from the 1894.
Mike

[Bass Ackward]

Rational bullet weight is not an enemy to any gun. The pressure to drive a heavy bullet can be if you aren't smart. Match you powder speed in a brand that is capable of being reduced to your bullet weight and then stay close to a document that publishes pressure.

As long as you hold pressure to 28,000 psi or less, you should be fine in any of the older variations and the tougher / harder steel of the newer ones can take 35,000 fairly steady. So your ceiling should be based upon his gun really.

[Poygan]

I could not adjust the sights sufficiently on my 29-2 with the 8 3/8 bbl. The impacts were higher than I could adjust with any of the published loads. Probably would have worked with a shorter barrel but I didn't own one before I modified the mold.

[dubber123]

I shot a bunch with H-110 out of a 6" 629 and a 4" Mountain Gun 629. I never had much luck getting good groups at slower speeds. It shot very well around 18 grs. of H-110.

[44man]

Bass is right, it is pressure that will loosen a Smith, not boolit weight. I had 5 of them and shot thousands of heavy silhouette loads through them without a problem. The gun is tougher then you think. I would start at about 18 grs of 296 or H110 and slowly work up until it shoots like you want. I use 21.5 in the Ruger. I would keep it a little lower in the Smith.
I shot a lot of the early factory loads in mine to get brass. They were a LOT hotter then they are today. Recoil with a 240 gr was much heavier then I get with a 330 gr boolit today. They actually hurt to shoot.

[wonderwolf]

The 310gr Lee works well at short ranges out of my 4 S&W's but it does not perform or the rifleing in the barrel wont stabilize it enough for anything past 100 yards. I'll take a look at my notebooks when I get home to see what loads I used. I would be tempted to get another 310 mold and modify it for hallow point. :drinks:

[Dale53]

The Lee 310 is the most accurate bullet up to 100 yards that I have ever shot out of a number of Smith's and Rugers. I have no experience at distances further than 200 yards as my home range is limited to 100 yards.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I and Frank Siefer of F&M Reloading designed this bullet. I had the distinct pleasure of shooting the first head of big game with this bullet (a nice 10 point white tail buck). It is a superb bullet for anything that the .44 magnum is suitable for.

One note: it was designed with two crimp grooves so that it could be used in rifles. However, you MUST be careful and reduce your loads if loaded "short". All of mine have been loaded "long" for use entirely in revolvers.

Dale53

[Lloyd Smale]

never shot this bullet. I was so turned off by bad accuracy with the 45 rf lee that i never bothered with this one. Is it a production mold or was it just a group buy. I need another 44 mold like a hole in the head but if guys are having good luck with it i might want to give it a run.

[Mark]

Llyod,
http://www.grafs.com/product/190344
Standard production mold. The above is from Grafs and is 6 cavity. I heard rumblings awhile back saying that the 6 bangers were different than the 2 cavity. I have the 2 cavity and my accuracy has been great to 100 yards as well. I have never shot the boolit farther than that.
Dale,
What do you mean by 2 lube grooves? Are you saying that it is mandatory to put lube at the gas check if using this boolit in a rifle? I have not shot this boolit in a rifle and I would like your opinion on it.
Thanks,
mark

[wonderwolf]

The Lee 310 is the most accurate bullet up to 100 yards that I have ever shot out of a number of Smith's and Rugers. I have no experience at distances further than 200 yards as my home range is limited to 100 yards.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I and Frank Siefer of F&M Reloading designed this bullet. I had the distinct pleasure of shooting the first head of big game with this bullet (a nice 10 point white tail buck). It is a superb bullet for anything that the .44 magnum is suitable for.

One note: it was designed with two lube grooves so that it could be used in rifles. However, you MUST be careful and reduce your loads if loaded "short". All of mine have been loaded "long" for use entirely in revolvers.

Dale53

I think he means 2 crimp grooves one is 2 long for S&W the other works for longer cylinders and single shots...have not tried it in rifle

I've loaded mine with

7gr of unique
15.5gr/16gr and 16.5gr of 2400

I wrote down that 16gr gave the best perfomance out of my 6" 629 but non performed well out of the 10.5" at longer ranges. The 4" 29 was a good gun for this at shorter ranges

Here is a thread a while back I was asking about heavier bullets 300+gr bullets in .44mag (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=22201)

[Dale53]

As most of you have suspected, I meant "Two Crimp Grooves" (not two lube grooves).

Sorry! A simple typo...

Dale53

[wonderwolf]

As most of you have suspected, I meant "Two Crimp Grooves" (not two lube grooves).

Sorry! A simple typo...

Dale53

Happens to us all....I had to go take a look of some of the 310's to make sure I wasn't mistaken....Her I've been using that as a crimp groove when I should have been putting lube in it. So what kind of development went into the 310 lee? did you guys try it without the gas check shank?

[Dale53]

The bullet mould was developed under a time constraint - Frank had an upcoming Alaskan bear hunt. We desired to make a "performance" bullet that "Joe Everyman" could afford. We wanted the largest meplat possible and needed two crimp grooves so that it could be used in rifles with SAAMI overall length restrictions. We went with a gas check as it is easier to get a bullet to shoot accurately with a gas check and we had time problems. It worked even better than we hoped and is the most accurate .44 bullet we and many others have used to 100 yards (I don't have easy access to a 200 yard range). Since we were most interested in handgun hunting, we try to limit our shots to no more than 125 yards for sure hits so the longer ranges were not tried. We have done NO work with a flat based version but it should be interesting.

My personal choice is to limit my use of this bullet to game shooting. I use Keith 240-250 grs bullets for practice shooting. Frankly, the Keith bullet is fine for deer of most any size. However, for Elk and above, I would surely choose the Lee C430-310 RF.

Dale53

[Three44s]

Dale53,

Thank you sir for the info and your work on this bullet. I have a 2 cav mold from Lee in this design .... have not killed game with it but it sure looks like it "oughta hurt"!

Three 44s

[Dale53]

The ten point whitetail that I shot with it right after getting the moulds, was not a good test. The deer was twenty-five yards away and I shot it in the neck (that's all that was showing). It broke his neck and he did a head stand and was down instantly. However, it blew a vertebra straight up through the top of the neck leaving three holes in the neck. Pretty impressive but truth to say, it was not a very good test (a .32 in the same place would have probably done the job).

However, many others have had equally good results with this bullet on game and target.

Dale53

[crabo]

Which would be the best brand of gc to buy to use on this bullet? I may have to get a mold if yall don't stop talking about this.

Crabo

[MT Gianni]

Crabo, Mine is over 10 years old and has worked well with Gator and Hornady checks. I have never tried LY 44 checks. Gianni

[Dale53]

I have only used Hornady gas checks.

Dale53

[Three44s]

I recall Hornady checks with mine.

Three 44s

[44man]

I see where someone has trouble with the heavy boolit hitting high. They sure do and you have to tighten up your grip so the barrel doesn't rise as much. You should not run out of sight adjustment.
I had to learn to shoot my .475 offhand after I shot 2# of hair off the top of three deer. Target shooting didn't give me the same problem but I was relaxing too much shooting at deer and the barrel was REALLY coming up. I started to talk to myself and tell the nut behind the trigger to "hold tight".

[45r]

Maybe it is just me but the most consistantly accurate boolits I've shot in my revolvers like my 629 PC Hunter has been Rcbs gas check SWC like their 240 and 300 grainers.I have LBT style boolits also and they shoot well but I'm leaning back to the SWC Keith type boolits.I don't think they neccesarily need a long nose or driving band though.My rcbs 45 cal 300 grain swc boolits shoot raggad hole groups out of my F/A 454 casull shooting a mid level load using HS-6 or pushed hard using H-110.The 240GC shoots so well in my 629 that I wonder why I have other molds in this cal sometimes.I have a real good 280GC LBT type mold but the boolits kick harder and the accuracy is the same.Nothing against the Lee boolit,it looks like a fine LBT style boolit.I just don't think they are any better than the Keith types anymore.I don't intend to buy anymore unless its for a levergun because they are needed to feed well.When I'm too lazy to put on gas checks I'm quite happy to shoot the rcbs Keith boolit in my 629 over 9 grains unique.It shoots ragged hole groups and will kill deer.The 240 pushed by a max load of H-110 is more to my liking if shots are out to a 100 yards or so.If I need more performance and range I go to my 454 casull.Don't mean to affend anybody,just my 2 cents worth.

[TCLouis]

First loading I tried with this Boolit was 18.5 grains of WC-820 ( and old slow batch that matches H110 in several test runs). Full group is best I have ever shot at 50 yards and would be smaller yet, but in any accurate load in this gun one chamber throws a boolit or bullet out to the side about an inch. I went up to max loading, but group opened up (still a good group for 50 yards) and I believe accuracy over velocity for anything and any distance I plan to shoot. I will have to cast up another bunch and try them on out to 100 yards and beyond. The XTP is accurat on out there so I will assume this boolit will match it!


I can not load it long in either my SRH, or RH, I have plenty of cylinder length left, but the nose of the boolit inteferes with the the cylinders throat and that precludes using the bottom crimp groove.

As I said, this is the MOST accurate boolit or bullet I have ever shot out of the SRH so I can live with it.

[Three44s]

TCLouis,

I noticed a bit of resistance on chambering .... I would bet a wee bit smaller sizer die would reduce the ogive just enough to let those rounds chamber even when seated longer.

Three 44s

[S.B.]

I think he means 2 crimp grooves one is 2 long for S&W the other works for longer cylinders and single shots...have not tried it in rifle

I've loaded mine with

7gr of unique
15.5gr/16gr and 16.5gr of 2400

I wrote down that 16gr gave the best perfomance out of my 6" 629 but non performed well out of the 10.5" at longer ranges. The 4" 29 was a good gun for this at shorter ranges

Here is a thread a while back I was asking about heavier bullets 300+gr bullets in .44mag (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=22201)

What kind of velocity are you getting with these loads?

[Dale53]

TCLouis;
Frank and I appreciate your remarks. We have gotten a good deal of pleasure from watching others do SO WELL with this bullet.

In all truth, a 240-250 gr Keith is all that is needed for deer. However, for the bigger, big game animals ( Elk, Moose, and Bear) the 310 should come into it's own. I am a certified cast bullet fan for hunting with the revolver. They are RELIABLE and unfortunately, I have seen some jacketed bullets that are NOT. There is, of course (always an "of course") if the bullet design is correct for the job at hand. I like LARGE FLAT meplats and standard or heavier weight in my game bullets.

Handgun bullets have limited power compared to rifles. So, my choice of a large caliber bullet with a large flat meplat and heavy weight comes together to insure both a large wound channel and a DEEP wound channel with total penetration for a good blood trail if needed (all pre-supposing adequate velocity to get the job done).

My idea of adequate velocity is 1200-1400 fps. That can easily be handled by a .44 magnum or a Ruger level .45 Colt.

Since my standard is to keep maximum range to 125 yards or less, I really don't see the need for more velocity.

Dale53

[S.B.]

I've never owned a Lee mold. After reading this thread, I may just have to have one. Does anyone here have any hunting experience with this bullet? I have been holding out for a LBT 300 grain swc mold but, the much lower cost of the Lee has me thinking, my wish could come true, sooner?

[Dale53]

The six cavity Lee moulds are much nicer then their two cavities. However, that said, if you will carefully check over the two cavities (see the "Leementing" Sticky thread) and remove any burrs from the sprue plate and treat them gently, you can cast LOTS of fine bullets for little cost.

I have only killed one deer with the Lee C430-310-RF. It was a 25 yard shot and broke the deer's neck. Of course, it was an instant stop (as most any bullet would have been given the location of the hit). However, I WAS imprressed with the wound - blew a vertabrae out of the top of the neck.

Dale53

[NSP64]

I've been pushing them out at 875fps (12.6 gr 2400) without the GC from my 7.5" SRH. no leading using LLA.:drinks: loaded long, but I'll load them short for the friends S&W.

[HCL]

Dale
Just a short note to say Thanks, great boolit. My favorite for all my applications.
Mike

[TCLouis]

or measured velocity with 18.5-21.5 grains of H110 and this boolit?

Guess it is time to get Quick Load for the times I am too lazy to set up the chrono.

[snowtigger]

I don't shoot much paper, but the 430-310 Lee regularly busts milk jugs at 125 yards for me. (That is the maximum distance on the range I frequent most often.)
At the range in town, I can scare the he!! out of a paper plate at 300 yards with this bullet
BTW the milk jugs come apart real nice at 125. I don't have the load in front of me, but, it was acouple grains below max with Lil-gun.
I have about 6 different molds for 44, but this is the only one I reach for nowdays. Either Hornaday or Gator checks.
Thanks Dale

[S.B.]

Anybody got a favorite load using Unique powder with this bullet?

[wonderwolf]

Anybody got a favorite load using Unique powder with this bullet?



I've tried it with 7gr of unique but my note book says that I thought it would work better with a slower powder. I didn't write down what the primers looked like.