43 Spanish and .445-ish groove, no holy joy

[ohland]

The Argentine RB is putting up a helluva fight. Old retrobate is trying to resize some .445s so they will chamber. Could be too wide in the neck. Our lead is running @ 19 BHN, not much bump up with a 439186... Might as well take up drinking. And... sizing the 445s down far enough is doing a job on the grease grooves.

My suggestions of re-chambering to the 44-70 didn't go far.

Before someone chimes up with common sense, it isn't my rifle. NOT. MY. RIFLE.

Looks like a very soft 439186 is the only option, what a waste of a beautiful bore...

[curator]

If you lube the .445s before sizing them down you can preserve the grease grooves. Sofer lead may be a good idea.

[John in PA]

Lube capabilities of the .439186 are close to nil, even for smokeless loads. Unless there's a good grease wad column underneath, no joy. Neck ream/turn brass and go with bore diameter bullet with deeper grooves. Smokeless, 10.0 gr Unique with a tuft of Dacron to hold powder against the primer,

or Swiss BP, 1.5-2f, and more lube/softer alloy, nothing beyond 1:20, no antimony. Also, a very small hollow hand-drilled in the base, say .200" diameter by .250 deep will give them a start. Similar to the original arsenal 405 grain 45-70 bullets.

http://accuratemolds.com/bullet_detail.php?bullet=44-385M-D.png might be a start, though I'd go for deeper wider grooves and a slightly shorter nose.(i.e. longer base section, but same overall length)

[country gent]

Several things to try are pan lube bullets and then size down lube should help perseve grease grooves and ease the down sizing of the bullet. Try a push thru sizer with a longer lead into the size ring making sizing more gradual. How much are you trying to size these down/ Start dia and finish dia? If you dont want to lube first grease gooves can be deepened with a chanelring tool also. If you going to load true black powder the 19 bhn may be on the hard side to work well. 10-12 bhn 20-1 or 15-1 may be better. What are barrel dimensions?

[enfield]

Your comment on rechambering made me chuckle. I recently got an Argentine rolling block that has a beautiful bore and the wood and metal are as good as you could possibly want ( for a 130+ year old rifle ) but when I got the rifle ( didn't see it, just went by description from the gun store online ) I noticed that the brass that was with it was "almost" straight walled. long story short, whoever had it used what looks like a 1/2 inch drill to rechamber it, they even left gouge marks in the action from the drill chuck about where the hammer is. Makes you wonder what people are thinking. I made a sleeve that I pressed & loctited in for the neck and it seems to be fine now, I shoot the 446110 lyman bullet out of it.

[Nobade]

I just use .430" boolits in mine, paper patched up to be a nice slip fit in a fired case. I can barely get a .442" gage pin in a case, so the boolits end up at .441". Cast from air cooled wheelweights, they bump up fine when hit by a case full of FFg. Shoots like a champ and easy to deal with.

-Nobade

[leadman]

I use air cooled whee-weights in my 43 Mauser and 40-65 RB also and it works fine with black or smokeless powder.

[fouronesix]

I don't know where the thought of .445+ came from but that is too fat- IMO. Also, 19 BHN is way too hard- IMO.

I have a Rem RB in 43 Spanish with good bore and it is one of the most accurate of my BP type single shots. I have a Mountain Molds mold for that cartridge. It is a grease groove, gas checked bullet of conventional design. It drops at .442. I push through size to about 4415. I pan lube with soft BP type lube. Bullet weighs 380 grains. I use alloy of about 10 BHN. I load with 5744. Charges vary between 20 and 23 grains. I use loose dacron filler. Velocity with dacron fillered 21 grain charge of 5744 is about 1150 fps. Very accurate, very stable (obviously if accurate) and no leading.