FAsmus
07-05-2015, 05:59 PM
Gentlemen;
I recently came into a S&W M1917 in 'as issued' but otherwise excellent shape: The action is as tight as the day it was made, the bore is nearly as nice, only showing where perhaps someone allowed a piece of foreign material to scratch it from the forcing cone to about and inch down the barrel. Otherwise it is sharp.
I don't have a proper round nose or wad-cutter bullet mold in 45 for this revolver so I got out my old Colt 45 mold, the mentioned 255 grain Lyman 452190. ~ As you fellows know, this is the old original design that Colt used way back there in 1873.. - modified for our modern bore size of 0.452.
I cast up a run of these bullets, measured them and found the mold dropped them at 0.4545 - somewhat big for the usual 45 ACP but I had an idea! I got out my small-hole gauge and measured the cylinder throats of the 1917 and found that they are 0.452 - except right where the chamber ends and the throat begins. There they are 0.455!
Well, we all know that the cylinder of a 1917 is WAY too long for the 45 ACP cartridge anyway, so, I decided to load these oversize, overly long bullets into the 45ACP cases as cast, no sizing, lubed only in a 0.458 die.
I then found that it wasn't necessary to size the cases either; the oversize bullets were a perfect press-fit into fired 45 ACP cases. All I had to do was de-prime, bell the case mouths slightly, re-prime and I was ready to go!
I charged a case with 3.8 grains 700X, seated a bullet to the first grease groove and tried to fit it into the chambers of the M1917. It fit a little snugly but gentle finger pressure seated the cartridge all the way in until I had a good feel as the case mouth hit the end of the chamber. I looked into the front of the cylinder and saw that there was no way that the bullet could ever exit the case and extend beyond the front of the cylinder - it was still way down in there where I knew that recoil alone would never be able to size the oversize bullet enough to move it through the 0.452 throat.
I could pull out the loaded round by simply inserting my finger nail under the rim - out it came! ~ I currently don't have any 'moon' clips - they are on back-order.
I loaded up 100 of these for initial testing and found to my dismay that they were so long that the usual 45 ACP cartridge box didn't even come close to closing when they were put into place! Over-all length of the cartridges as loaded is 1.425.
At the range this load did very well, shooting to the fixed sights and grouping into 6x1.500 at 10 yards from the crude, improvised rest.
Absolutely no signs of excess pressure were encountered at all. The fired cases punched out of the cylinders with my wooden dowel with no resistance at all.
I fired the 100 rounds and after inspecting the revolver I found - aside from lube smoke - that the barrel, forcing cone and cylinders were in perfect shape!
Wonderful stuff!
Good evening, Forrest
I recently came into a S&W M1917 in 'as issued' but otherwise excellent shape: The action is as tight as the day it was made, the bore is nearly as nice, only showing where perhaps someone allowed a piece of foreign material to scratch it from the forcing cone to about and inch down the barrel. Otherwise it is sharp.
I don't have a proper round nose or wad-cutter bullet mold in 45 for this revolver so I got out my old Colt 45 mold, the mentioned 255 grain Lyman 452190. ~ As you fellows know, this is the old original design that Colt used way back there in 1873.. - modified for our modern bore size of 0.452.
I cast up a run of these bullets, measured them and found the mold dropped them at 0.4545 - somewhat big for the usual 45 ACP but I had an idea! I got out my small-hole gauge and measured the cylinder throats of the 1917 and found that they are 0.452 - except right where the chamber ends and the throat begins. There they are 0.455!
Well, we all know that the cylinder of a 1917 is WAY too long for the 45 ACP cartridge anyway, so, I decided to load these oversize, overly long bullets into the 45ACP cases as cast, no sizing, lubed only in a 0.458 die.
I then found that it wasn't necessary to size the cases either; the oversize bullets were a perfect press-fit into fired 45 ACP cases. All I had to do was de-prime, bell the case mouths slightly, re-prime and I was ready to go!
I charged a case with 3.8 grains 700X, seated a bullet to the first grease groove and tried to fit it into the chambers of the M1917. It fit a little snugly but gentle finger pressure seated the cartridge all the way in until I had a good feel as the case mouth hit the end of the chamber. I looked into the front of the cylinder and saw that there was no way that the bullet could ever exit the case and extend beyond the front of the cylinder - it was still way down in there where I knew that recoil alone would never be able to size the oversize bullet enough to move it through the 0.452 throat.
I could pull out the loaded round by simply inserting my finger nail under the rim - out it came! ~ I currently don't have any 'moon' clips - they are on back-order.
I loaded up 100 of these for initial testing and found to my dismay that they were so long that the usual 45 ACP cartridge box didn't even come close to closing when they were put into place! Over-all length of the cartridges as loaded is 1.425.
At the range this load did very well, shooting to the fixed sights and grouping into 6x1.500 at 10 yards from the crude, improvised rest.
Absolutely no signs of excess pressure were encountered at all. The fired cases punched out of the cylinders with my wooden dowel with no resistance at all.
I fired the 100 rounds and after inspecting the revolver I found - aside from lube smoke - that the barrel, forcing cone and cylinders were in perfect shape!
Wonderful stuff!
Good evening, Forrest