Help with a .357 load for a H&R rifle

[crashguy]

Short story .... I got a gift basket some time ago that contained, appox 95, 200 grain JSP (.358) that I believe are intended for 35 rem. I have a thought to use them in a .357 mag H&R handie rifle for white tail in a woods environment. Is this proposition feasible ? and what, if any, loads would be recommended.

Thanks

Ed

BTW .. As I am really just attempting to not have these bullets sit around my shop and go to waste...so if there was someone that could use them for there intended purpose I would gladly consider a trade.

[curator]

The Handi-.357 will shoot those condomized .358/200JSP just fine, at least mine will. When I first took delivery of my .357Mag barrel. a friend gave me several boxes of probably the same bullets he bought for a .35 Remington Marlin that he had since sold. I loaded them "long" under loads varying from 10 to 12 grains of Alliant 2400. My Handi-357 has a really long throat or free-bore so loading the bullets out to almost touch the rifling gave better accuracy and allowed me to up the powder charge some without causing pressure problems. I wouldn't recommend this load in any .357 Mag revolver.

[Groo]

Groo here
H&R uses a long throat [ as most do] that is like the chamber on a revolver, not a rifle.
Drop in the bullet, measure to the base of the bullet from the face of the barrel with a caliper.
measure the length of the bullet itself and add the two.
This YOUR max overall length.[ you will seat a little shorter]
Then for fun, compare this length to a drawing of the 357 maximum [see where this is going???]

[crashguy]

Curator - Thanks ... I'm encouraged this is doable.

Groo- LOL, you opened up a whole new line of what if's... I measured the bullet to base as 1.41 and bullet as .908 total 2.318... I recall some reading I did on the 357 max in the handi using 357 brass and running the bullet long... is that what you had in mind?

[GhostHawk]

Some of us even use .360DW brass in our H&R Handi Rifle .357's. Being just a bit longer you can get a 158 gr bullet a bit closer to the rifling.

[Four-Sixty]

I never reamed my Handi rifle for use with 357 Maximum brass. I was always waiting for Starline to make the 360 DW brass. Now that I have some on hand, I can load 158 grain JSP bullets in a 360 DW cases and they drop in just fine. I need to cast up some of the lyman 170 grain Keith boolits to try out next.

[Outpost75]

My experience has been that the 200-grain .35 Remington bullets do not expand well unless you can drive them over 1800 fps, which is a bit difficult to do in a .357 rifle less than 24" barrel length unless you exceed SAAMI pressure limits. I have had wonderful results on deer using the Remington 180-grain semi-jacketed HP intended for the .357 Maximum, which is a 180-grain bullet assembled into a 158-grain scalloped jacket with generous "glob" of exposed lead and a large hollow cavity. This bullet works wonderfully in a .357 Handi Rifle with a compressed charge of all the 4198 or RL7 you can get into the case, seating the bullet out, and crimping in the crimp groove provided.

When so assembled it is too long in OAL to work in typical revolvers or lever action rifles, but in the long throated Handi Rifle it is superb and a stone killer! About 1600 fps.

[crashguy]

I always can count on good information on this site... As it stands , I won't try to jamb a square peg in a round hole and attempt to use those for hunting. I'll do some homework on the alternate brass loadings and just get these to ring some steel down range.