A 10 mm experiment with the Ruger Buckeye special

[26Charlie]

A friend gave me a box of Berry 180 gr plated hollow points for 10 mm, for which I don't have an auto, only the Ruger 38-40/10 mm Blackhawk 6 1/2" revolver. I thought I would try them against cast loads. Another friend gave me a pound of Hodgdon CEPistol powder. I picked a load off the Hodgdon data site, 7.6 gr for the 180 gr bullets.
So far, so good. Results at twenty five yards, wrist rest :( will not hold a foot and a half circle. Cast load of same weight bullet,eight and a half grains of Blue Dot, groups into one and three quarters inches. .
.
.

.

???

[Harter66]

Not really a big surprise . Big change in powder , bullet construction and load . Perfect throat fit vs nominal dia . A historically well suited powder vs the latest copper scrubber wonder . Copper plate vs lead and lube against the bbl . The lube residue and BD fouling alone could toss the load all by itself .
Who knows what the copper scrubber properties did to the bore .

[GooseGestapo]

I finally got rid of the sole box of 500 "Berry" bullets I ever bought.
They were 115gr .356" for 9mm, or were supposed to be. They actually miked .354".
I aquired a lightly used S&W 5906 to shoot in PPC production semi matches. Was looking for a good load by trying everything in my inventory besides "boolits".

The Berry's over 4.9gr of LongShot that is getting 2"groups with 120gr TC @ .357", won't stay on the B27 Center! Half will key-hole.
Yes, I only lightly taper crimp them.

I got rid of them today by melting them with other scrap bullets and made some .38 .358" 148gr wadcutters.

[26Charlie]

Research on the net shows trouble with these plated bullets due to crimp, velocity, or gun configuration. Plating is evidently thin, and if damaged causes keyholing. I did not see keyholes, but only three out of the six were on paper.

I conclude that my load is hot, near the top load for that powder, and the jump from the cylinder to the forcing cone gets the bullet going too fast to resist damage by the rifling. Too bad.

Of course, one could say that the bullets call out for a gun to shoot them in....

[oldhenry]

I envy you with that Buckeye Special .38-40/10mm. If I run across one @ anywhere near a decent price, I'll get one. My '73 in .38-40 needs a companion.

Henry

__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ _________________________
A real sport involves either gasoline or gun powder...........anything else is just a game

[contender1]

There is a pair of Buckeye's for sale on the ruger forum.

[oldhenry]

There is a pair of Buckeye's for sale on the ruger forum.

Thanks for the heads up.

[26Charlie]

Just to be sure about the quality of cast loads, I dug out a couple of boxes I had loaded in the past. One was 10mm with a 200 gr RCBS bullet over 10 gr Blue Dot, put aside as being too hot. Sticky ejection. It grouped six into 3.3" at 25 yards, even so. Then I shifted to the .38-40 cylinder, with a 200 gr SAECO bullet over 8 gr of Unique, definitely more pleasant to shoot, grouping six into 2.05" at the aforementioned 25 yards.

[ShooterAZ]

I won a 500 RD box of those Berry's bullets at a shooting match in Colorado. I quickly learned that I would never, ever buy any of them. My opinion of them is that they are junk.