Cast up some bullets for my 45-70 Encore

[rickt300]

My two holer 457191 was up first. Got her running just fine pretty fast, love it when i am dropping two good ones at a time until the pot gets low. Made some pretty soft and some harder than Wheelweights. Now the really fun mold is a RCBS that casts a 405 grain gas checked bullet. It is a one holer and I have never seen a mold that absolutely had to have the sprew plate just almost loose to cast a good bullet. If you don't smoke the mold every ten bullets or so the middle bands don't fill out. And don't forget it has it's perfect temperature fetish also. At any rate I got 50 or so of each. Going to dip lube the harder 457191's and shoot some in a few. They came out of the mold at .459 so I am going to shoot these without sizing.

[rickt300]

Well the only thing I learned today is that 26.5 grains of IMR 4227 under a 300 grain bullet is a mild and easy to shoot load in an Encore. The scope I chose to top the rifle went south on me all the way to Guatemala. Had a nice group going and suddenly my point of impact is 2 feet high. I adjust it down and get another group going and suddenly the holes are not appearing in the group and are low by 4 inches! At any rate next testing will be with a different scope, probably a 4 power Leupold.

[rickt300]

Well went on to 14.0 grains of Unique and got fliers. Going to have to try a filler of some sort.

[blackpowder man]

I’ve been working on my Katahdin .45-70 since spring and still haven’t found “the load”. Using the Lee 340 and 405 plain base and the Noe 460-340 in both hollow point and flat point. I’ve used Goex, 4227, 4759, 3031, 4198, 2400, and Unique. None were horrible and none great. Probably 3-4” groups. My expectations may be too high, but my Pedersoli Sharps and Winchester High Wall will shoot 1 1/2-2” groups using a tang peep. The Encore has a nice Nikon Monarch on it. I think I’m going to try the Lee 500 grain pointy boolit next.

[Cosmic_Charlie]

My most accurate load so far with my Henry SS was 50 grains of Swiss 2F, a tuft of dryer lint under the Lee 405 HB. 20/1 alloy. About 1" at 50 yards. 27 of 4198 under the same boolit was o.k. too. Next outing I will try some unsized cases and thumb seat the boolits.