Henry big boy question

[RyanJames170]

Has anyone loaded SWC/Keith bullets into a Henry big boy 45 colt if so did you have feeding issues and if you did what over all Length did you end up using to allow it to feed from the magazine.

I can not get my Henry big boy to feed a SWC Keith bullet at all. How ever it feeds a 200gr cone like SWC

[pworley1]

I have had good results with the 452424.

[RyanJames170]

What OAL are you running with yours?
That bullet looks a lot like the one I am using.

[quilbilly]

I am using the Lee 200 RF and the Lee 255 RF in mine and they both feed flawlessly.

[TomAM]

Keith designed his bullet for revolvers. It exceeds SAAMI spec cartridge overall length because revolver cylinders can accommodate that length.

Repeating rifles cannot.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I'm not sure this helps you with your 45colt, BUT, my Henry BBS in 41 mag will cycle SWC boolits.
I had Jared at Arsenal molds make a custom lightweight (205gr) SWC with the Crimp groove placed at the appropriate place, as well as having all the leading edges radiused like the Lee 195gr SWC.

https://www.artfulbullet.com/index.php?threads/report-custom-mold-from-arsenal-molds.3469/

[autogun]

My Henry Big Boy Steel rifle in 45 colt feeds Lyman 452424 bullets just fine. OAL is out of the Lyman manual at 1.575.

[georgerkahn]

Keith designed his bullet for revolvers. It exceeds SAAMI spec cartridge overall length because revolver cylinders can accommodate that length.

Repeating rifles cannot.

Imho, TomAM said it all. Not with this bullet/rifle combo, but I had similar issues with a Marlin: set bullets deeper, and... problem solved!
geo

[RyanJames170]

My Henry Big Boy Steel rifle in 45 colt feeds Lyman 452424 bullets just fine. OAL is out of the Lyman manual at 1.575.

Thank you, I figured it was a Overall length problem, figured out that mine will allow upto 1.630 before it has a big fit about that bullet

[TomAM]

SAAMI spec lengths for revolver cartridges has been routinely ignored by handloaders and bullet designers for many decades. The length of a bullet's nose was limited only by cylinder length.

The popularity surge for leverguns has been a rude awakening for many bullet casters.

[longbow]

I was one of those rudely awakened about 20 years ago when I got an 1894 Marlin and what I had read was the best bullet for .44 mag... the Keith SWC Lyman 429421. I cast then loaded then ran into intermittent jamming. I took a while to figure out but of course the Lyman cast bullet manual does point out that the 429421 seated to crimp groove exceeds SAAMI OAL.

Also, .44 mag rilfes have larger groove diameter than .44 handguns so since my mould cast at 0.429" I got leading in my 0.431" groove barrel!

Seating the bullet deeper and crimping over the front driving band helped but didn't solve feeding problems which weren't just due to too long OAL. Mine had an aversion to SWC noses with large meplats. I had to modify the carrier a bit to lower the nose at feeding. Randy Buchannan says adding a bevel to the breech face will help/solce feeding issues with SWC's.

Also, I found a post on the Marlin owners forum about filing the cartridge stop to allow longer OAL. It is easy to do and works for Marlin. I suspect the Henry is similar because looking at an exploded view of the guts of a Marlin and Henry they appear to be pretty similar.

Those are two issues you might investigate for Henry... filing the cartridge stop and putting a small bevel on the breech face. Modifying the carrier is a little more extreme. It seems to be a common procedure on Marlins but not sure about Henrys.

Longbow