wildcat 35-45 pistol dies?

[hornsurgeon]

i had never heard of this untill i got a set of dies in a bunch of stuff i just bought. from what i can find out, this is a 45acp necked down to 357/38 for use in 1911 type pistols. now, do i wait till i have the cash some day to build the pistol or what? anyone here ever heard of this round?

[cuzinbruce]

It was briefly popular some years ago. For target shooting IIRC. I think the idea was 38 caliber recoil on a 45 frame. I expect it was done by re-chambering a .38 Super barrel. If you hunt around, I think you can find someone to do it. When I checked, there was someone in Australia (I think) offering the barrels. Expensive though. The dies are expensive too, check the price groups for RCBS or Redding. And I think you need forming dies as well as loading dies. I have had a couple sets but sold them on eBay.

[hornsurgeon]

this has the form die as well. what did you get on ebay for them, if you remember?

[flinchnjerk]

Known as the 38-45 Auto, 45-38 Auto, or 45-38 Clerke. According to the 6th edition of COTW, .38 Super barrels are reamed to the new caliber and used in the .45 Auto without any other change. In the late 80s Dean Grennell developed a variant (that he dubbed the 38-45 Hardhead) using .45 Win Mag or .451 Detonics as the parent case - I assume because he wanted to substitute plutonium for smokeless powder. Reported velocities in excess of 1500 fps with a 124 grain bullet from a 5 inch 1911.

[Echo]

Bo Clerk developed it around 1960, as a target round shooting .38 bullets that would feed nicely in a 1911, and so would be competitive in the CF matches w/less recoil than a .45 wadcutter. Some pundits thought it should actually be a high-power round, and tried to soup the cartridge up. I was hooked.

I had one back in '64. Jim Clark built it for me - well, actually all that had to be done was chamber a barrel and put it in the gun. Shot it some, but figured out that it would NEVER be a hot performer - the boiler room is actually less than a .38 Special! Sold the barrel and re-installed the .45 bbl.

Offer the dies on eBay and let some other guy have the pleasure...

[bobthenailer]

i local gun shop has a set of rcbs 38/45 dies for $10.00

[cuzinbruce]

I don't recall exactly, probably about $75 Buy It Now, that should be about half the price of a new set. IIRC

[hornsurgeon]

i pu them up on ebay. lets see how crazy the frenzy gets

[cuzinbruce]

Good Luck

[StarMetal]

Actually you rechamber a 9mm barrel, as the 38 Super case is .900 long and the chamber won't clean up entirely. Being they were made on 9mm/38Super bore diamensions one may find the 38 Special bullets a tad too fat, but as we know some 9mm groove diameter are fat.

You do need forming dies and my set has four in addition to the three reloading dies.

It was intended, as mentioned, as a target round, but like anything else it got souped up. I've seen them push a 115 grain to 1600 fps.

I will have to say mine is one of the most accurate pistols I've owned. I had a barrel chambered to it for my Colt Gold Cup. Feeding is absolute 100 percent positive, which is another reason Bo came up with the idea.

Edited to say that if you push the envelope the primer will flow back into the 45acp's rather larger firing pin hole and donuts will be cut from the primer. Sometimes these will stop the firing in from hitting the primer on the next shot. There were two cures if you decided to take this avenue. One was bush the firing pin hole to the smaller 9mm size pin or use large rifle primers.

Joe