Lyman #429348 180 gr. WC in .44 Mag?

[Bert2368]

I just picked up a Lyman #429348 DC mould. The old discontinued 180 gr. plain base wadcutter. I have lots of W231, Herco and green dot on hand, but only a little of Bullseye, 4227 and 2400. Any suggestions for the 3 powders I have lots of? Going to run these in a Ruger SBH with 10 1/2" barrel.

I had tried Gardner's cache commercial version of this bullet with 7 to 7.5 of Trail Boss, accuracy was good at 7.5 but they were sized .429, too small for my cylinder chokes which run .4305-.431... 100 rounds leaded a bit. Anyhow, I would rather use the (cheaper!) powders I have more of.

[Wally]

I don't have that mold, but I use the Lee 208 WC/ .44 Caliber---I use it in my .44 mag revolvers mostly in the .44 Special but it works well in the Magnum case

Loads are----.44 Mag 8.0 W-231---1,000 FPS

.44 Special 5.5 Bullseye 950 FPS

[GBertolet]

I have that mold. I use it in my 29-2 S&W with 4.5 gr Bullseye in 44 spcl cases for a plinking load. The bullets drop from the mold @.433 dia and I tumble lube with Lee Liquid Alox and load them as cast. The cylinder throats are .432 in this Smith. This load is downright pleasant to shoot. I never saw a bullet do damage to tin cans like this one does. Half a dozen hits, and they are shredded, and they are ready for the recycle bin.

[Bert2368]

Oh, fill the cans with water and ONE hit sends 'em to the recycle bin. The guys at the scrap yard look at me funny...

Thanks for the hint on liquid allox. I hope mine come out a good size to shoot "as cast".

[HeavyMetal]

Used that boolit for years and loaded any of the 44 special loads in 44 mag brass. I have a problem with using "short" brass in Magnum chambers.

231, greendot and reddot worked fine with this boolit and I was always getting "ribbed" because the area behind the targets was always covered in "confetti"

Matter of fact if the target stand had 5 or 6 targets on it before I used it you could literally see the "confetti" blow off the back side of the target with each shot!

I got in on the group buy for one of the 250 grain full wadcutters, which I am extremely happy with ( a 4 banger) and I sold the 429348 mold a few months ago to a fellow site member.

Think you'll be real happy with it.

[Bert2368]

Thanks for the info. Did you have any preferance for powders as far as cleanliness? What alloy were you running?

The commercial undersized ones I got from Gardner's were HARD. So was the lube on them. I guess they use the materials most likely to come through the mail in good shape, not the best for shooting.

[HeavyMetal]

I used straight clip on WW and dropped them in water straight from the mold.

Hate alox with a passion because it runs in the heat here in LA. Used Blue Angel and now Lar's Carnuba never got leading.

When I was loading these I used a lot of WW-452AA, still have 7 or 8 pounds of it for my 45 loads, very clean burning!

The replacement was Supertarget you might see if Winchester has load data for that in the 44 special info.

[GBertolet]

I use half lead and half WW in my mix. At low velocities this bullet shoots better when cast soft. No leading, especially when liquid alox is used. This alloy expands easily to seal the bore in low pressure loads.

[Dale53]

Bert2368;
Of the three powders you mention, W231 is perfectly suitable for this bullet.

Using magnum cases, Lyman lists a minimum of 9.0 grs of 231 for 1002 fps and a max of 12.9 giving 1315 fps.

That said, if I wanted a target load I would be in the 7.0 gr area and would suspect that would work sell.

Dale53